In 2025, Open House Valencia held its seventh edition with a wide range of activities focused on architecture, the city and its citizens. The festival ran from October 24 to 26 and included more than 70 buildings, over 20 guided urban routes, technical visits, exhibitions, talks, workshops, satellite events and other cultural activities.

Focusing on people, as the ones who imbue architecture with meaning through their presence, Open House Valencia 2025 allowed the city to become a space for learning and reflection. The programme featured 16 buildings and 5 guided tours specifically dedicated to showcasing the Open House Europe annual theme: Future Heritage. Layered discussions on heritage and renewal gave much-needed space to people’s emotional, lived experience of architecture.

Architectural Highlights

Among the buildings selected to explore the theme, the Turia Campus stood out as a model of how existing heritage could evolve into meaningful architecture for the future. The project, developed for Universidad Europea, transformed the Old San Juan Bautista Asylum into a modern urban campus while preserving the original structure’s essence. Key architectural elements, such as the restored nolla mosaic tile floors and the discovery of a Spanish Civil War air-raid shelter, were thoughtfully maintained. The intervention followed heritage conservation guidelines and prioritised artisanal restoration techniques, ensuring that local traditions were preserved.

Another significant site was the Vinival winery, a landmark of the Patacona area in Alboraya that has long formed part of the collective memory of the city. For generations, its brick silos stood visible from the main road, accompanying the expansion of Valencia’s metropolitan area. The current redevelopment project proposes a new neighbourhood around the preserved winery, placing the historic structure at the heart of a network of public spaces. While the rehabilitation was well received for protecting an emblematic structure, the tours, unafraid of complex debate, asked visitors to consider how redevelopment projects walk the line between prioritising local needs or serving private interests.

Beyond individual buildings, the festival explored broader urban narratives through the Industrial heritage route through El Marítimo. This guided tour explored a layer of Valencia’s past often overlooked in traditional narratives. Moving along what was once a railway line—now transformed into Calle Serrería—the walk traced a landscape shaped by 20th-century industrial growth. From the former Matadero and Estación del Cabanyal to the iconic Bodegas Vinival and the old Cervezas El Águila factory, participants were invited to reflect on the coexistence of decay, memory and transformation. The route sparked questions about what to preserve and how to ensure that fragments of the working city are not lost in contemporary development.

Debating and Learning

Complementing the tours, the festival included activities that deepened the conversation around Future Heritage. The Open Talk series provided a platform for residents and professionals to discuss their lived experiences in some of the most emblematic buildings in Valencia, including Espai Verd, Finca Roja and Santa María Micaela. Titled ‘(Sobre)vivir en una vivienda patrimonial’ (Eng. Between Living and Surviving in a Heritage Home), the debate explored how living in heritage architecture affects daily life, regulations and emotional attachment to place. The direct link between personal narratives and the broader question of preserving heritage made this one of the most thoughtful discussions of the festival.

A second key discussion, ‘Espacios que hablan: del pasado industrial al presente cultural’ (Eng. Spaces That Speak: From an Industrial Past to a Cultural Present), explored the transformation of Nave Ribes into a vibrant cultural centre. Experts from architecture, heritage and cultural management discussed how adaptive reuse can preserve physical memory while generating new social value. The discussion highlighted the challenges of working with large industrial structures and how such projects can activate communities.

Finally, the festival placed special emphasis on educational activities for younger audiences. Two workshops, ‘Pequeños arquitectos’ (Eng. Little Architects) and ‘Rascacielos: retos de altura’ (Eng. Skyscrapers: The Challenges of Height), allowed children to interact with architectural ideas in a playful way. Participants built models of the rehabilitated Nave 3 and constructed tall structures, learning about spatial design while strengthening the family-friendly dimension of the festival.

By balancing technical visits with open debates and hands-on workshops, Open House Valencia 2025 successfully highlighted the potential of integrating architectural heritage into new models of urban growth, raising vital questions about preservation, identity and the role of different actors in shaping the city.