Why has Spain fallen in love with architecture?

The death of General Franco in November 1975 triggered a design revolution in those regions within Spain repressed since the Caudillo seized power in 1939. In Barcelona, street signs along the Avenida Generalissimo Franco were torn down, a satisfying moment for Catalans whose language, culture and politics had been suppressed.

In 1980, Catalonia regained its autonomy. Two years later, Pasqual Maragall was elected mayor of Barcelona. Maragall championed a strenuous reconstruction of this magnificent seaport. Architecture played a key role. The city planner, Oriol Bohigas, brought intelligent redevelopment to its poorest squares, while a cluster of bright young architects shone through with the design of enticing new bars, clubs and restaurants. And then came the 1992 Olympics. Investment in ambitious new buildings, parks and civic engineering pole-vaulted. Barcelona became a magnet for architectural innovation as it had been in the heyday of Antoni Gaudi, designer of the sensational Sagrada Familia. Today there are said to be more architects at work there than in New York.

The Barcelona experience affected Bilbao. Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Museum made this neglected Basque city the centre of international attention. In turn this inspired a revival of architecture that spread across Spain and reached out to the world, employing internationally acclaimed architects. Now it is beguiled by the sorcery of Zaha Hadid, whose Spiralling Tower design for Barcelona was commissioned this week.

Spain's own talent has blossomed abundantly too, helped by attitudes to heritage and planning very different from those in Britain. In the smallest Spanish towns it is possible to see bright new buildings that would be a credit to Barcelona or Bilbao jostling happily with historic neighbours. The desire to shape a visibly worthwhile new world in a country that had once produced both the sensual delights of the Alhambra and the religious rigours of the Escorial continues apace as the ghosts of four decades of dictatorship are finally laid to rest.