Grandson, son and father of architects, renowned professor and honoured urban planner, Manuel Ribas Piera was the foremost promoter of international relations at the Barcelona School of Architecture, inviting the best known architects of the time (such as Stirling, Kleihues and Aymonino), and co-founder, with Giancarlo de Carlo, of the ILAUD programme (International Laboratory of Architecture and Urban Design). He set up the pioneering landscape architecture studies in Catalunya, now an international point of reference. His overt cosmopolitanism went hand in hand with a staunch commitment to the city of Barcelona, at metropolitan and local level, as shown by plans for Bellvitge and El Carmel, and his openly voiced disagreement with some political decisions. For all of these reasons, we thank him posthumously for his great skill, his friendship, his culture, his generosity, his tenacity and his example.