Santiago Calatrava’s City of Arts and Sciences is in Valencia, Spain. The sprawling cultural and architectural complex occupies the southeastern end of the former Turia River bed.
The project began as a proposed science-and-technology center in the late 1980s and was redesigned and expanded during the 1990s. Calatrava designed most of the complex, while Félix Candela designed L’Oceanogràfic, its major aquarium component.
The complex opened in stages, beginning with L’Hemisfèric in 1998. Its attractions include an IMAX cinema and planetarium, a science museum, an opera house, a landscaped walkway, bridges, and the Oceanogràfic aquarium. The final major structure, L’Àgora, opened in 2009.
A common mix-up is confusing Valencia with Barcelona, another Spanish city strongly associated with landmark architecture. Valencia is the correct city here—and it is also Calatrava’s birthplace. The site’s futuristic white forms and reflecting pools have become one of Valencia’s defining modern symbols.