Antoni Gaudi's Organic Architecture

A view of Barcelona from the rooftop of the colourful and bizarre architecture of Antoni Gaudi's Casa Batllo. This wonderful building hardly has a straight line and is adorned with brightly coloured tiles. The architecture definately has an "organic" feel to it and inspired by biological life.

Barcelona Balconies

These beautiful balconies were seen in the La Rambla district of central Barcelona, Spain. The ornate ironwork, wall murals and painted shutters all add up to architectural  perfection.

The Barri Gòtic ("Gothic Quarter" in Catalan) is the centre of the old city of Barcelona. Many of the buildings date from medieval times, some from as far back as the Roman settlement of Barcelona. Catalan modernisme architecture (often known as Art Nouveau in the rest of Europe), developed between 1885 and 1950 and left an important legacy in Barcelona. A great number of these buildings are World Heritage Sites. Especially remarkable is the work of architect Antoni Gaudí, which can be seen throughout the city. His best known work is the immense but still unfinished church of the Sagrada Família, which has been under construction since 1882, and is still financed by private donations. As of 2007, completion is planned for 2026.

Alien Spaceship Interior

This is the inside of the Antoni Gaudi designed Sagrada Familia church in Barcelona. To me it looked like the inside of some strange alien spaceship with its organic design. Some more of Antoni Gaudi's work can be seen in this earlier post

Dragon Roof

This is another example of Antoni Gaudi's architectural genius on the rooftop of Casa Batllo in Barcelona, Spain. The arched roof design and complex chimneys are very typical examples of his designs being colourful and full of irregular lines. The arched roof has been likened to the back of a dragon or dinosaur. The local name for the building is Casa dels ossos (House of Bones), and indeed it does have a visceral, skeletal organic quality. It was originally designed for amiddle-class family and situated in a prosperous district of Barcelona.

Casa Batllo

This is the blue tiled stairwell in the famous Casa Batllo designed by Antoni Gaudi in Barcelona, Spain. You will note that there is hardly a straight line in this building with windows, doors, railings all having curves. An earlier post on this blog entitled House of Bones describes this building in more detail.

House of Bones

Casa Batlló is a building restored by Antoni Gaudí and Josep Maria Jujol, built in the year 1877 and remodelled in the years 1904–1906; located at 43, Passeig de Gràcia (passeig is Catalan for promenade or avenue), part of the Illa de la Discòrdia in the Eixample district of Barcelona, Spain.

The local name for the building is Casa dels ossos (House of Bones), and indeed it does have a visceral, skeletal organic quality. It was originally designed for a middle-class family and situated in a prosperous district of Barcelona.

The building looks very remarkable — like everything Gaudí designed, only identifiable as Modernisme or Art Nouveau in the broadest sense. The ground floor, in particular, is rather astonishing with tracery, irregular oval windows and flowing sculpted stone work.

It seems that the goal of the designer was to avoid straight lines completely. Much of the façade is decorated with a mosaic made of broken ceramic tiles (trencadís) that starts in shades of golden orange moving into greenish blues. The roof isarched and was likened to the back of a dragon or dinosaur. A common theory about the building is that the rounded feature to the left of centre, terminating at the top in a turret and cross, represents the sword of Saint George (patron saint of Catalonia), which has been plunged into the back of the dragon.