Did you know? A Catalan and Galician brick…

By Ferran Garcés

Last Friday, a piece of ceramic from Torre Bellesguard was turned over, and in doing so, we discovered the unexpected story of an English manufacturer, with a lion and a unicorn in the logo (Alfred Meakin). Today, we will turn over another piece with no less unique history behind it, although, at first glance, it’s just a “brick”. We are referring to the bricks that make up the skeleton of the house, especially visible in the Music Room, also known as the Brick Room.

From one end of the Peninsula to the other

1036 km is the distance between Rúa Leandro Cucurny, in Burela, Lugo province, and Carrer Cucurny, in Montmeló, Barcelona province. In both places, the street name preserves the name of the company that manufactured the bricks used at Torre Bellesguard. In fact, it’s more than just one street. Pere Rodríguez, the mayor of Montmeló, recently commented in an interview how “many people in the town still know Constitution Square as Cucurny Square”. And Cucurny, like all major factories, was much more than a business, becoming part of the collective memory of the population around it. The same mayor added: “In Montmeló, almost everyone knows someone who worked there. Some neighbors even worked there themselves when they were young.” At 1036 km away, in Burela, they could say the same. So, this is the story not just of a “brick”, or a street, but of a whole era, its people, and its legacy.

First novelty, then nostalgia

What today seems like a branch of the past, at the time was the sprout of a cutting-edge material: fireproof brick. Cucurny was the name of the company founded in 1840 by Pau Cucurny i Delahaye, a Catalan of French origin who is credited with introducing the fireproof brick in Spain, along with another manufacturer named Joan Molas. However, the Cucurny family ended up dominating the market and, consequently, became its main reference point.  

Its origin can be traced to Barcelona, and shortly thereafter, to L’Hospitalet de Llobregat. In a second phase, the expansion of the business led to the establishment of a new factory in Burela in 1908, one year before Gaudí left Torre Bellesguard, and in Montmeló in 1915, one year before Domènec Sugrañes added some decorative elements to the house. As we can see, we are talking about a parallel story.

Leandro Cucurny of the Galician street refers to one of the members of the third generation of the family. At that time, in addition to fireproof bricks, the company was famous for the quality of the stoneware it produced, as well as the production of all kinds of products. “From bricks, as a general product, to special application pieces: for mines, gas factories, steam boilers, glass and porcelain factories, and stoneware pieces for acid manufacturers.”  

During these years, the Cucurny family opened branches in Madrid, Cartagena, Málaga, Seville, and Zaragoza. It was their best period. “During the Civil War, the Montmeló factory was nationalized and produced transport boxes for armament for the Republican army,” recalls journalist Oriol Serra. “During the post-war period, it resumed its usual activity, until the proliferation of materials such as glass or plastic devalued ceramics and forced its closure.” By 1980, all the factories and branches had closed their doors.  

It wasn’t until 2020 when both Montmeló and Burela started organizing a series of activities to recover their shared past. A past that, as we have said, remains present in the names of some streets and in the collective memory of their residents. However, Cucurny’s past also endures in the walls of Torre Bellesguard, shaping its skeleton, clearly visible in the Brick Room. A past that we invite you to visit and enjoy in person!

Notes

(1) Serra, Oriol (17/03/2021), “Montmeló remembers the old Cucurny factory with an exhibition”, El9nou newspaper  

(2) In some places on the Internet, it is stated that Pau Cucurny i Delahaye was the introducer. However, according to the Catalan encyclopedia, the introducer of fireproof materials was Joan Molas, but “the Cucurny company is, without a doubt, the leading company in these products for three quarters of a century.” To be more exact, “in 1859, Cucurny y Compañía introduced, with relative success, a continuous kiln for the firing” of this material. After 1860, Pau Cucurny would leave Joan Molas behind and become the most important company among fireproof material manufacturers in Catalonia. (link)

(3) Salgado, Fernando (14/04/2015), “Gres Cucurny or Gres Burela”, La Voz de Galicia newspaper  

(4) Redacción (30/09/2020), “Burela recovers, like Montmeló, the history of the old Cucurny stoneware factory”, A Marina Xornal magazine  

(5) “En la memòria col·lectiva de la gent de Montmeló hi ha un nom que es repeteix recurrentment, gairebé es podria dir que es troba en la genètica del municipi: La Cucurny. Poques són les famílies que no tenen algun vincle, laboral o emocional, amb aquella gran factoria de ceràmica refractaria i gres”, 

Redacció (12/03/2021), “L’exposició ‘Redescobrim l’antiga fàbrica Cucurny’ es podrà veure en el Museu Municipal”, web de l’Ajuntament de Montmeló.