Plaça Major (main square)
The Plaça Major (city council's square) of Manresa is and used to be one of the meeting points of its inhabitants and where the city council is located nowadays.
During the Middle Ages was divided into two parts, the Plaça dels Especiers (Spice Square) and the Plaça Major (main Square), by a block of houses that was demolished in the seventeenth century. This place has always been a meeting point for parties and celebrations to street carnivals, parades, processions, liturgy act's representations, markets, and so on. One of the most important events that takes place today is the Fira de l'Aixada (Hoe's Fair) in winter and the Correfoc (festival with fire) during the Festa Major (main city's festival), in summer.
Manresa City Council, which presides over the square, is a civil baroque building built between 1739 and 1777 and designed by Joan Garrido, after the old house of Veguer and Batlle (Mayor) was destroyed by a fire in 1713. It is a stately building, designed as a large house with a sober facade, where the only embellishment is a great shield of the city in the center.
In 1892 they signed the Basis for Catalan Regional Constitution, popularly known as the Bases de Manresa. This document compiled eighteen articles for the creation of a Catalan regional power project.