If ever a city was defined by an architect, that city is Barcelona and the architect Antoni Gaudi. Inspired by nature and an endless imagination, he designed a house of bones, a stone quarry, a fairytale park and a Disneyland style cathedral. Discovering the work of this eccentric genius is a top priority of any visitor to the city.

Gaudí, throughout his life, studied the angles and curves of nature and incorporated them into his designs. The hyperboloids and paraboloids he borrowed from nature were easily reinforced by steel rods and allowed his designs to resemble elements from the natural environment, such as trees.

Gaudi was born in southern Catalonia in 1852. As a child he modelled copper in his father’s workshop, he examined nature and went to school to study religion and mathematics. He decided on a career in architecture and arrived at the University of Barcelona, graduating in 1878. His first commission was ornate lamps in the Plaça Reial. He only got the job because the original designer had died.

Lamps in the Plaça Reial

Liceu

Gaudi met and formed a close friendship with Eusebio Güell, a wealthy Catalan industrialist. Güell became Gaudi’s favourite client and his money allowed Gaudi to indulge his architectural fantasies. Their first project was a family town house for Güell. The Palau Güell features a main hall for entertaining high society guests, who arrived through front iron gates resembling seaweed. No expense was spared and the building borders on lunacy, especially when you venture onto the roof to observe the 14 weird chimneys, a trademark of Gaudi.

Front facade of the Palau Guell

Iron Gates

Ornate brickwork in the cellar

Colourful Chimneys

Passeig de Gracia

In 1900 the rich industrialist Josep Battló bought a run down building on the fashionable boulevard Passeig de Gracia and commissioned Gaudí to restore it. The Casa Battlló is typical Gaudí, with no straight lines. Much of the front façade is decorated with a mosaic of broken ceramic tiles that range from shades of golden orange to greenish blues. The roof is arched and was likened to the back of a dragon or dinosaur. The building became known as the House of Bones and it is claimed the bones of the front façade, represent the victims of the dragon on the roof.

Front facade of the Casa Battlló, nicknamed the House of Bones

Front window - outside and inside

Arched corridors

Weird shaped roof, resembling a dragon

Diagonal

Shortly after, Pedro Milà, a rich businessman was impressed by the Casa Battló and commissioned Gaudi to design the Casa Milà, a nearby apartment block. As in all his projects, Gaudi ignored town planners, exceeding the permitted height and continually changed the design as he went along. The resultant eccentric building was nicknamed La Pedrera (which is Catalan for stone quarry) because it has a front façade that looks like a cliff with caves. The building is pure fantasy, with a water powered lift, crazy ironwork and a roof with disorientating pathways and weird chimneys that resemble something out of a science fiction movie.

Front facade of La Pedrera

Fantasy Interior

The writer George Orwell once remarked that “the Casa Milà, was the most hideous building in the world!”

Pathways and chimneys on the roof.

The finest collaboration between Gaudi and Güell came at the Parc Guell. This large, mad project was to develop 60 houses on a hillside on the outskirts of Barcelona. Most of it was not developed, but what did get built has won the affection of generations of visitors, inspiring wonder and laughter. It was converted into a park in 1922 and highlights include the grand entrance and staircase leading to pavilions that seem to have been taken straight out of a Hansel and Gretel fairytale. Connecting stairs lead to a grand plaza, originally intended as a market place. The plaza is bordered by the largest bench in the world, the colourful ceramic Serpentine Bench, which twists snakelike around the plaza and gives magnificent views over the city.

The entrance to Parc Guell

Grand staircase, leading to pavilions

Serpentine bench!

Between 1906 and 1926, Gaudí lived in one of the two houses that were completed at the Parc Guell. This house has become the Casa Museu Gaudí, (Gaudi Museum) and displays some of Gaudí's furniture (including some from the Casa Batlló) and drawings.

Colourful mosaics

Sagrada Familia

Gaudi’s final project was the Sagrada Família. However, by then physically he was a mess. Already a nervous character, Gaudi became a total recluse and detached from normal life. He would wave his stick at passing trams that annoyed him and one day in 1926 he could not get out of the way quick enough and he was hit. Gaudi was taken to a pauper's hospital as they initially thought he was a tramp, with clothes held together by string and pockets full of nuts. Following his death, Gaudi was virtually declared a saint by the residents of Barcelona and was laid to rest in a building site – the Sagrada Família. Yet for all his bizarre work and untimely, unseemly death, Gaudi’s name lives on as one of the most original and ingenious architects of all time.

The unfinished Sagrada Família

Learn more about the Sagrada Família

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