Barcelona: Antoni Gaudi

I will be posting about my recent trip to Barcelona but hoped to highlight on some areas in more detail. Barcelona is a city full of vast architectural beauty and the most famous Barcelonan architect is Antoni Gaudi.

We toured Casa Batllo, the house that Gaudi designed for the Batllo family and is displayed on the prestigious Paseo de Gracia that becomes Las Ramblas. The home has a spirit of its own. The building hardly has a straight line in it and has more ergonomic and environmental considerations than buildings in our day and age. It is whimsical with it’s colorful glass windows in circles and waves, the scale like walls and ceilings that undulate and create wave and swirls around the viewer.

Gaudi’s home is like nothing else you will ever see, it is a famous landmark in Barcelona, however it is the tops of his buildings that are so neat. Gaudi crafts the chimneys into mosaic works of art and tops the house with a cross and colorful waves to cover the water collection area.

We also saw La Pedrera where a museum is dedicated to Gaudi and the roof is crowned with soldiers and other mosaic works. This apartment building is home to private residences

despite the busy draw of tourists it experiences.

Art works splashed throughout the Parc de la Ciutadella and around the city were also great views, however the unfinished work of Gaudi may be his most impressive.

The Sagrada Familia, designed by and worked on until his death in 1926 (Hopefully to be finished by 2026) The inside of the church is like a stone forest and I don’t speak figuratively. It features two opposing frescoes, one in a very lush celebratory style full of renaissance ornate ness depicting the nativity, the other a raw and angular depiction of the Passion of Christ is still under construction and has to be framed by the bones he planned to have build atop the roof. The church is enormous, but still has many towers and meters to rise. The architecture is unlike any church or cathedral you will ever see-- a work for all ages. I plan to return in the years to come to see it continue.

More to Come on Beautiful Barcelona!