Sagrada Familia in Barcelona (Spain) - Antonio Gaudi's church

 The Holy Family Basilica was supposed to be a symbol of the living Roman Catholic faith and the center of the whole complex of buildings, including schools and school workshops.

Gaudi treated building as an organic process - the stone takes on life, and ornaments grow from it like plants. He created on the construction site, observing the emerging shapes and preferred to change them according to his will, rather than leaving others to implement his project.

Gaudi worked on the construction of the church until his death, after his death no one was able to lead the construction as he did, which is the reason for the infinite construction.

The church is 60 meters wide and 95 meters long.

You can get to the top of the tower by beating 400 stairs, or use the available elevator.

In intention, the church was to contain three monumental facades depicting the birth of Christ, the Passion of Christ and Resurrection. Each of them had to finish four huge towers.

The only façade completed by Gaudi is Facade de la Natividad ("cradle of life").

Architect Antoni Gaudi died in 1926 struck by a tram, earlier he devoted this construction to more than 40 years of his life. Gaudi was buried in a crypt inside the Sagrada Familia.

After the architect's death, several architects took over to complete the construction. As some of the projects were destroyed during the Spanish Civil War in 1936, the final appearance of the building is not precisely specified, the last notes contained more or less information that the church is to accommodate 13,000 people, and the building is to have 18 towers, 4 each facades representing 12 apostles. The remaining 4 towers representing 4 evangelists, the last two dedicated to Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary.

The church was designed not to exceed 173 meters above sea level, because this is the height of the Montjuic mountain in Barcelona. Gaudi believed that a natural, God-created mountain should dominate the city, therefore, according to Gaudi's wishes, the Tower of Jesus Christ will be slightly lower than the Barcelona hill, while on its top there will be a cross.

Completion of works is planned for 2026, the hundredth anniversary of the architect's death.

There are rumored plans to complete the construction, they include, among others 170 meter high central tower project.

Although the construction of the church began in 1882, the stained glass windows are quite new, they were added only at the end of 2001. The design and implementation was entrusted to the Spanish Joan Vila-Grau in 1999.

The building is visited annually by over 3 million tourists, making it the most-visited tourist attraction of Spain. Thanks to tourism and private subsidies, construction costs of around EUR 25 million per year are covered on an ongoing basis.

Sagrada Familia is on the UNESCO World Heritage list.