La Mercè 2026: Experiencing Barcelona’s Biggest Celebration

From September 23 to September 27, Barcelona had its biggest annual celebration, and I was lucky enough to be part of it: La Mercè 2026! Starting on Wednesday, the city dressed itself in colors, culture, music, and hundreds of activities happening all around Barcelona until Sunday to celebrate its patron saint, La Mercè.

Who is La Mercè?

Through my classes, I learned that La Mercè became Barcelona’s patron saint during a time when the city was facing a big epidemic. According to the story, the city’s government asked La Mercè to protect and save Barcelona from the epidemic, promising that if she did, she would become the city’s new patron saint.

Before La Mercè, Santa Eulàlia was Barcelona’s patron saint. She was a young girl who converted many people to Christianity, and her remains are still kept in the Cathedral of Barcelona. Popular culture also says that it often rains during La Mercè because the rain represents Santa Eulàlia’s tears after being replaced as the city’s patron saint. Luckily, we did not experience any rain during this year’s celebration!

The events I attended with my friends were very different from each other, and we also took advantage of some of the museums being free during the celebration. So, if you are planning to study abroad in Barcelona next fall, definitely plan on staying for this long weekend! My top three favorites were:

Human Castells — Castellers

One of the most popular Catalan traditions during La Mercè is the castells, where groups of people build human towers in the main plaza. It was incredible to see how quickly they could build such tall towers, and it was definitely surprising to see the small children climbing all the way to the top!

This is an important part of Catalan culture because people of all ages participate in building the towers. Beyond just being impressive to watch, the castells represent the resilience, teamwork, and strong sense of community that Catalans identify with.

Correfoc — The Devils’ Run

This was definitely the scariest and most thrilling experience. During the correfoc, people dressed as devils run through the streets carrying fire and fireworks, accompanied by music.

My friends and I were so close to them that I remember literally cowering behind the crowd whenever they got close, while everyone around us was shouting and laughing. It was definitely a must-do experience!

At one point, we even got to stand in the center while the band was playing and were just vibing to the music. Then we looked behind us and saw more people coming with fire, so we had to make a run for it, haha.

Drone Show

There was also an amazing drone show one evening to celebrate La Mercè. The drones created different figures and images of important landmarks from Barcelona, and it was just really cool to watch from close to the beach.

Final Thoughts...

Overall, La Mercè was a super fun week and definitely helped me connect more with Barcelona and understand Catalan culture better. I loved that the celebration was not just about watching performances but actually experiencing traditions that are such an important part of the city.

It was also one of those moments where I felt really lucky to be studying abroad and to have the opportunity to experience something that I probably would not have known much about if I were just visiting Barcelona as a tourist.