The unique style of Antoni Gaudi Automatic translate

Antoni Gaudí (1852–1926) was a Catalan architect and designer, generally considered the most prominent figure in Catalan Modernism. His buildings were primarily concentrated in Barcelona, with the Sagrada Familia being his crowning achievement. Between 1984 and 2005, seven sites associated with Gaudí were awarded UNESCO World Heritage status.

Brief information

Gaudí was born on June 25, 1852, and died on June 10, 1926, after injuries sustained when he was hit by a tram in Barcelona. He studied architecture in Barcelona and graduated in 1878. Almost all of his practice was in Barcelona and surrounding cities, and a significant part of his life was spent on the Sagrada Familia, which remained unfinished at the time of his death.

Descriptions of his style often include freedom of form, active use of color and texture, and a striving for integrity — when structure, volume, and finish all converge. For many commissions, he utilized crafts as a full-fledged design layer: ceramics, stained glass, forged metal, and carpentry. Of particular note is the trencadís technique — a mosaic made from ceramic fragments, where the key is not the perfect module, but the controlled "unevenness" of the arrangement.

Biographical and urban context

Gaudí is associated with the Modernisme movement in Catalonia in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In this environment, architecture was closely intertwined with applied arts and decorative work, and new materials and technologies were perceived as an opportunity to expand expressiveness. At the same time, Gaudí himself began under the influence of neo-Gothic and "Oriental" motifs, later moving toward a more personal language, which he derived from observations of natural forms and geometry.

Childhood and the formation of views

Antonio Gaudí was born on June 25, 1852, in Reus, Tarragona. In Russian, he was known as Antonio Gaudí, born on June 25, 1852, in Reus, Tarragona, to a family of blacksmiths. His father, Francesc Gaudí, was a boilermaker, and metalworking was constantly going on in the house; according to some biographical accounts, it was this craft that shaped Antonio’s sensitivity to volume and spatial thinking.

As a child, he suffered from rheumatism, which caused him to miss school and spend much time alone, observing nature. Biographers often attribute this characteristic to his keen attention to plant and animal forms, which later became a constant source of artistic inspiration.

From 1863, Gaudí attended the Escoles Pías de Reus, where, in addition to religious and humanistic education, he met his first friends — Jusep Ribera Sanz and Eduard Toda i Güell. Together, they founded the satirical magazine El Arlequín, for which Gaudí contributed drawings — a detail that, in retrospect, explains his early interest in visual language.

He moved to Barcelona for higher education, and in 1878, he graduated from the School of Architecture as one of the institution’s first graduates. According to some sources, the school’s director, Elies Rogent, when presenting him with his diploma, said something ambiguous: "They were either a genius or a madman." Alongside his studies, Gaudí worked as a draftsman and assisted in artisan workshops, which gave him a practical understanding of materials long before his first independent commission.

Early years of practice

At the 1878 Paris World’s Fair, Gaudí presented a design for a display case for the glovemaker Compagni. It was there that his work was seen by Eusebi Güell, an industrialist and philanthropist who became the architect’s main client for many years. This meeting formally changed the scope of his career: from small urban projects, Gaudí moved on to large residences, parks, and an entire industrial town.

In his early years, he also collaborated with the architect Joan Martorell-Montells, a fact reflected in encyclopedic sources: it was Martorell who recommended Gaudí for the Sagrada Familia project in 1883. This confluence of circumstances — participation in the Paris exhibition, meeting Güell, and Martorell’s recommendation — came together over the course of several years, propelling Gaudí’s practice from the periphery to the center of Barcelona’s commissions.

Works outside Catalonia

Most of Gaudí’s buildings are concentrated in Barcelona and the surrounding area, but three sites are located outside Catalonia, and all three belong to the early or middle period of his practice.

El Capricho in Comillas

Villa Quijano, known as El Capricho, was built in the Cantabrian town of Comillas between 1883 and 1885, commissioned by Máximo Díaz de Quijano. Gaudí did not personally visit the construction site; his assistant, Cristóbal Cascante, oversaw the project. The building features horizontal bands of brick alternating with green tiles and a cylindrical tower with a decorative cap resting on columns. The ceramic ornamentation includes stylized images of sunflowers — a plant whose seeds are arranged in a mathematically precise spiral, echoing the natural patterns Gaudí studied throughout his life. El Capricho represents his early decorative style, where "oriental" motifs and artisanal ornamentation had not yet given way to the structural geometry of his later period.

Bishop’s Palace in Astorga

The palace in Astorga, León, was built from 1889 to 1915 and was one of Gaudí’s few works in the neo-Gothic style he employed during that period. The commission came from Bishop Juan Bautista Graus, a Catalan by birth, which explains Gaudí’s choice for the Castilian site.

Gaudí conceived the building as both a castle on the outside and a church on the inside: four corner towers, Gothic arches, and a central space with a church-like feel. Construction was interrupted after the death of Bishop Graus in 1893, and Gaudí abandoned the commission after clashing over his approach with the new management. The palace was completed by another architect, and the final structure’s conformity to Gaudí’s vision remains a subject of debate among researchers.

Casa de los Botines in Leon

Casa de los Botines was built in León between 1891 and 1894; it is one of Gaudí’s three buildings outside of Catalonia, along with El Capricho and the palace in Astorga. This residential building with corner towers features the same neo-Gothic features as the one in Astorga: lancet windows, crenellated elements, and a granite façade. The building today serves as a museum, with one space dedicated to Casa de los Botines itself and its history.

Casa Calvet: The Quietest Building

Casa Calvet, completed in 1900, is often singled out as Gaudí’s most restrained and traditional building, with its familiar Barcelona façade concealing only a "restrained expressionist spirit" in the balconies and bay window. The building received the municipal award for the best building in Barcelona that year — remarkably, it was the architect’s most "unrecognizable" work that was the first to receive official recognition.

However, the construction was not without controversy: city authorities initially denied permission because the building exceeded the permitted height, but the house was ultimately built according to the original plans. The interior was designed with the same meticulous attention to detail as in his other works: Gaudí designed the furniture and door handles, which have become collector’s items in their own right.

Torre Bellesguard

The Torre Bellesguard, officially Casa Figueras, was built from 1900 to 1909 at the foot of the Collserola mountain range in Barcelona. Gaudí received the commission from a merchant’s widow, María Sages, who purchased the site where the medieval castle of King Martin I of Aragon stood. The architect preserved fragments of the medieval walls and incorporated them into the new building, achieving the fusion of two layers of history within a single volume. From the outside, the building reads as a neo-Gothic structure, with a tower crowned by a cross, crenellated parapets, and vertical lines rarely seen in Gaudí’s other works. Inside, the space is bright and contrasts with the dark slate façade; the stairwell, with its colored tiles and curved arches, evokes Mudéjar architecture, influenced by three religions — Islam, Judaism, and Christianity.

The attic, with its eight supporting pillars and network of brick arches, is striking in its lightweight construction — according to legend, one of Gaudí’s employees remarked, "There’s something here that’s hard to understand why it stands." This anecdote conveys not mysticism, but a very specific engineering principle: Gaudí knew how to create the appearance of lightness through precise calculations of load distribution.

The religious dimension of practice

Gaudí’s connection to Catholicism was not a ritualistic matter, but rather part of his professional worldview. According to contemporaries, cited on the official Casa Batlló website, he saw himself as an architectural intermediary between God and humanity, an interpreter and continuer of creation. After the 1910s, according to some sources, he began to decline secular commissions; according to one account, he consulted the Virgin of Montserrat before accepting any non-religious proposal.

The religious symbolism in his works is not limited to the Sagrada Familia: in the crypt of the Colonia Güell, the mosaic above the entrance depicts the four cardinal virtues; Christian symbols appear in Park Güell; and the façade of Casa Batlló is often interpreted as a reference to Saint George and the Dragon, although Gaudí himself left no direct explanation. During his life, he regularly prayed and confessed; the path to the church of Sant Felip Neri remained a daily commute until his last day.

In April 2025, Pope Francis approved his elevation to the status of "Venerable" — one of the steps toward beatification; the case had been opened in the Archdiocese of Barcelona in 2003.

Companions and workshop

Gaudí rarely worked alone. Among his collaborators, sources most often cite Josep Maria Jujol, who helped create the trencadís surfaces and mosaic elements in Park Güell and Casa Batlló, and later independently developed similar sculptural ideas. Another regular assistant was Francesc Berenguer, the son of Gaudí’s primary school teacher; he oversaw many of the projects on site and designed the workhouses in the Colonia Güell.

Gaudí’s studio format was atypical for the era. He didn’t maintain a large office with drawing boards, but preferred to work with models, walk around the site, and make decisions as construction progressed, often changing the original design right on the spot. This flexibility ensured a high level of trust from the client and the architect’s constant presence during construction — which explains why, after 1915, he effectively lived at the Sagrada Familia.

After the 1936 fire, most of the documentation was destroyed, and knowledge of Gaudí’s methods was largely reconstructed from photographs, fragments, and the recollections of those who worked with him. Part of this reconstruction was carried out by Joan Matamala, his personal assistant, who removed Gaudí’s death mask and left detailed notes on their collaboration.

The facades of the Sagrada Familia as two artistic worlds

The Sagrada Familia has three completed or partially completed façades: the Nativity, the Passion, and the Glory. The Nativity façade is the only one designed and begun during Gaudí’s lifetime: it was completed between 1894 and 1930 and features a dense layer of sculpture depicting scenes from the life of Christ from birth to adolescence.

The Passion façade was built based on Gaudí’s designs, but the sculptural program was created by Josep Subirac in the 1980s and 1990s. Subirac deliberately chose an angular, almost Cubist style, at odds with the organic nature of the Nativity, which sparked controversy: some considered it a betrayal of the artist’s spirit, others an honest, modern response. Both approaches are documented in encyclopedic sources without judgmental judgments about "correctness."

The third façade — that of Glory — has been under construction since 2002; it is intended to be the main entrance from Calle Mallorca and the largest of the three in terms of sculpture volume. Here, too, debates are ongoing about the degree to which it adheres to Gaudí’s historical designs — a topic that the architectural community and the Sagrada Família bureau are addressing publicly and without definitive answers.

Structural innovations in the Sagrada Familia space

In the final decades of construction, the cathedral’s internal structure relied on a system of branched supports, which the design team describes as a realization of Gaudí’s ideas. The key principle: inclined columns branch at the top like tree trunks, forming nodes that bear loads from multiple directions simultaneously, eliminating the need for external flying buttresses. A model of cords and weights, made for the crypt of the Colonia Güell and now housed in the Sagrada Familia Museum, demonstrates the principle: inverted cords, when stretched, produce a shape that, in a normal position, works in compression without unnecessary bending moments. According to this logic, the columns need not be vertical — it is sufficient for the resultant force to coincide with the axis of the element.

For non-professional observers, this means that the very “movement” and “liveliness” of the interior that journalists write about have a direct constructive explanation, and not just an artistic one.

School on the grounds of the Sagrada Familia

On the grounds of the church stands a small structure — the Escola de la Sagrada Família, built by Gaudí in 1909 for the children of workers. It is remarkable not for its size, but for its structural design: the undulating roof and walls are formed by a single hyperbolic paraboloid, providing rigidity without unnecessary thickness. The building is often cited as an example of Gaudí’s use of complex surfaces even in "insignificant" buildings — not just representative ones. The structure has been preserved as a historical element of the complex.

Death

On June 7, 1926, at 6:05 PM, according to police reports, Gaudí was walking along his usual route to confession at the Church of Sant Felip Neri. At the intersection of Gran Vía de les Corts Catalanes and Calle Bailén, he stepped back when he saw a number 30 tram and was struck by another tram coming from the opposite direction.

No passersby recognized him: by then, he was poorly dressed and had no identification. Taxi drivers refused to take him to the hospital, mistaking him for a vagrant; the people who found him eventually took the architect to Santa Creix Hospital, a hospital for the poor. Friends only found him three days later.

Gaudí died on June 10, 1926, from his injuries at the age of 73. He was buried in the crypt of the Sagrada Familia — his chosen burial place — and around five thousand people came to pay their last respects. His death mask was taken by Joan Matamala, and a copy is kept in the house-museum in Park Güell.

The question of the authenticity of the continuation of construction

With Gaudí’s death and the fire of 1936, the construction of the Sagrada Familia faced a fundamental question: what exactly to build and on what foundation. Architects working on the project after the destruction of the documentation reconstructed the original design from surviving fragments, photographs, plaster models, and testimonies.

A number of professional societies and individual critics have publicly spoken out against continuing construction, citing the impossibility of faithfully reproducing the architect’s vision after such a loss of documents. Another position — advocated by the Sagrada Família Foundation — is that construction relies on reconstruction, supplemented by modern digital modeling tools, and that halting the project midway would cause greater damage.

UNESCO has recognized as authentic those parts built under Gaudí — the crypt and the Nativity façade — and these are included in the serial World Heritage nomination. The debate about authenticity remains open.

Periodization of creative practice

Researchers usually distinguish several phases in Gaudí’s work, although there are no strict boundaries between them:

• Early period (c. 1878–1887) : influence of “oriental” motifs, neo-Moorish details, fascination with decorative surfaces – Casa Vicens, El Capricho.
• Neo-Gothic period (around 1888–1898) : intensification of Gothic references, systematic interest in historical architecture – Palau Güell, Colegio de las Teresianas, palace in Astorga.
• Naturalistic and organic period (c. 1898–1914) : transition to curvilinear forms, active work with geometry and crafts – Park Güell, Casa Batlló, Casa Milà, Bellesguard.
• Late period (c. 1914–1926) : almost complete concentration on the Sagrada Familia, development of structural systems of branching columns, synthesis of all previous experience.

This periodization is convenient as a working map, but Gaudí himself did not formulate it in the form of programmatic statements, and the transitions between phases can only be traced when comparing objects.

Place in architectural historiography

Gaudí has been interpreted differently throughout history. During his lifetime, he was associated with Catalan modernism and the Art Nouveau movement, although his work already transcended both movements. From the 1930s to the 1950s, professional interest in him temporarily waned, as rationalist architecture dominated, perceiving Gaudí’s sculpture as excessive.

Its rehabilitation began in the 1950s, along with a general rethinking of historical modernism. In the late 20th century, it began to be compared to the precursor of digital parametric design, as its geometric surfaces and principles of spatial load-balancing clearly echo practices that have received new tools in the digital age. Such parallels are based on real geometric coincidences, not speculative analogies.

He is compared to Horta and Guimard as masters of Art Nouveau, but encyclopedic sources clearly establish the difference: Gaudí’s architecture possesses a religious and national content that his contemporaries lacked, or almost lacked. The comparison with Salvador Dalí, sometimes found in popular texts about Barcelona, remains a journalistic gesture and is not supported by any cross-influences or contacts between the two authors in documentary sources.

Six objects and one tower

For readers seeking a systematic study of Gaudí’s works, the UNESCO list is a useful starting point: seven components cover almost the entire range of his style. Add to these the Torre Bellesguard and El Capricho as objects demonstrating the "extremes" of his range: one an example of the most restrained historical synthesis, the other of early decorative freedom.

A separate route for understanding his construction method includes the crypt of the Colonia Güell (catenar vaults, suspended model) and the interior of the Sagrada Familia (branching columns, linear surfaces). Together, these two sites demonstrate how the same engineering principle evolved from an experimental prototype to its implementation in a world-class building.

Hexagonal tile

One of the objects, not on the UNESCO list but firmly entrenched in Barcelona’s urban code, is the hexagonal paving slab designed by Gaudí for Casa Milà. The pattern features marine motifs — octopuses and starfish — and has been used on sidewalks throughout the city since the late 1990s. The slab has been labeled an "urban icon," which in itself speaks to Gaudí’s range as a designer: from 172-meter-tall towers to a simple element beneath one’s feet. Early in his practice, he undertook small urban projects in Barcelona, but Casa Vicens is usually considered his first major residential work, after which he received more serious commissions. A major turning point in his professional biography is associated with his patron, Eusebi Güell: they became acquainted after a display of his work at the 1878 Paris Exhibition, and Güell subsequently commissioned him for a number of projects, from a palace to a park.

From 1883 onward, Gaudí became involved with the construction of the Sagrada Familia, gradually shifting his efforts there; after 1915, he devoted almost his entire attention to the temple. Construction itself began in 1882 under the direction of Francisco de Paula del Villar, and Gaudí assumed leadership in 1883 and dramatically altered the design, applying his own approach to the volumes and load-bearing structure.

Principles of form and method

From historical styles to personal language

His early works show traces of neo-Gothicism and approaches inspired by the Islamic art of the Iberian Peninsula; over time, he shifted toward a sculptural approach, where the form reads almost like sculpture rather than as a set of "correct" façade rules. Encyclopedic reviews emphasize that after the early 20th century, his projects fit poorly into conventional stylistic labels, although connections to Art Nouveau and Catalan Modernism persist in their dates, settings, and techniques.

This trajectory is useful for a sober reading of Gaudí: he didn’t suddenly invent curved lines, but gradually accumulated tools — from historical quotations to constructive logic. Several sources emphasize that Gaudí avoided exhaustive drawings and often preferred three-dimensional models, where one could test the effects of space and loads.

Geometry as a working tool

One of the most consistent themes in Gaudí’s descriptions is the transition from flat geometry to spatial geometry and then to surfaces conveniently defined by straight lines (ruled surfaces). Such forms typically include the hyperbolic paraboloid, hyperboloid, helicoid, and cone; they provide both expressiveness and structural clarity because they can be constructed using repeatable techniques on the site.

A separate point is the catenary and the catenary arch: encyclopedic retellings say that Gaudí used catenaries as a rational way to distribute the load, not as a decorative "gesture." Another technological layer is the Catalan vault, made of brick laid face down in layers with mortar; this is attributed to the search for inexpensive and flexible materials that can achieve complex curvatures without expensive stone systems.

For a general audience, a simple formula is useful: Gaudí favored geometric solutions where the structure and exterior are aligned. If a line is suitable for supporting the load, it often becomes the line of the interior and façade, without any attempt to "hide" the load-bearing structure.

Layout as a calculation

The Colonia Güell crypt project is associated with a famous example of model calculation: Gaudí created a suspended model with cords and weights to achieve natural curves, then recorded them by photographing the inverted model. Sources describe a scale of 1:10 and a model height of approximately 4 meters, emphasizing the seriousness of the method: this is not a toy, but a construction laboratory.

This technique is also important for reading the Sagrada Familia. It demonstrates that Gaudí’s complex sculpture relied on testing the behavior of form, rather than on "drawing beauty."

Materials and crafts

Gaudí combined the design of the building with the design of its details: metal railings, joinery, ceramics, stained glass, and lighting. This density of craftsmanship changes the perception of the architecture: one sees not only the walls but also the rhythm of the handles, the pattern of the grilles, the work of light through the glass, and all of this is connected by a common logic.

The trencadís technique is described as working with ceramic fragments, often waste, which are assembled into mosaics with a vibrant pattern. It’s important to clarify from the sources: for Gaudí, this wasn’t "decoration for decoration’s sake," but rather a part of the material — a way to achieve color and texture where smooth tiles would produce a flat effect.

Biographical information also notes his interest in the engineering innovations of the era, including iron and reinforced concrete, but he never rejected traditional materials if they offered a better solution. In practice, this is evident in the combination of stone, brick, wrought iron, and ceramics, where each layer fulfills its own function — load-bearing, enclosing, or expressive.

Sagrada Familia as a laboratory

Construction of the Sagrada Familia began on March 19, 1882, and by 1883, Gaudí had become the chief architect, radically redesigning the structure and integrating Gothic style with the curvilinear forms of Art Nouveau. At the time of Gaudí’s death in 1926, less than a quarter of the building was complete, and further work depended on donations and, later, visitor revenue.

The Spanish Civil War proved a disaster for documentation: in July 1936, part of the workshop and materials were destroyed, complicating the project’s continuation and making the question of "authenticity" a constant topic of debate. Meanwhile, the sections created by Gaudí are preserved as key historical fragments, and UNESCO specifically recognizes the crypt and the Nativity façade as part of a World Heritage site as part of a serial nomination.

The internal system of supports and vaults is often described as "trees," but the engineering is more important: sources speak of branching columns, catenary curves, and ruled surfaces that bear the load without the traditional external flying buttresses. This technical solution coincides with the spatial effect: the viewer sees not a "forest of metaphors," but a clear logic, where the support branches where the force must be distributed.

Towers and heights

Encyclopedic sources indicate that Gaudí’s design calls for 18 towers, each associated with the apostles, the evangelists, Mary, and Christ. Construction progress reports indicate that 13 towers (the apostles on two façades, the four evangelists, and Mary’s tower) will be completed by 2023.

Official updates to the church’s article also record important height milestones: on October 30, 2025, the church became the tallest church building after reaching 162.91 meters, surpassing the Ulm Minster’s 161.53 meters. On February 20, 2026, the central tower reached its final height of 172.5 meters. These figures refer to the current state of construction and may be updated as decorative elements are completed, but the figures themselves are stated as facts in the encyclopedic source.

UNESCO status

UNESCO describes the "Works by Antoni Gaudí" as a series of seven sites in and around Barcelona. These include Park Güell, Palau Güell, Casa Milà, Casa Vicens, the Nativity façade and crypt of the Sagrada Familia, Casa Batlló, and the crypt of the Colonia Güell.

Such a list helps to separate the "most famous among tourists" from what is recognized as a set of representative works, where both construction and decorative arts and urban scale are visible.

Famous buildings and their features

Below are the sites most often cited as central to Gaudí’s method; some are on the UNESCO list, providing additional verifiability.

Casa Vicens

A biographical overview states that Casa Vicens was his first major commission, after which he received larger proposals. It is often associated with his early phase, which featured "Oriental" motifs and an interest in decorative surfaces, but also a desire to merge architecture and applied arts into a single work.

For the layman, it’s easy to observe a simple thing here: Gaudí’s façade quickly ceases to be a "plane with windows." It becomes a field where material and ornament work together, not separately.

Palau Güell

Palau Güell in Barcelona is one of seven sites in the UNESCO Serial Nomination. The connection with Eusebi Güell is described as long-standing and productive: it was he who commissioned Gaudí to undertake a number of projects after seeing his designs at the 1878 Paris Exhibition.

From a scholarly perspective, Palau Güell is interesting as an example of an urban residence where a rich decorative program is combined with the needs of a real house. Encyclopedic sources emphasize that Gaudí designed not only the shell but also the interior elements and craftsmanship, which is critical in terms of quality for this type of building.

Park Güell

Park Güell is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site "Works of Antoni Gaudí." Biographical information lists it among the architect’s major projects of the early 20th century, when he shifted toward a more personal style.

The park is important because it showcases Gaudí beyond the "single building" format. Here, routes, terraces, staircases, support systems, and finishes take center stage, where ceramics and stone function as real environmental materials rather than as isolated decoration.

Casa Batlló

Casa Batlló is one of Gaudí’s most famous works in Barcelona and is included in the UNESCO World Heritage Sites list. His Wikipedia biography dates it to the period 1904–1910, as part of his active phase, when he created both Casa Batlló and Casa Milà.

From a professional perspective, the project is often discussed as an example of renovation: an existing city house received a new shell, a new interior lighting system, and new plastics, while remaining within the dense urban fabric. An encyclopedic source emphasizes his habit of conducting the project using three-dimensional models and refining details as they are developed, which helps explain the coherence of the result.

Casa Milà (La Pedrera)

Casa Milà is also one of the seven UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Gaudí’s works are often described as being interested in catenary curves, as well as systems that allow for the creation of large spaces and complex forms while maintaining structural logic.

For readers without an engineering background, it’s helpful to view Casa Milà as an example of "a residential building that behaves like an engineering structure." It’s not about style, but about how the load-bearing structure and volume adapt to light, ventilation, and layout, and how the external undulations don’t have to be whimsical if they reflect a real layout.

Crypt of Colonia Güell

The Colonia Güell crypt is one of the seven UNESCO components. It is this project that is associated with the suspension model described in sources, where cords and weights create compression curves, and then an inverted photograph helps to document the solution for the columns and arches.

This episode is often used as a simple bridge between "beauty" and "calculation." The model demonstrates Gaudí’s ability to derive form from physical experimentation, without complex mathematics on paper, but with a clear engineering intuition.

Sagrada Familia

Gaudí’s parts of the Sagrada Familia — the crypt and the Nativity façade — are included in the World Heritage site as part of a serial nomination. According to encyclopedic data, the construction history extends from 1882 to the present. Funding came from private donations, and later, visitor revenue contributed a significant portion.

From an engineering perspective, sources describe a system of inclined and branching columns and the use of linear surfaces, which allows for a different interpretation of the church’s "Gothic" character: its appearance evokes tradition, but its underlying logic departs from classical Gothic. In 2010, the church was consecrated by Pope Benedict XVI and granted the status of a minor basilica, confirming its ecclesiastical function even before its completion.

Gaudi’s style as a sum of observable features

Below are listed signs that can be tested on various objects without relying on romantic explanations. This is useful if you need a calm, almost "technical" portrait of the author.

• The connection between construction and sculpture: the forms of the supports and vaults are read as load-bearing, and not as superimposed decoration, which in the sources is associated with catenaries, ruled surfaces and the development of spatial geometry.
• Priority of the layout and volume over the "ideal set of drawings": the encyclopedic source directly speaks of his dislike of detailed plans and preference for three-dimensional models.
• A strong share of crafts: ceramics, stained glass, forging, carpentry are described as the architect’s tools, and trencadís as a separate technique for working with materials.
• Working with historical layers without literal copying: sources mention neo-Gothic and "oriental" techniques as a starting point, but the resulting language goes beyond the boundaries of conventional modernism.
• Long-term projects where decisions mature on site: the most striking example is the Sagrada Familia, to which he devoted a significant part of his life, and which continued to be built after his death, surviving the destruction of documentation in 1936.

International recognition and scientific interest

Gaudí’s global reputation is confirmed not only by the popularity of his Barcelona sites but also by formal institutions: seven of his works have been designated UNESCO World Heritage Sites. The encyclopedic source also notes that the canonization process for Gaudí was opened in the Archdiocese of Barcelona in 2003, and in April 2025, Pope Francis approved his canonization as "Venerable."

For architectural researchers, another layer — the technological one — is important. Gaudí’s descriptions constantly return to themes of geometry and constructive rationality, making him a convenient figure for interdisciplinary discussions between architects, engineers, restorers, and art historians.

If you need a guide to the "most verified" sites, the UNESCO list provides a ready-made selection of seven components, which bring together different types of works: residential buildings, a palace, a park, crypts, and parts of a temple.

Childhood and the formation of views

Antonio Gaudí was born on June 25, 1852, in Reus, Tarragona. In Russian, he was known as Antonio Gaudí, born on June 25, 1852, in Reus, Tarragona, to a family of blacksmiths. His father, Francesc Gaudí, was a boilermaker, and metalworking was constantly going on in the house; according to some biographical accounts, it was this craft that shaped Antonio’s sensitivity to volume and spatial thinking.

As a child, he suffered from rheumatism, which caused him to miss school and spend much time alone, observing nature. Biographers often attribute this characteristic to his keen attention to plant and animal forms, which later became a constant source of artistic inspiration.

From 1863, Gaudí attended the Escoles Pías de Reus, where, in addition to religious and humanistic education, he met his first friends — Jusep Ribera Sanz and Eduard Toda i Güell. Together, they founded the satirical magazine El Arlequín, for which Gaudí contributed drawings — a detail that, in retrospect, explains his early interest in visual language.

He moved to Barcelona for higher education, and in 1878, he graduated from the School of Architecture as one of the institution’s first graduates. According to some sources, the school’s director, Elies Rogent, when presenting him with his diploma, said something ambiguous: "They were either a genius or a madman." Alongside his studies, Gaudí worked as a draftsman and assisted in artisan workshops, which gave him a practical understanding of materials long before his first independent commission.

Early years of practice

At the 1878 Paris World’s Fair, Gaudí presented a design for a display case for the glovemaker Compagni. It was there that his work was seen by Eusebi Güell, an industrialist and philanthropist who became the architect’s main client for many years. This meeting formally changed the scope of his career: from small urban projects, Gaudí moved on to large residences, parks, and an entire industrial town.

In his early years, he also collaborated with the architect Joan Martorell-Montells, a fact reflected in encyclopedic sources: it was Martorell who recommended Gaudí for the Sagrada Familia project in 1883. This confluence of circumstances — participation in the Paris exhibition, meeting Güell, and Martorell’s recommendation — came together over the course of several years, propelling Gaudí’s practice from the periphery to the center of Barcelona’s commissions.

Works outside Catalonia

Most of Gaudí’s buildings are concentrated in Barcelona and the surrounding area, but three sites are located outside Catalonia, and all three belong to the early or middle period of his practice.

El Capricho in Comillas

Villa Quijano, known as El Capricho, was built in the Cantabrian town of Comillas between 1883 and 1885, commissioned by Máximo Díaz de Quijano. Gaudí did not personally visit the construction site; his assistant, Cristóbal Cascante, oversaw the project. The building features horizontal bands of brick alternating with green tiles and a cylindrical tower with a decorative cap resting on columns. The ceramic ornamentation includes stylized images of sunflowers — a plant whose seeds are arranged in a mathematically precise spiral, echoing the natural patterns Gaudí studied throughout his life. El Capricho represents his early decorative style, where "oriental" motifs and artisanal ornamentation had not yet given way to the structural geometry of his later period.

Bishop’s Palace in Astorga

The palace in Astorga, León, was built from 1889 to 1915 and was one of Gaudí’s few works in the neo-Gothic style he employed during that period. The commission came from Bishop Juan Bautista Graus, a Catalan by birth, which explains Gaudí’s choice for the Castilian site.

Gaudí conceived the building as both a castle on the outside and a church on the inside: four corner towers, Gothic arches, and a central space with a church-like feel. Construction was interrupted after the death of Bishop Graus in 1893, and Gaudí abandoned the commission after clashing over his approach with the new management. The palace was completed by another architect, and the final structure’s conformity to Gaudí’s vision remains a subject of debate among researchers.

Casa de los Botines in Leon

Casa de los Botines was built in León between 1891 and 1894; it is one of Gaudí’s three buildings outside of Catalonia, along with El Capricho and the palace in Astorga. This residential building with corner towers features the same neo-Gothic features as the one in Astorga: lancet windows, crenellated elements, and a granite façade. The building today serves as a museum, with one space dedicated to Casa de los Botines itself and its history.

Casa Calvet: The Quietest Building

Casa Calvet, completed in 1900, is often singled out as Gaudí’s most restrained and traditional building, with its familiar Barcelona façade concealing only a "restrained expressionist spirit" in the balconies and bay window. The building received the municipal award for the best building in Barcelona that year — remarkably, it was the architect’s most "unrecognizable" work that was the first to receive official recognition.

However, the construction was not without controversy: city authorities initially denied permission because the building exceeded the permitted height, but the house was ultimately built according to the original plans. The interior was designed with the same meticulous attention to detail as in his other works: Gaudí designed the furniture and door handles, which have become collector’s items in their own right.

Torre Bellesguard

The Torre Bellesguard, officially Casa Figueras, was built from 1900 to 1909 at the foot of the Collserola mountain range in Barcelona. Gaudí received the commission from a merchant’s widow, María Sages, who purchased the site where the medieval castle of King Martin I of Aragon stood. The architect preserved fragments of the medieval walls and incorporated them into the new building, achieving the fusion of two layers of history within a single volume. From the outside, the building reads as a neo-Gothic structure, with a tower crowned by a cross, crenellated parapets, and vertical lines rarely seen in Gaudí’s other works. Inside, the space is bright and contrasts with the dark slate façade; the stairwell, with its colored tiles and curved arches, evokes Mudéjar architecture, influenced by three religions — Islam, Judaism, and Christianity.

The attic, with its eight supporting pillars and network of brick arches, is striking in its lightweight construction — according to legend, one of Gaudí’s employees remarked, "There’s something here that’s hard to understand why it stands." This anecdote conveys not mysticism, but a very specific engineering principle: Gaudí knew how to create the appearance of lightness through precise calculations of load distribution.

The religious dimension of practice

Gaudí’s connection to Catholicism was not a ritualistic matter, but rather part of his professional worldview. According to contemporaries, cited on the official Casa Batlló website, he saw himself as an architectural intermediary between God and humanity, an interpreter and continuer of creation. After the 1910s, according to some sources, he began to decline secular commissions; according to one account, he consulted the Virgin of Montserrat before accepting any non-religious proposal.

The religious symbolism in his works is not limited to the Sagrada Familia: in the crypt of the Colonia Güell, the mosaic above the entrance depicts the four cardinal virtues; Christian symbols appear in Park Güell; and the façade of Casa Batlló is often interpreted as a reference to Saint George and the Dragon, although Gaudí himself left no direct explanation. During his life, he regularly prayed and confessed; the path to the church of Sant Felip Neri remained a daily commute until his last day.

In April 2025, Pope Francis approved his elevation to the status of "Venerable" — one of the steps toward beatification; the case had been opened in the Archdiocese of Barcelona in 2003.

Companions and workshop

Gaudí rarely worked alone. Among his collaborators, sources most often cite Josep Maria Jujol, who helped create the trencadís surfaces and mosaic elements in Park Güell and Casa Batlló, and later independently developed similar sculptural ideas. Another regular assistant was Francesc Berenguer, the son of Gaudí’s primary school teacher; he oversaw many of the projects on site and designed the workhouses in the Colonia Güell.

Gaudí’s studio format was atypical for the era. He didn’t maintain a large office with drawing boards, but preferred to work with models, walk around the site, and make decisions as construction progressed, often changing the original design right on the spot. This flexibility ensured a high level of trust from the client and the architect’s constant presence during construction — which explains why, after 1915, he effectively lived at the Sagrada Familia.

After the 1936 fire, most of the documentation was destroyed, and knowledge of Gaudí’s methods was largely reconstructed from photographs, fragments, and the recollections of those who worked with him. Part of this reconstruction was carried out by Joan Matamala, his personal assistant, who removed Gaudí’s death mask and left detailed notes on their collaboration.

The facades of the Sagrada Familia as two artistic worlds

The Sagrada Familia has three completed or partially completed façades: the Nativity, the Passion, and the Glory. The Nativity façade is the only one designed and begun during Gaudí’s lifetime: it was completed between 1894 and 1930 and features a dense layer of sculpture depicting scenes from the life of Christ from birth to adolescence.

The Passion façade was built based on Gaudí’s designs, but the sculptural program was created by Josep Subirac in the 1980s and 1990s. Subirac deliberately chose an angular, almost Cubist style, at odds with the organic nature of the Nativity, which sparked controversy: some considered it a betrayal of the artist’s spirit, others an honest, modern response. Both approaches are documented in encyclopedic sources without judgmental judgments about "correctness."

The third façade — that of Glory — has been under construction since 2002; it is intended to be the main entrance from Calle Mallorca and the largest of the three in terms of sculpture volume. Here, too, debates are ongoing about the degree to which it adheres to Gaudí’s historical designs — a topic that the architectural community and the Sagrada Família bureau are addressing publicly and without definitive answers.

Structural innovations in the Sagrada Familia space

In the final decades of construction, the cathedral’s internal structure relied on a system of branched supports, which the design team describes as a realization of Gaudí’s ideas. The key principle: inclined columns branch at the top like tree trunks, forming nodes that bear loads from multiple directions simultaneously, eliminating the need for external flying buttresses. A model of cords and weights, made for the crypt of the Colonia Güell and now housed in the Sagrada Familia Museum, demonstrates the principle: inverted cords, when stretched, produce a shape that, in a normal position, works in compression without unnecessary bending moments. According to this logic, the columns need not be vertical — it is sufficient for the resultant force to coincide with the axis of the element.

For non-professional observers, this means that the very “movement” and “liveliness” of the interior that journalists write about have a direct constructive explanation, and not just an artistic one.

School on the grounds of the Sagrada Familia

On the grounds of the church stands a small structure — the Escola de la Sagrada Família, built by Gaudí in 1909 for the children of workers. It is remarkable not for its size, but for its structural design: the undulating roof and walls are formed by a single hyperbolic paraboloid, providing rigidity without unnecessary thickness. The building is often cited as an example of Gaudí’s use of complex surfaces even in "insignificant" buildings — not just representative ones. The structure has been preserved as a historical element of the complex.

Death

On June 7, 1926, at 6:05 PM, according to police reports, Gaudí was walking along his usual route to confession at the Church of Sant Felip Neri. At the intersection of Gran Vía de les Corts Catalanes and Calle Bailén, he stepped back when he saw a number 30 tram and was struck by another tram coming from the opposite direction.

No passersby recognized him: by then, he was poorly dressed and had no identification. Taxi drivers refused to take him to the hospital, mistaking him for a vagrant; the people who found him eventually took the architect to Santa Creix Hospital, a hospital for the poor. Friends only found him three days later.

Gaudí died on June 10, 1926, from his injuries at the age of 73. He was buried in the crypt of the Sagrada Familia — his chosen burial place — and around five thousand people came to pay their last respects. His death mask was taken by Joan Matamala, and a copy is kept in the house-museum in Park Güell.

The question of the authenticity of the continuation of construction

With Gaudí’s death and the fire of 1936, the construction of the Sagrada Familia faced a fundamental question: what exactly to build and on what foundation. Architects working on the project after the destruction of the documentation reconstructed the original design from surviving fragments, photographs, plaster models, and testimonies.

A number of professional societies and individual critics have publicly spoken out against continuing construction, citing the impossibility of faithfully reproducing the architect’s vision after such a loss of documents. Another position — advocated by the Sagrada Família Foundation — is that construction relies on reconstruction, supplemented by modern digital modeling tools, and that halting the project midway would cause greater damage.

UNESCO has recognized as authentic those parts built under Gaudí — the crypt and the Nativity façade — and these are included in the serial World Heritage nomination. The debate about authenticity remains open.

Periodization of creative practice

Researchers usually distinguish several phases in Gaudí’s work, although there are no strict boundaries between them:

• Early period (c. 1878–1887) : influence of “oriental” motifs, neo-Moorish details, fascination with decorative surfaces – Casa Vicens, El Capricho.
• Neo-Gothic period (around 1888–1898) : intensification of Gothic references, systematic interest in historical architecture – Palau Güell, Colegio de las Teresianas, palace in Astorga.
• Naturalistic and organic period (c. 1898–1914) : transition to curvilinear forms, active work with geometry and crafts – Park Güell, Casa Batlló, Casa Milà, Bellesguard.
• Late period (c. 1914–1926) : almost complete concentration on the Sagrada Familia, development of structural systems of branching columns, synthesis of all previous experience.

This periodization is convenient as a working map, but Gaudí himself did not formulate it in the form of programmatic statements, and the transitions between phases can only be traced when comparing objects.

Place in architectural historiography

Gaudí has been interpreted differently throughout history. During his lifetime, he was associated with Catalan modernism and the Art Nouveau movement, although his work already transcended both movements. From the 1930s to the 1950s, professional interest in him temporarily waned, as rationalist architecture dominated, perceiving Gaudí’s sculpture as excessive.

Its rehabilitation began in the 1950s, along with a general rethinking of historical modernism. In the late 20th century, it began to be compared to the precursor of digital parametric design, as its geometric surfaces and principles of spatial load-balancing clearly echo practices that have received new tools in the digital age. Such parallels are based on real geometric coincidences, not speculative analogies.

He is compared to Horta and Guimard as masters of Art Nouveau, but encyclopedic sources clearly establish the difference: Gaudí’s architecture possesses a religious and national content that his contemporaries lacked, or almost lacked. The comparison with Salvador Dalí, sometimes found in popular texts about Barcelona, remains a journalistic gesture and is not supported by any cross-influences or contacts between the two authors in documentary sources.

Six objects and one tower

For readers seeking a systematic study of Gaudí’s works, the UNESCO list is a useful starting point: seven components cover almost the entire range of his style. Add to these the Torre Bellesguard and El Capricho as objects demonstrating the "extremes" of his range: one an example of the most restrained historical synthesis, the other of early decorative freedom.

A separate route for understanding his construction method includes the crypt of the Colonia Güell (catenar vaults, suspended model) and the interior of the Sagrada Familia (branching columns, linear surfaces). Together, these two sites demonstrate how the same engineering principle evolved from an experimental prototype to its implementation in a world-class building.

Hexagonal tile

One of the objects, not on the UNESCO list but firmly entrenched in Barcelona’s urban code, is the hexagonal paving slabs designed by Gaudí for Casa Milà. The design features marine motifs — octopuses and starfish — and has been used on sidewalks throughout the city since the late 1990s. The slabs have been designated a "city icon," which speaks volumes about Gaudí’s range as a designer: from 172-meter-tall towers to a simple footstep.