Narch creates a collage of decorative tiles by removing walls in a Barcelona apartment

Architecture studio Narch has renovated a Barcelona apartment, removing many of the internal walls to create a single space with a variety of patterned tile floors.

The historic apartment is located in the Eixample district of Barcelona, and features a number of decorative floors dating back to the early 20th century. Narch was asked to transform the 65-square-metre home to create a space large enough to host family events. To achieve this, the designers removed most the internal walls, creating a more straightforward open-plan layout.

But removing these partitions also had another effect – the tiled floors, which previously had been confined to separate rooms, now appear alongside one another in a single eclectic composition.

These tiles, known as encaustic tiles, are traditional in Barcelona. They are made by pouring differently pigmented ceramics into a mould, before pressing them to create a pattern that goes right through. The team sourced extra floor tiles from the same period to fill in any openings.