IAAC takes part barcelona's role as world capital of architecture 2026

BARCELONA BECOMES WORLD CAPITAL OF ARCHITECTURE 2026

With Barcelona named World Capital of Architecture for 2026, the city soon transforms into a living laboratory of design, hosting a ten-month programme of public installations, exhibitions, debates, and collaborative projects that explores how architecture shapes and responds to contemporary urban life. Anchored within this dynamic is the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (IAAC), whose academic programmes have long prepared students to operate precisely in these experimental, city-scale contexts.

For over two decades, the school has been embedded in the city’s fabric as a site for testing architecture’s future, intersecting with technology, ecology, and culture. Its campus extends beyond the classroom, into urban spaces, fabrication labs, and forest sites, offering students a chance to explore design as something both applied and speculative, built and debated.

IAAC invites future architects to join its master’s programmes in Barcelona | all images courtesy of IAAC

IAAC BRIDGES EDUCATION & RESEARCH THROUGH REAL-WORLD Projects

IAAC is structured into five key research labs that operate at the edge of architecture and allied disciplines. These labs bring together designers, engineers, scientists, technologists, and makers in collaborative projects that respond to today’s most urgent challenges, ranging from climate adaptation to advanced construction. In partnership with institutions like MIT, CITA, Sci-Arc, and the Barcelona City Council, the institute explores how architecture can evolve through shared knowledge and cross-sector innovation. Learning happens by doing — students engage with real-world conditions and hands-on experimentation, from dense urban sites to remote forest environments.

master students work across disciplines to rethink the future of the built environment

MASTER PROGRAMMES OPEN PATHWAYS TO BARCELONA’S DESIGN FUTURE

As Barcelona prepares to host a city-wide conversation around the future of architecture, IAAC students will be working from within that dialogue, contributing to civic collaborations, independent experiments, and site-specific prototypes. The school’s master programmes span a wide range of disciplines, from advanced urbanism, ecological construction, and computational design, to emergent futures, robotics, and artificial intelligence. These diverse pathways share a commitment to reshaping the built environment through technological literacy and hands-on research that address the challenges of our time and the complexity of real environments.

design education unfolds through a long process of making and testing

To support access to these programmes, IAAC offers a limited number of competitive scholarships in the form of partial tuition waivers. Awarded based on merit and financial need, these range from 30–50% and are available to applicants who apply within the admissions deadlines. The next intake begins in October 2025. Final applications, including scholarship requests, are due by August 9th.

Become part of IAAC’s master programmes and engage directly with Barcelona’s World Capital of Architecture 2026 initiatives.