0134, 3439 SPAIN (Catalonia) - Casa Batlló - part of Works of Antoni Gaudí (UNESCO WHS)

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Part of the Manzana de la Discordia (Block of Discord, but also Apple of Discord), located at 43, Passeig de Gràcia,  in the Eixample district of Barcelona, Casa Batlló is a building restored in the years 1904-1906 by Antoni Gaudí and Josep Maria Jujol (with the contribution of Gaudí's assistants, Domènec Sugrañes i Gras, Josep Canaleta and Joan Rubió). Like all the buildings designed by the brilliant Catalan architect, it looks stunning and very modern, even for today's viewer, so it's hard to imagine how strange it may seem, with its organic, even visceral forms, for the early 20th century Barcelonians.

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The building consists of a ground floor, a main floor with a courtyard, four further self-contained floors, a loft and a roof terrace. There is private access to the noble floor (the main floor), and a communal stairwell set within the building well, which has been expanded and artistically tiled as though it were part of the exterior facade. The entire building is astonishing, but stand out in the first place the ground floor (with its tracery, irregular oval windows and flowing sculpted stone work) and the arched roof like a back of a dragon or dinosaur, plated with tiles in the form of scales.

2643 SPAIN (Catalonia) - Casa Vicens - part of Works of Antoni Gaudí (UNESCO WHS)

Casa Vicens is a modernist building in Barcelona, located in the neighborhood of Grácia on Calle de las Carolinas, 24. It was the first house designed by Antoni Gaudí, and is considered one of the first buildings of Art Nouveau. Its style is a reflection of Neo-Mudéjar architecture, including oriental and neoclassical as well. Gaudí broke away from tradition and created his new language of architecture, and Casa Vicens represents a new chapter in the history of Catalan architecture.

SPAIN - Works of Antoni Gaudí (UNESCO WHS)

Seven properties built by the architect Antoni Gaudí (1852-1926) in or near Barcelona testify to Gaudí's exceptional creative contribution to the development of architecture and building technology in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These monuments represent an eclectic, as well as a very personal, style which was given free reign in the design of gardens, sculpture and all decorative arts, as well as architecture.

0809 SPAIN (Catalonia) - Park Güell - part of Works of Antoni Gaudí (UNESCO WHS)

Built betwen 1900 and 1914, after Gaudí's plans, on the hill of El Carmel in the Gràcia district of Barcelona, Park Güell is even today one of the largest architectural works in south Europe. Inspired by the English garden city movement it was originally part of a commercially unsuccessful housing site, which included a large country house (Larrard House or Muntaner de Dalt House), next to a neighborhood of upper class houses called La Salut (The Health). Park Güell is the reflection of Gaudí’s artistic plenitude, which belongs to his naturalist phase (first decade of the 20th century).

0683 SPAIN (Catalonia) - Crypt at the Colònia Güell - part of Works of Antoni Gaudí (UNESCO WHS)

Crypt at the Colònia Güell is an unfinished work by Antoni Gaudí, built as a place of worship for the people in a manufacturing suburb in Santa Coloma de Cervelló, near Barcelona. Colònia Güell was the brainchild of Eusebi Güell i Bacigalupi, Count of Güell, the main patron and lifetime friend of Gaudí, but only the crypt was finished (between 1908 and 1916), because the textile industrialist lost the profits from his business, and the money ran out. This is one of the architect's most studied works and a precedent for many of the solutions used in Sagrada Familia.

0668 SPAIN (Catalonia) - Palau Güell - part of Works of Antoni Gaudí (UNESCO WHS)

This Palau Güell, one of the most luxurious of Barcelona, was commissioned to Antoni Gaudí by his main patron and lifetime friend, Eusebi Güell i Bacigalupi, Count of Güell, The architect started the project around 1880 and signed it in 1886, and the building, placed close to La Rambla, in an area  that in this period was the center of Barcelona, was developed between 1886 and 1888, although the decoration wouldn't finish until 1889. The palace was the Güell residence for a while, much later, in 1945, being sold by the count's daughter to the Diputació de Barcelona (Provincial government of Barcelona).

0269 SPAIN (Catalonia) - Casa Milà - part of Works of Antoni Gaudí (UNESCO WHS)

In 1905, when began the construction of Casa Milà, known later as La Pedrera (The Quarry), Gaudí not finished yet the restoring of Casa Batlló, located on the same vital artery of Barcelona, Passeig de Gràcia. Besides, it will be the final residential building erected by Catalan architect, the last 15 years of his life dedicating them exclusively to Sagrada Família. Completion of both houses was marked by tragic personal events, in 1906 dying his father, and in 1912 his niece, the closest people in his life, with whom she lived in the house in Park Güell.

0183 SPAIN (Catalonia) - Sagrada Família - part of Works of Antoni Gaudí (UNESCO WHS)

Sagrada Família, on its full name Basílica i Temple Expiatori de la Sagrada Família (Basilica and Expiatory Church of the Holy Family), is considered by the critic Paul Goldberger "the most extraordinary personal interpretation of Gothic architecture since the Middle Ages". The idea of building this church was launched by an pious organization whose sole purpose was to stop de-Christianization of the Barcelonese. The organization bought in 1877 a land in the new Eixample district and entrusted the project to the architect Francisco de Paula del Villar, who offered to draw for free plans for the magnificent temple.

0100 SPAIN (Cantabria) - El capricho de Gaudí

Of all the cities that I have ever seen them before (not too many, it's true) most impressed me Barcelona, and Antonio Gaudí was undoubtedly a key role in forming my opinion. I would venture to say that after the "intervention" of great master of Catalan Modernism, the city hasn't been the same, even if the architect from Reus came relatively late to the celebrity of today, simply because that it happens to those who exceed too much contemporaries.