Barcelona- 19 mar

Today was a really great day for me as I fulfilled my dream of seeing the Sagrada Familia and other works of Gaudi (1852-1926)- a great artist and architect, who inspired his works greatly from nature.

We started the walk on Passeig de Gracia- a street that hosts many shops and 2 of Gaudi's houses. The first one we saw was Casa Batlio, built between 1904 and 1907 for the industrialist Josep Batlio Casanovas. People in the days the house was built were astonished by the work and quickly nicknamed it "The House of Bones" or "The House of Yawns". The facade is covered with ceramic discs and colored glass windows.

This is one of the rooms inside. Everything is filled with details and natural elements. The woodwork is impressive, the window opening mechanisms are made to fit your hand perfectly, the little holes below the window are meant to aid the ventilation of the house, the columns are shaped like bones and the ceiling looks like a whirlpool. Everything flows and is a pleasure to feel. It's like the house was meant to be a monument of flowing shapes, detail and ergonomy.

This is one of the 2 interior courtyards. The tiles are lighter on the lower floors and darker above and the windows get smaller and smaller on the upper floors. All this done to keep the light even everywhere in the house. Here you can hear sea sounds and the atmosphere is great.

The roof of the house is decorated Gaudi style and it looks like the back of a dragon. The ceramics used here comes from Majorca. Gaudi is in his colorful age here.


We were all very inspired by this first house and by Gaudi's genius.
The next house we saw was Casa Mila or La Pedrera. Pere Mila was an important Barcelona business man, who wantd to build a house on Passeig de Gracia. So he and his wife hired the most expensive architect: Antoni Gaudi. Built between 1906 and 1912, Casa Mila was the last piece of civil engineering Gaudi did.

The strtucture of the house is done so that the facade is a mere cover- no load is placed on it. The rails of the balconies are iron sculptures, designed and cast by Gaudi himself. This house has no corners on the facade- everything is rounded.

The courtyard is used as the main axis of the bulding. Inside the house you can find a museum dedicated to explaining the life and time of Gaudi, as well as some of the techniques he used. Also, one can see rooms with objects resembling those used by the people who lived here.

The roof is filled with chimneys with anthropomorphic shapes.

Finally, we reached the objective I was most anxious to see and one of Gaudi's best works: the Sagrada Familia. The work on this temple began in 1882. On this church, Gaudi introduced solutions that he had tested and solved in other projects. Sagrada Familia would be called the "Cathedral of the poor", because it had to be financed completely out of donations. The works continue up to this day, folowing the plans the architect left behind.

The facade below: the facade of passion was built after Gaudi's death and I personally think it's far from the plans he had and from the facade he did. The sculptures were done in 1990. Gaudi envisioned this facade after he became ill with Maltese fever. He said: "I am prepared to sacrifice the very construction, to break vaulting and cut columns to give an idea of how cruel sacrifice is".

The details of the building would take days to notice entirely. It all looks like a castle made out of wet sand...

This was the facade of the Nativity that Gaudi himself did.


Dazzled by all we had seen, we just had time to see another Gothic Cathedral in the city center and to see the Dali museum.

Night-time caught us in a traditional Spanish bar, with sangria and beer, celebrating the birthday of Marius.