🌀 Where nature and imagination climb the hillside

High above Gràcia, Park Güell unfurls like a mosaic dream between city and sky. Commissioned in 1900 by industrialist-patron Eusebi Güell and designed by architect Antoni Gaudí, the project envisioned a garden-suburb on the Carmel slope. What emerged between 1900 and 1914 was a Modernista landscape where architecture grows out of stone and tile like coral. The entrance pavilions – gingerbread gatehouses of trencadís and fantasy – lead to the sinuous staircase crowned by the famous salamander, and to the Hypostyle Hall, whose forest of 86 columns was planned to support a marketplace.

Only two of the 60 or so planned homes were built. Gaudí himself moved into one of them in 1906. After the housing scheme collapsed in 1914, the estate gradually transitioned into public hands and was officially opened as a municipal park in 1926. Above the Hall, the serpentine bench – designed with broken-tile trencadís by Gaudí’s collaborator Josep Maria Jujol – wraps the plaza in a rainbow spine while offering sweeping views over Barcelona and the Mediterranean. In 1984 the park was inscribed as part of the UNESCO World Heritage listing “Works of Antoni Gaudí”.

💡 Interesting Facts 💡

Initially intended for luxury homes, the project failed to attract buyers due to its remote location and complicated lease conditions; only two houses were completed.
Gaudí lived on-site from 1906 until his death in 1926 in one of the houses that were not even of his own design.
Rainwater from the plaza is collected via the undulating bench and funneled through the Hypostyle Hall’s columns into underground reservoirs – a clever integration of form and function.

Look closer: Column capitals drip with vegetal motifs; gutters hide rain-catching systems; even the railings echo sea-weed curls.

✈️ Travel Tips ✈️

1️⃣ Address: Carrer d’Olot s/n (Gràcia / El Carmel). Best light ≈ sunset for city panoramas.
2️⃣ Metro: L3 Lesseps or Vallcarca (15-minute uphill walk); Bus 24 stops near the main gate.
3️⃣ Gaudí route: Combine with Sagrada Família and Casa Batlló for a Modernisme trilogy.
4️⃣ Detail hunt: The dragon fountain, the Hypostyle Hall ceiling medallions, and the stone viaducts camouflaged into nature.
5️⃣ Tickets: Since 2013 the “Monumental Zone” requires timed entry – book ahead.

Park Güell