BarcelonaCarles Vilarrubí died at the age of 71 this morning in Barcelona. A native of Barcelona, Vilarrubí has participated in the country’s most important estates and in recent years was particularly linked to gastronomy, occupying the presidency of the Catalan Academy of Gastronomy and Nutrition since 2016, where he was considered a man of consensus. Dedicated to business and banking, he was also a man close to Jordi Pujol and a key figure in the beginnings of Convergència i Unió, a fact that placed him in the task of participating in the creation of Catalunya Ràdio, being director of the Games and Betting Authority of the Generalitat de Catalunya, being a councilor of the Catalan Radio and Television Corporation, or later, being part of the founding team of Rac1.
The other institution to which Vilarrubí was closely linked is Futbol Club Barcelona. A great fan of Barça, Vilarrubí explained that he fell in love with the figure of Cruyff in the 70s. He was part of Sandro Rosell’s board that won the elections in 2010 and remained at the club during the presidency of Josep Maria Bartomeu, becoming institutional vice-president of the entity. He resigned on 1 October 2017 to show his disagreement with the decision to play the league match against Las Palmas following the police crackdown on the day of the Catalan independence referendum. Vilarrubí defended that it would have been better to lose points than to go out to play, as the players defended and ended up accepting Bartomeu himself. Fervent defender of the more Catalan side of the club, he promoted the initiative to name the Barça box office in 2015 after the club president Josep Suñol i Garriga, executed by Francoist troops during the civil war.
As a young man, he had become one of the drivers of the club’s ice hockey team, of which he would be its goalkeeper, a sport he had discovered in the 70s when he was on holiday in Puigcerdà. He also played field hockey at Atlético de Terrassa.
Saint George’s Cross
Carles Vilarrubí was married to Sol Daurella, president of Coca-Cola Europacific Partners and the richest person in Catalonia. He had three children. Two from a first marriage with Maria Rosa Jordà and a daughter with Daurella. Vilarrubí has also been president of the CVC Grupo Consejeros business holding and the Willis S&C insurance brokerage. In 2015 he was awarded the Cross of Sant Jordi for his role in key moments in the country, in which he has always tried to act as a link with a constructive spirit. At a business level, he has also been a member of the board of directors of several companies such as Telefónica, Fira de Barcelona or Antena 3, among others.
In his time at the Catalan Academy of Gastronomy and Nutrition, Vilarrubí has been key to growing the National Gastronomy Awards, as well as expanding the academy’s activity through the incorporation of new members, such as Fina Puigdevall or Jordi Vilà, who did so this summer. It has also encouraged the consumption of our local and often undervalued hunting cuisine. Vilarrubí has been a strong defender of Catalan cuisine, denouncing that it was not a criterion in search engines or that in Barcelona there were practically no restaurants with the term “Catalan cuisine” on the sign.
