Gaudí's City| Barcelona, Spain | International Travel Photography

Everything about La Sagrada Familia is incredible. Part of my awe is of course owed to the building itself, with its utterly unprecedented forms and endless elements of craftsmanship and symbolism on every surface and in every corner. But I am also left with this lingering thought… What is it that allowed Gaudi to become the most famous architect in all of Spain and not just a crazy man with wacky ideas? Upon Gaudi’s graduation, the director of the Barcelona Architecture School reportedly said about him, “We have given this academic title either to a fool or a genius. Time will show.” And perhaps it’s borderline blasphemous to say it now, so clearly has he fallen on the side of genius, but I have to imagine that had history taken a couple different turns, he could have just as easily been deemed a fool.

I suppose I am just left with a sense of gratitude that history got this one “right,” as awe-inspiring as it is to take even a brief step into the mind of Antoni Gaudi.

La Sagrada Familia is Spain’s most visited tourist attraction. Construction on the cathedral began in 1882, albeit very slowly, and it continues now, mostly funded through ticket sales, with a projected completion date of 2026 or later. While some aspects of the church are common to most cathedrals (the general layout, the stained glass), the shapes and the detail of the building felt entirely unfamiliar to me, except maybe to echo skeletons or what plant stalks might look like to insects.

Despite the hordes of visitors in the building, I still felt as if I were experiencing something new and exciting and unprecedented.

A small building in the back used to be a school for the workers’ children.

The building below is Gaudi’s Casa Batllo or the House of Bones. We passed by it briefly on our bike tour but didn’t go inside.

A couple blocks up from Casa Batllo is another Gaudi building, La Padrera or Casa Mila, but unfortunately the entire facade was covered for renovation, so all we could see was the doors. And on the right below, a look at the iron work on Palau Guell, which is right on La Ramblas.

Finally, the last thing we squeezed in while we were in Barcelona was a visit to Park Guell, Gaudi’s famous park outside the city center.

I love the mosaic work all over Park Guell.

Unique archways and columns and more hyperboloids.

Overlooking Barcelona with Sagrada Familia visible on the left and the fin-shaped W Hotel in the center.

Gaudi– the perfect way to cap off our visit to Barcelona. And then we were off to San Sebastian for the next adventures.

Anna Wu is a wedding and portrait photographer based in San Francisco but often jetsetting around the world. Follow her on facebook for more photography and travel adventures.

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