Located in the Sants-Montjuïc district, the Agricultural Pavilion is located within the grounds of the 1929 International Exhibition, right on the border of the França Xica district and Montjuïc Park. Formed by several bodies, this group of buildings occupies the corner between Passeig de Santa Madrona and Carrer de Lleida, articulating its volumes around a central courtyard today known as Plaça de Margarida Xirgu. Currently, only half of the original buildings are preserved.
It was one of the biggest pavilions of the exhibition, with a surface that exceeded 16,000 m2. The entire complex was distributed around a large central garden courtyard with several porticoed naves and galleries. The whole complex follows the canons of noucentista architecture, adopting, however, an Italian Renaissance language. While the walls of the façades are coated with white and yellow mortar, the supporting elements, the framing of the openings and the decorative elements were made of terra cotta.
The body facing the Passeig de Santa Madrona stands out for the porticoed gallery that surrounds the old main entrance to the site, which frames a monumental terra cotta portal with Ionic pilasters decorated with quarterings. Above the moulded arch of the door there is a terra cotta relief with two allegories of field work and the inscription "AGRICVLTVRA". However, the most important thing about this construction are the multiple octagonal towers that protrude above the roof, covered with tiled domes decorated with ceramic pinnacles, and the large dome with a central drum. The façades of this building include a veritable catalogue of Renaissance windows, based on arch galleries, entablature, pediments, shells and chandelier decoration. At the corner between Carrer de Lleida and Passeig de Santa stands out a plaque supported by two angels made in bronze by Frederic Marès in memory of the architect Manuel Maria Mayol stands out. The façade facing Plaça de Margarida Xirgu presents a large entrance box with lowered arches supported on robust columns with Ionic capitals. This box maintains a very clear formal correspondence with the courtyard of Casal Solleric in Mallorca city, this being a likely source of inspiration. On this façade there is a bas-relief of a classical theme representing an athlete, the work of Frederic Marès. The interiors of this body were greatly transformed due to abandonment and new uses, although the main hall remains - a space with a Greek cross plan crowned by a large dome decorated with paintings referring to life in the countryside, work by Darius Vilàs.
The body facing Carrer de Lleida, today occupied by the Teatre Municipal Mercat de les Flors, presents an access body crowned with domes attached to a large nave with a rectangular plan. The access body, which forms a corner, presents two access boxes formed by three terracotta arches on Tuscan stone columns and two window galleries with Tuscan columns and a terracotta eaves. In the corner, a large shield of Barcelona in terra cotta supported by four angels of the same material was embedded. The angles of this body are finished with towers crowned with domes and ceramic pinnacles. In the middle rises a dome of greater dimensions. The interior of this body houses a large circular hall with large Corinthian columns on the first level and galleries of Ionic columns on the second, bearing the weight of a dome decorated with paintings by the Mallorcan artist Miquel Barceló. On one of the walls that link to the new building of the Institut del Teatre, there is a ceramic mural by Frederic Amat.
The Agricultural Pavilion was built between 1927 and 1929 under the technical direction of the architects Josep Maria Ribas i Casas and Manuel Maria Mayol i Ferrer. They conceived it as a monumental complex of buildings in several bodies around a central square in order to host the agricultural section of the International Exhibition of 1929. During the post-war period the pavilions that surrounded the central square on its northern and eastern sides they were completely demolished and replaced by new homes, leaving less than half of the buildings that made up the complex standing. These went on to house municipal warehouses and workshops and, between 1964 and 1984, the Mercat Central de la Flor, until it was moved to the Mercabarna area of the Zona Franca.
In 1983, the city council's culture councillor, Maria Aurèlia Capmany, promoted the creation, in the nave perpendicular to Carrer de Lleida, of Mercat de les Flors, a municipal centre for dance and movement arts. The building, reopened in 1985, was remodeled to accommodate its new uses and its main dome (12 metres in diameter) was redecorated by Majorcan artist Miquel Barceló.
From 1999, the sector facing the Passeig de Santa Madrona was also rehabilitated to host the headquarters of Teatre Lliure, an institution founded in Gràcia in 1976 and which would grow with the inauguration of the new headquarters in November 2001. On the occasion of that inauguration, the old central courtyard was redeveloped with a new square which was dedicated to Margarida Xirgu. Parallel to these refurbishments, on the northern flank of the square, which had also been demolished, the new headquarters of the Institut del Teatre, an underground car park and Plaça Ovidi Montllor were built there. All in all, the complex is currently known as the City of Theatre, as it houses the Mercat de les Flors Municipal Theatre, the Teatre Lliure Foundation, and the Theatre Institute.