The Holm Oak of Carrer de l'Encarnacio

Barcelona's oldest tree nearly lost to a housing development. This holm oak already stood on the rural Pla del Bonpa, tied to a farmhouse called Can Vidalet, when Gracia was still open countryside rather than a neighbourhood. It shows up on the city's own maps from 1845, and dendrochronologists, who read a tree's age in its rings, later put its age at around 250 years. By the 2010s the oak stood in the courtyard of the Casetes de l'Encarnacio, a cluster of small 19th century houses slated for demolition to build new flats. Neighbours spent three years fighting the plan under the banner Salvem l'Alzina, Save the Oak, and in 2019 the city catalogued the tree as a Tree of Local Interest specifically to stop the diggers. It worked, partly: the houses could not be fully restored, only their facades survived, but the garden around the oak opened to the public in April 2021. The tree is now 22 metres tall with a canopy the same width, wider than any other oak measured in the city.