The single best department store is El Corte Ingles (tel 93 306 38 00; Placa de Catalunya), with smaller offshoots spread about the surrounding area. It has another important branch northwest of town on Placa de la Reina Maria Cristina and a third on Avinguda Diagonal.
FNAC (Avinguda Diagonal 549), the French-owned store specialising in CDs, tapes, videos and books, is worth exploring for these items. The shop is part of a huge shopping mall - l'Illa del Diagonal - considered one of the city's more interesting architectural developments since the Olympic Games.
A more central shopping centre, El Triangle (Placa de Catalunya) houses a branch of FNAC and a collection of other stores, including Habitat.
If you like shopping emporia, the Centre Comercial de les Glories, by the massive roundabout and metro stop of the same name, could be for you. It counts 250,000 square metres of space in the grounds of the former Hispano Olivetti factory, and is also home to a range of bars and eateries to take your mind off shopping for a while.
Hypermarket lovers in Barcelona were given the ultimate treat in 2001 with the opening of Heron City, an enormous complex of shops, cinemas, bars, restaurants and other diversions. It's located well out of the centre of town at Passeig de Andreu Nin, just off Avinguda de la Meridiana about 4km north of Placa de les Glories Catalanes (metro Fabra i Puig). Yes, mall mentality has arrived.
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