On a quiet slope between San Bernardo and Conde Duque, the building at Noviciado 7 has stood for more than two centuries, silently watching Madrid change around it. Built in the 18th century, its nearly meter-thick stone walls have contained many lives: Jesuit novices in prayer, market vendors selling fish, whispered meetings during the Franco regime, and even plans for a sauna that never opened.
Today, it houses N7A, a private members’ club that blends cannabis culture, coworking, art, and technology. This is not just the story of a building; it is the story of how history, community, and a vision for the future have intertwined within its walls.
A Building With Many Lives
Long before the city buzzed with modern cafes and scooters, this structure stood as part of a quiet, village-like neighborhood. Built in the 18th century, its thick stone walls, nearly a meter deep, held the warmth of wood-burning hearths and the chatter of families. For a time, it even housed a small community of nuns. Local memory whispers that it once belonged to the Count of Puñonrrostro, and during the final years of the Franco regime, hidden passageways in its belly offered discreet refuge to those in danger.
While the grand Jesuit Novitiate of San Ignacio, just a few doors down, turned into the Central University of Madrid in the 19th century, Noviciado 7 remained residential, a quiet witness to centuries of change. The block saw horse-drawn carriages give way to taxis, and elegant handwritten letters replaced by smartphones.
The Founder
Today, Noviciado 7 is home to N7A, a private members’ club where people gather not just to share cannabis, but to trade ideas, build projects, and create together. Its walls carry centuries of reinvention, from sacred vows to social rebellion, and they have never stopped adapting.
It takes a particular kind of person to see possibility in a place like this. Ricardo, the founder of N7A, is that kind of person. Equal parts caretaker, contrarian, and visionary, he is as comfortable talking about 18th-century Jesuit politics as he is about Starlink bandwidth. When he stepped through Noviciado 7’s doorway for the first time, he says, he did not just see a derelict building. He saw a living structure with centuries of memory and the potential to become something entirely new.
Photos courtesy of EHQ.
Layers of History
Ricardo can trace its past in detail. The Jesuit order once owned the entire stretch from San Bernardo to Amaniel, and this corner was part of their noviciado, the religious house where novices—newly admitted members of the order—lived, studied, and prepared for a life of service while taking vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Political disputes with the crown ended with the expulsion of the Jesuits, their property seized and redistributed. Much of it became government buildings, but according to Ricardo, this piece evolved into a neighborhood market.
Vendors sold their goods at the front, while they lived in the back rooms, the air thick with the smell of fish and fresh produce. Ownership later passed, he says, to a fisherman who ran the nearby market, and then to a pair of hairdresser brothers who served Spanish royalty.
One of those brothers, Ricardo says, converted to Judaism and quietly opened the upstairs rooms for Jewish prayer gatherings during the Franco years. There is still a small Star of David carved into the stone at one corner. He cannot prove it with documents, but the story aligns with the building’s personality, a place that has always made space for those living on the margins of what is considered acceptable.
The building’s last intended use, according to Ricardo, had been as a sauna; in Madrid, it was often a discreet social venue for the LGBT community. However, when the owners were denied the license, they stripped the place bare in frustration. Walls, floors, wiring, plumbing, and lighting were all torn out. Ricardo spent nearly eighty percent of his initial budget just cleaning and repairing the basics. Granite salvaged from the old fish market was set into new counters and walls, and the courtyard became a green pocket with olive trees and room for conversation.
What made the task even more complex was that Noviciado 7 is officially classified under Integral Protection, the highest general level of heritage status in Madrid and just one step below the rare Singular category. This means that every change, from the facade to structural elements, had to respect the building’s original form, adding another layer of responsibility to the project.
Earlier in 2018, before Ricardo took over, the owners of Noviciado 7 and its adjoining property submitted a special zoning request, known as a Plan Especial, to allow the conversion of the buildings into tourist apartments. Municipal records show that the City Council denied the request on January 18 of that year, maintaining the area’s residential designation and the existing restrictions on tourist accommodation in much of the Centro district.
Photos courtesy of EHQ.
From Local Rumors to a Living Whiteboard
When Ricardo opened N7A on October 1, 2019, the local community was not entirely sure what to make of him or the space. “People thought I was running some kind of sect,” he says, smiling. “No tobacco, vegetarian food only, and I would not play reggaeton… in Madrid, that is suspicious.”
Yet, the reality was nothing like the rumors. From the outset, the club drew a diverse mix of travelers, developers, and artists. Within weeks, its windows were covered in marker sketches, lines of code, design diagrams, and notes for new projects, a kind of living whiteboard for ideas.
When lockdowns hit, Ricardo refused to let the space go silent. He says he hosted fundraisers that packed the club well beyond the legal limits of the time, sending proceeds to groups like Doctors Without Borders and an organization rescuing African women from female genital mutilation. “It felt like the right thing to do,” he says.
Photos courtesy of EHQ.
A Cultural Engine in the Heart of Madrid
The N7A of today is far more than a place to consume cannabis, it is one of Madrid’s most eclectic cultural meeting points. In the back of the building, a beautiful room lined with ancient wooden furniture serves as a high-end coworking space where smoking is not allowed, and where I have spent the past six months working alongside a rotating cast of creatives, coders, and entrepreneurs.
The weekly Stoned Chess Club has been running for three years and is now led by Lateefah Messam-Sparks, a former top under-21 player for England who has been teaching chess for over fifteen years in clubs, schools, and private classes. Every year, they organize a grandmaster simultaneous exhibition in the space, and every week she gathers a group of members for games that unfold under the soft light of antique lamps. She describes the club as an incredible space in the heart of the city and truly a haven. She loves that whenever you walk in, you can always see members playing chess.
Yoga is offered three or four times a week by different instructors, often paired with guided meditations that transform the club into a quiet sanctuary. Beyond wellness, the space hums with activity, including startup launches, regular DJ sets on weekends, intimate live performances, and music video shoots that turn its courtyard and rooms into vibrant backdrops. Later this year, the club will also host its first cannabis cup, bringing together growers, enthusiasts, and the wider community in a celebration that blends tradition with the future of cannabis culture.
Tech Meets Tradition
Tech has been part of the club’s character since its earliest days. Monthly Solana gatherings are now a fixture, attracting blockchain builders, libertarian thinkers, and the crypto-curious. Ricardo talks about it like a philosophy as much as a technology. “Freedom, privacy, decentralization,” he says. “I want the club to be partially off-grid, not just in power but in information and access.” In the basement, Ricardo has installed a dedicated server room with a Starlink satellite connection and a ten-gigabit external line, infrastructure more common to a data center than a centuries-old building.
For Ricardo, running N7A has never been about ownership. “We are custodians,” he says. “Every year we shut down for a month to reinvest in the space. It is not just about taking, it is about giving back.” Some parts of the club carry a weight that is hard to ignore, like the basement once used, according to Ricardo, to hide people during wars and political persecution. That history shapes how the club operates today. Under Spain’s association framework, members can gather in private spaces and consume cannabis on-site, and N7A is careful to respect those boundaries while keeping the experience genuine.
Photos courtesy of EHQ.
Noviciado 7 has been a Jesuit novitiate, a bustling market, a hair salon for royalty, a near-sauna for Madrid’s LGBT community, and now a cannabis club with the heart of a tech lab and the soul of a cultural center. The details change, but the essence remains. In a city that builds up and forgets quickly, some walls still remember, and sometimes, they even get high.
When I arrived in Madrid at the beginning of the year, I did not know many people and spent the first two months working from a beautiful hotel coworking space. It was quiet, elegant, and professional, but I didn’t make a single genuine connection. That changed when I started working from N7A. In this room lined with old wooden furniture, I found an international mix of designers, musicians, entrepreneurs, investors, students, and wanderers from all over the world. Conversations happened naturally, over a joint in the courtyard.
One afternoon I sat with a Syrian, a Yemeni, and a Lebanese, talking freely, something rare for an Israeli in most settings. The atmosphere is low-key but alive, powered by an amazing energy from the team that runs the place. They make everyone feel welcome, whether it is your first day or your fiftieth, and that warmth is as much a part of N7A as the building’s centuries-old walls.
This article is from an external, unpaid contributor. It does not represent High Times’ reporting and has not been edited for content or accuracy.
