Library Fundación Bartolomé March

In the 1930s, a local man of finances, Joan March y Ordinas, purchased several properties in the place where the Convent of Santo Domingo, disbanded in the 19th century, once had its orchards. March intended to use the land to build his residence there, and commissioned the project to architect Luis Gutiérrez Soto.

The regionalist style building was built between 1940 and 1945, the years immediately after the Spanish Civil War. Its triangular floor plan is divided into different spaces. The most conventional, a five-storey quadrangular block, is just past the Balearic Islands Parliament Building. The second block has a chamfer with a segmental arch and a dated coat of arms (1945). The third building is more artistic, comprising three floors, with a large terrace with an arched gallery, the main floor with a three-arched gallery and a top floor with a porch and overhang. Noteworthy are a neo-Baroque wall mural and a Renaissance window in the façade facing Calle Palau Reial, taken from Can Savellà and crowned by a medallion of a bust of Emperor Charles V.

The building houses the headquarters of the Fundación Bartolomé March, created in 1975 by Bartolomé March Servera (1917-1998), who was an important collector and book-lover. This foundation features different spaces and services, such as the museum and the library.

The museum at the Foundation houses works from different periods and forms of visual arts, mainly modern and contemporary sculpture, a Neapolitan crèche from the 18th century, a noteworthy collection of medieval and modern maps and a collection of manuscripts, rare books and artistic bookbindings. On a wall of the indoor staircase is a majestic mural painted by Josep M.  Sert in 1944.

The Foundation's library, of untold value, specialises in matters relating to  the Balearic Islands. It opened to the public in 1970. Its holdings of books and documents range from the 14th century to the present day, with more than two thousand manuscripts and sixty thousand volumes of books, periodicals, opuscules and other printed works.