The MaserGrup business group is financing the reconstruction of the tower, which is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2026.
Casa Navàs in Reus has already begun reconstruction work on the tower destroyed in 1938 by a bomb during the Spanish Civil War. This week, the scaffolding needed for the work to erect the new tower on the house is being installed, with the aim of finally completing it in early 2026, according to the construction company’s forecasts. Thanks to the MaserGrup business group, which will finance the entire reconstruction, Casa Navàs will regain its original appearance as designed by Lluís Domènech i Montaner in the early 20th century.
As announced in mid-2024, following the restoration of the frontispiece, the owners of the Casa Navàs want to materialize the definitive reconstruction of the façade and raise again the unique tower that presided over the corner of the building before the war. For weeks now, the craftsmen involved in the reconstruction have been working in their workshops on the various construction and ornamental elements that, from now on, the construction company Constècnia will begin to install on Casa Navàs, following the technical project designed by architects Joan Tous and Pau Jansà, who were also responsible for the restoration of the frontispiece in 2020.
At the moment, during this last week of August, scaffolding is being installed which will initially allow work to begin on placing the stainless-steel structure on which the stones that will form the tower will be fixed. This structure did not exist in the original tower, but its installation is mandatory under current safety regulations.
The steel structure will be attached to the building, a task that will require dismantling part of the current roof. Subsequently, the stone blocks, hand-carved by master stonemason Florenci Andreazini from Selva del Camp, will be placed using stone from Vinaixa, the same stone used by Domènech i Montaner.
A year ago, it was announced that the tower would be assembled in advance in one of Constècnia’s workshops to check that all the pieces fit together correctly before being transported in blocks to Casa Navàs. In the end, as this is a complex task and the assembly requires millimetric precision, it was decided to assemble it only partially in the workshop and finish building it on the building itself to ensure optimal placement.
Once this phase is complete, the stained-glass windows, made by master glassmaker Joan Serra Renom of the company L’Art del Vitrall in Sabadell, will be installed. The reconstruction will be completed with the installation of ironwork elements, which will ultimately be the work of Marc Herrero Baró, a craftsman from the Santa Maria de Palautordera forge. Among these elements, the replica of Jaume I’s ship, which will preside over the tower, stands out.
Virtually no original parts of the tower are preserved, therefore, for the reconstruction new stones and stained glass will be used, in the image and likeness of the originals. What will be used will be a large part of the ironwork that crowned the tower and served to support a weathervane that indicated the cardinal points. It ended in a boat that symbolized a ship of Jaume I to the conquest of the Mediterranean Sea. Although the boat is preserved, given its poor condition and that it would require a very deep restoration and reconstruction work, it has been decided to keep the piece as a museum element and reproduce a new one.
The technical complexity involved in carrying out such an ambitious project has caused a delay in the work, which will finally be completed in the first quarter of 2026, according to the forecasts of the construction company Constècnia.
Description of the old tower of Casa Navàs
The tower has a height of eight meters, to which must be added four meters and a half of the iron gazebo, and its diameter is one and a half meters. The tower was located on the corner between the façades of the street of Jesus and the Plaza del Mercadal and was formed by two octagonal bodies. The lower body was located at the height of the second floor of the house and was attached; while the upper body had eight exposed faces, as it protruded above the cornice line, and reached up to 17.50 meters above the level of the square.
Between the two bodies, as well as at the start of the tower and at its crown, there was a stone band decorated with plant sculptural motifs, delimited by cornices of various types and styles. In the central strip between the two bodies, on the perpendicular face at the corner, there was a gargoyle in the shape of a dragon. All the exposed faces of the tower were covered with translucent rectangular glass and finished at the top with stained glass windows with floral plant motifs.
At the top there was a sculpted stone band, like an octagonal railing. In the upper part there was a gazebo of wrought iron elements, with vegetal motifs. From the center of the gazebo, a vertical bar was erected at the top, from which a weathervane, also made of iron, indicated the cardinal points and was crowned by a ship symbolizing that of Jaume I.
