Life in Tirana

Barcelona, City of Creative Architecture, Yummy Tapas and a Real Cool Vibe

For those of you who have never been to Barcelona, imagine a clean, fresh city, with city beaches, vibrant port area, manageable size and architecture to amaze the eyes. While there are Roman ruins the most interesting thing about the city is how one man, Antoni Gaudi started designing buildings in the late 1800s. More later on that but it really opened up the scene for others to also stretch the typical architectural designs.
Above is the famous cathedral, Sagrada Familia at sunrise. Gaudi started this huge church at the turn of the 20th century. He devoted 40 years of his life to the design. As you can see it is not yet finished. The end date is 2025.
Above the photo of Sagrada Familia is the Cathedral of Barcelona built from the end of the 13th century until the facade was completed in the 1900s. That is 6 centuries of building!!!

Barcelona is often referred to as Catalonia. This region of Spain has an interesting history. Back in the 1700s (see ruins of the city above) the Catalans sided with the Austrian Empire. This alliance has been a thorn in the side of the rest of Spain and other parts of Europe. The flags you see above are of Catalonia and not Spain, decorating many balconies around the city. Talk floats around of Catalonia forming "the newest country in Europe".


In the background is the National Museum of Art of Barcelona

This was an interesting architectural building. It was built to be a fabric factory that operated for only two years.

Original bullfight arena for the city

Main Post Office. Two photos below is the sky light inside this architectural building.

For those into soccer....Apparently this FC Barcelona Team is hot!


Built between 1913 and 1930 this modernist style building was the hospital for the city.


From this photo on the outside of the Palau de la Musica Catalonia, down the next 7 photos is this remarkable music hall.

Using basically mosaic pieces, rod iron and glass, this early 20th century music hall was constructed.

The architect wanted as much light as he could achieve. The was made difficult by the fact that on the left side of the auditorium was a 4 story church 2 meters away. Believing in God's grace, he put in all the windows. Eventually, the church was taken down and moved to another part of the city. There are 300 performances here a year. Below is the wall decorations on the stage to inspire the performing artists. The architect contracted two different artists to complete the wall.

Looking up to the rod iron light fixture that was originally gas lights. Below is the amazing sky light in the auditorium.

Time to break for some tapas!

Peter eating lunch at the market. Plenty of fresh fish!

Above are the fruit drinks with ice on top. These have been popular for 325 years. Ice must have been tricky back in the 1700s! In the background are candies on sticks.

Grilled peppers and fried artichokes. Below is a "grab and go" at the big market with their famous dried beef.

We were in Barcelona on March 8th. Across Europe, International Women's Day is celebrated with great attention. Through the streets, 20,000 men and women, young folks to pensioners paraded with bands to cheer on women and raise challenges still confronting females in this society.

Below are statues, structures and installations around the city

Look who is pointing to America...Christopher Columbus. Hm..maybe he should have stayed home!


The cable car running from center city to the mountain

The Olympic torch at the Olympic Village for the 1992 Games


Many palm trees and a very sunny climate. Barcelona had not had any rain for 35 days when we were there.

Balconies are on most every building along all the streets. 100 years ago the most prestigious apartments were on the first floor with the grandest of balconies. However today with the noise and pollution, people are gravitating to the upper floors.

A questionable more modern attempt at the characteristic balconies!

Daily life as we saw it ....

We stayed in a very cool hotel. H10 Cubix Hotel. This is looking down from our floor to the sitting area 6 floors down. Everything was based on cubes. The architectural creativity lives on.

Dead end sign with a protest sticker about modern football

Plenty of small cozy streets to stroll through in the old part of town.

One way to collect garbage

There were many of these "people" making a euro around town

Swanky shops like this Gucci store

In the midst of one of the busiest streets, one can turn into this monastery and experience this quiet soothing place

Cutting the dried beef for a customer

I had to save Antoni Gaudi for the end of my blog. Below is the La Pedrera. He understood architecture as a total art. He paid attention to every detail of work. Fascinated by nature and geometry he took advantage of the innovations of the early 1900s in using certain materials such as iron.

Some call this a great petrified wave. From the courtyard below to the roof top creations following, he was incredibly creative

Front door

Roof top sculptures. Gaudi thought all the other roof tops surrounding this building were flat, uninteresting scenes. He used champagne bottle pieces in the sculpture below.

Such attention to detail within the apartments

He was not without some vanity as he framed up this arch on the roof top to look out at his famous church in progress

Another example of his obsession with his church is this house in the foreground where he lived, looking out on the church in progress

From La Pedrera, we visited Park Guell. Gaudi had hopes that this 20 hector plot of land would be a subdivision of sorts, a bit out of town where well to do folks could build their houses with a bit of garden space. It never materialized but the entrance to the park, the playful garden areas leave their mark in the city

House in this park where Gaudi lived

This is on one of the walk ways. It is called the aquaduct and made of materials straight from the ground

Gaudi always had his crosses (he was a religious man) on a horizontal plane as if you were looking up or down at the cross

Casa Batllo

To the left was an existing building in Barcelona. The owner wanted a remake. To the right is what Gaudi created

Casa Batllo

This is the house next door to Casa Batllo that was not designed by Gaudi. It was done in the late 1800s by Puig i Cadafalch. Quite the name!

Finally, the world famous Sagrada Familia church

This is one small close up of the front of the church with the nativity scene

Light cascades in everywhere. The support columns are more tree like with branches arching out. Compare this to the older more traditional Cathedral of Barcelona below. When I went to take this photo above, the orange light toward the top was shimmering in my camera. It made one pause!