Parc Güell (Barcelona)

 park, monument, garden, Antoni Gaudí (architect), interesting place, UNESCO World Heritage Site, tourist attraction

Park Güell Tourist information:
www.parkguell.net84.net/eng/

Parc Güell Photos:
www.flickr.com/photos/tags/parcg%C3%BCell/

"Park Guell was commissioned by Eusebi Güell who wanted to create a stylish park for Barcelona aristocracy."
www.barcelona-tourist-guide.com/gaudi/park-guell.html

maps.live.com/default.aspx?v=2&cp=41.414570999999995~2....


Visit Barcelona in pursuit of architectural masterpieces created by Antoni Gaudi, and one of the best is his phantasmagoric Park Guell, a whimsical whirl of colored ceramics, sculptures, sinuous benches, weird buildings, bizarre pavilions and curved paths winding through a lush garden setting, with a view across the city from its hill-top perch.

The park's structures are curved in a mélange of fairy-tale shapes covered with mosaics of broken tiles in a style called "trencadis." Most of these tiles are brightly colored creating dazzling surfaces on the benches and columns, while other tiles are earth-brown fragments covering various pavilions and structures that look like they have grown out of the ground. Craftsmen worked under Gaudi's direction to create these amazing mosaics by smashing porcelain plates and pottery into little pieces then arranging them like a jigsaw puzzle. Some sculptures are similarly covered, especially the salamander fountain on the divided staircase that leads up to the 86-column Hypostile Hall. There is usually a small crowd waiting in turn to be photographed next to the bizarre salamander.

Gaudi was the city's most famous architect, best known for his still-unfinished Sagrada Familia church which is also worth seeing but is not as pleasing as this park. He lived from 1852 to 1926 and designed Park Guell at the beginning of the 20th century as part of a large housing project that never got built. Instead we are left with this much more interesting and valuable 37-acre park that is one of the city's most popular attractions. Its main section consists of a broad terrace rimmed with benches and steps leading down to the front gate, which is flanked by two small Hansel and Gretel-inspired huts topped with ice cream sundae-shaped roofs. These small areas can get very crowded, making it difficult to properly appreciate this premium destination, so your best strategy is to arrive when the park opens at 10:00 a.m. in order to see the colorful sights without a thousand other tourists getting in your way.
www.parkguell.cat/en/
panomagic.eu/en/2815/guell/

www.youtube.com/watch?v=7J8Qa9psS38