Route: Palau de la Virreina, La Rambla, Carrer de la Boqueria, Volta de Santa Eulàlia, Carrer de Ferran and Plaça de Sant Jaume.

Under the morning light of Santa Eulàlia’s Day, the “gegantona” lesser giant Laia will leave the Palau de la Virreina to head towards Plaça de Sant Jaume. Dancing in the city streets, she will make a stop in Volta de Santa Eulàlia, where the saint suffered her martyrdoms, to dedicate a dance to the sound of her own song. Once in the square, Laia will stand in front of the City Hall balcony, where the mayor will greet her and pay homage to the banner of Santa Eulàlia.

The saint’s day will start with the mayor and the municipal corporation of Barcelona hanging of the Santa Eulàlia banner on the City Hall balcony. The hymn Els Segadors will be sung and the “gegantona” lesser giant Laia will offer her traditional dance to the corporation. The Santa Eulàlia banner will hang throughout the day.

Concert venue: streets of the Gothic quarter

The carillon of the Palau de la Generalitat will be filling the streets of the Gothic quarter with music, with a festive concert to mark the Santa Eulàlia Festivities.

Courtesy of Anna Maria Reverter, we’ll be able to hear the Goigs de Santa Eulàlia, by Joan Salvat. Following this will be the Ball de Santa Eulàlia, which over the course of the festive period will be heard various times in Plaça de Sant Jaume and on La Baixada. And the concert will end with Engrunes, by R. Lamote de Grignon, a work made up of twelve short pieces. 

The concert programme may be amended for reasons of force majeure.

As the poet Joan Maragall said: “The sardana is the most beautiful of all the dances that are done and undone”. What better way to say farewell to the festa major than dancing to the music of the Cobla Sant Jordi – Ciutat de Barcelona sardana orchestra, which, as is traditional, will delight us with their melodies in the afternoon of Santa Eulàlia’s Day.

The dancing ends when the giantesses enter the square, but you can carry on listening to the cobla during the last dances of the festivities. 

Route: Palau de la Virreina, La Rambla, Carrer del Cardenal Casañas, Plaça del Pi and Plaça de Sant Josep Oriol.

7 pm: placing the giantesses

7.30 pm: Walk of the Laias

Route: Plaça de Sant Josep Oriol, Carrer del Pi, Plaça de la Cucurulla, Carrer dels Boters, Plaça Nova, Carrer del Bisbe, Carrer de Sant Sever, Baixada de Santa Eulàlia (wreath-laying ceremony and Santa Eulàlia Dance, at around 7.50 pm), Carrer de Banys Nous, Carrer de Ferran and Plaça de Sant Jaume (Santa Eulàlia Dance at 8.25 pm)

On Santa Eulàlia’s Day, all the giantesses of Barcelona adopt the name Laia for the most moving and significant acts of the festivities. When the city’s skies are cloaked in darkness, the giantesses that have been on exhibition during the days before the festa dance out of the doors of the Palau de la Virreina to meet up in Plaça de Sant Josep Oriol. After waiting a while under the magical light of the square, they will start a procession head by the “gegantona” lesser giantess Laia and the Laias of Plaça Nova and Plaça del Pi, followed by the other Laias, with the City Giantess bringing up the tail of the retinue. 

When the parade reaches Baixada de Santa Eulàlia, the walk will stop in front of the image of the patron saint to lay a wreath in her honour. The “grallas” players will play the Santa Eulàlia Dance, and Laia and Laieta, the Giantesses Villa and Nova of Place Nova will do their dance surrounded by the balconies and chapel of the narrow street.

In Plaça de Sant Jaume, once all the giants have paraded under the Santa Eulàlia banner hanging from the City Hall balcony, the Place Nova Giantesses will once again perform their dance. However, this time, it will be accompanied by the long version, played by the Cobla Sant Jordi-Ciutat de Barcelona sardana orchestra in the middle of the square, reaching its final climax and excitement of the end of the festivities, in which all the giantesses join in the last part of the dance, the moment when we can see all the Laias dancing in honour of the patron saint.