The opening of the Via Laietana, a street running through the old quarter of Barcelona, led to the demolition of old buildings and their replacement by new buildings such as this one for the headquarters of the Caixa de Pensions. Many of the buildings along the new road housed financial institutions and, little by little, the area specialised in the type of office building that was then a novelty. In 1911, Sagnier himself had already built the offices of the Banco Hispano Colonial at the other end of the street, one of the financiers of the urban development operation known as the ‘Reform’. The Casal de l’Estalvi (with the adjoining building called Casal de la Previsió, built five years later) closes the perspective of the new street and benefits from its picturesque Gothic appearance and the solidity of the Garraf stone. Over the years, the branches of la Caixa in various towns in Catalonia, also designed by Sagnier, took up some of the elements of this first building, such as the rough-hewn stone walls, thus unifying the corporate image of the institution in a very modern way. Another outstanding aspect of the building was its construction with a concrete structure, a material hitherto practically reserved for industrial buildings. However, the material was not evident either on the outside or in the interior, which was lavishly decorated. Of the five buildings and two shops by Sagnier that won prizes in the Barcelona City Council architectural competitions, only the Casal de l’Estalvi (together with Ignasi Coll's house on Avinguda del Tibidabo) has survived to the present day. The plaque that was affixed to the façade in such cases is still visible; the prize was also an extraordinary prize. It was the third time that Sagnier had received the award and this earned him the gold medal instituted by the City Council. Over the years, Sagnier maintained a close relationship with the savings bank founded by Francesc Moragas and Lluís Ferrer-Vidal, for which he still carried out other buildings, especially for the welfare services of its social work.