Church

Sagrada Família

Barcelona, Spain

Candidate image for Sagrada Família in Barcelona

Sagrada Família’s Nativity façade is crowded with plants, birds, and sculpted scenes, turning the building’s exterior into an image of creation. Gaudí’s design uses natural forms to express the joy of birth, while the unfinished basilica records generations of changing craft.

Guide preview

The Nativity façade is alive with detail: birds perch among leaves, and sculpted figures cluster around the central birth scene. Gaudí designed this eastern façade as a celebration of life and creation, according to the basilica’s own interpretation. Construction began here in 1891, and it was the only façade Gaudí saw substantially completed before his death in 1926.

Continue exploring

Discover the full story

Keep reading with a travel pass and explore every full guide and tour.

Upgrade

Quick facts

  • Construction on the Nativity façade began in 1891.
  • It is divided into three portals dedicated to the Christian virtues.
  • The Nativity façade and crypt were designated UNESCO World Heritage in 2005.

More places in Barcelona

landmark

Barcelona, SpainGuide with pass

Arc de Triomf

Barcelona’s Arc de Triomf was built as the ceremonial entrance to the 1888 Universal Exhibition, not as a victory monument. Its red brick and sculpted friezes combine a classical arch shape with a distinctly local architectural style and a message of welcome.

aquarium

Barcelona, SpainGuide with pass

Barcelona Aquarium

The Barcelona Aquarium’s Oceanarium puts visitors beneath a large Mediterranean tank, with an underwater tunnel running through it. The experience is built around a change in viewpoint: instead of looking down at marine life from above, you move through the water’s volume as fish pass overhead and a

church

Barcelona, SpainGuide with pass

Barcelona Cathedral

Barcelona Cathedral’s Gothic structure was built over earlier Christian places of worship, and its present façade was completed centuries after the medieval church began. The result is a layered monument where the building’s age and the date of its most visible front do not match.

museum

Barcelona, SpainGuide with pass

Barcelona History Museum

Barcelona History Museum at Plaça del Rei places visitors above the remains of Roman Barcino, where streets, workshops, and public buildings reveal the city’s early grid. The museum also occupies later medieval structures, making the site itself a layered exhibit of urban continuity and change.

museum

Barcelona, SpainGuide with pass

Barcelona Maritime Museum

Barcelona Maritime Museum occupies the Royal Shipyards, where galleys and other vessels were built and maintained for Mediterranean power. The broad Gothic halls are industrial spaces on a monumental scale, preserving the structure of a medieval naval arsenal while giving it a new museum role.

architecture

Barcelona, SpainGuide with pass

Barcelona Pavilion

The Barcelona Pavilion was built as Germany’s contribution to the 1929 International Exposition and dismantled soon afterward. Its 1986 reconstruction makes a temporary building permanently available for experiencing modern architecture’s use of material and space.