Opened on 19 January 2019, the Barcelona LGBTI Centre offers information services, facilitation, entertainment, guidance and initial support for LGBTIQA+ people and those around them, in coordination with various organisations and administrations in the city.  

The year 2022 brought the signature of a new agreement for the civil management of the centre, between Barcelona City Council and the Platform for LGBTI organisations in Catalonia. The agreement, which was made public last June, revalidates the City Council’s trust in the management of the centre by LGBTI organisations and allocates an overall budget of 2.3 million euros for the period up to 2025.  

The signing of the new agreement provides a boost for the centre, with the enlargement of the reception space, where a second social worker was taken on. This meant a qualitative improvement in the support provided by the service, offering a more sustained follow-up over time and a more comprehensive response to the needs and demands of users.  

In 2022, the Reception Service attended to 450 people, 117 of whom made more than one visit to the service. Foreigner status and asylum procedures, requests relating to basic needs and benefits and psychological advice account for nearly 50% of the requests handled by the service. 

Out of all those attended to be the service, 422 were referred to specialist services operating at the centre and offering legal and psychological advice for trans people. 

Over the course of these four years, the Reception Area has attended to 1,637 people, 82% of whom also received support from the specialist services at the facility. As part of the same service, coordination between social workers and specialists at the centre has been more agile and this has meant better support for cases. The last four years have also seen improvements to the coordination with other organisations and municipal services, such as the Care Service for Emigrants, Immigrants and Refugees (SAIER), the Care, Recovery and Shelter Care Service (SARA), LGBTI organisations and support services for people at risk of social exclusion. 

In the case of support in cases of discrimination through LGBTI-phobia, the LGBTI Centre works in conjunction with the Observatory against Homophobia and the Office for Non-Discrimination (OND) operated by Barcelona City Council. 

Around 90,000 people have taken part in the activities at the centre

Over the last four years, nearly 90,000 people have taken part in activities at the LGBTI Centre. These include activities organised by the entities operating at the centre (Casal Lambda, Observatori Contra l’Homofòbia, Gais Positius, Famílies LGTBI, Associació de Mares i Pares de Gais i Lesbianes), as well as those by other organisations and municipal services and the centre’s own in-house programme.  

These include workshops, training, meetings, round tables, awards ceremonies, tributes, film screenings, exhibitions, concerts, presentations of reports, recitals, theatre rehearsals, discussions about books and guided tours of the centre. The LGBTI Centre has become a point of reference for LGBTI organisations and others seeking to build in this perspective, offering its premises to host a diverse array of activities. 

At the same time, the LGBTI Centre has worked on a varied range of cultural activities aimed at all citizens and serving as a tool for awareness and visibility for the collective. The programme at the centre has covered topics as varied as bodily diversity, spirituality, interculturality and historical memory, always combining with the visibility and demands of LGBTIQA+ people. The overall figures for participation include the numbers for the festival at the centre, the big day when the facility celebrates and stands up for LGBTIQA+ rights.

In 2022 the festival at the centre sought to highlight the date of 17 May, the International Day against LGBTI-phobia, and brought together over 10,000 people between the workshops and activities for families in the morning and the concerts in the afternoon and evening in Ronda de Sant Antoni.

Over 11,000 requests for information handled between 2019 and 2022 

Between 2019 and 2022, the team for Information and Facilitation at the LGBTI Centre handled 11,811 requests for information, either by phone, email or face to face at the information desk.  

With the return to face-to-face activity in 2022 the figure rose to 5,600 enquiries, the highest since the LGBTI Centre opened. 

Most enquiries received over the last year were linked to registration for activities organised by the centre, followed by requests for the use of rooms to hold activities, appointments with the reception service, visits to the centre, temporary exhibitions and queries on where to get STD tests. 

Around 500 enquiries a year at the Armand de Fluvià Document Centre belonging to the Casal Lambda 

The LGBTI Centre is home to the Armand de Fluvià Document Centre, a complete archive, library and document collection relating to LGBTI topics, owned by the Casal Lambda. This space is regarded as one of the most extensive LGBTI document centres in the Spanish state, handling around 500 consultations a year.