Public spectacle.

The seafront around Palma's historic Gothic cathedral has been sensitively restored to create a series of landscaped promenades.

The seafront of Palma is dominated by the twin Gothic masterpieces of the Almudaina Palace and the fourteenth-century cathedral. Set on lofty Renaissance walls, the cathedral contains the largest nave in Catalan Gothic architecture. Strollers along the edge of the harbour below can marvel at the sight of the cathedral walls with their daring structural system of internal and flying buttresses. During the 1970s, however, a motorway was built on the seafront, effectively cutting off views of the cathedral for those on foot.

Some years later, a competition was held to find a more appropriate reconciliation of the needs of modern transport and ancient history. This was won by a team headed by local architect Pere Nicolau Bover, with a proposal that both restores the spectacle of the cathedral and creates a series of new public parks and promenades.

The motorway, which scythes past the cathedral in a gentle curve, is treated as a kind of elevated harbour wall, forming the last barrier against the sea. On each side of the motorway are linked sequences of sunken terraces and gardens. These vary from traditional promenades, gridded with palm trees and benches, to more informal landscaped spaces. Lush Mediterranean planting screens the motorway from the pedestrian zones. Directly below the cathedral ramparts, an area has been re-excavated to create a small lake, with water sculptures and fountains. Now the cathedral and its reflection in the water can once more be seen from a distance, as originally intended.

The Parc de la Mar scheme inventively combines hard landscaping with planting, changes of level and visual incident, such as the intriguing sculpture garden (with pieces by the Spanish sculptor Josep Guinovart) on the edge of the motorway which acts as a symbolic gateway to the new development. Terraces and gardens are modern interpretations of traditional Spanish squares and promenades, characterised by a relaxed Mediterranean delight in the public realm. Yet the material and formal qualities are also underpinned by the sense that a significant piece of the city has finally been returned to its citizens.