Barcelona! Casa Mila!

After we left Park Guell, we took the metro down and hit up a nice cafe for some refreshments. Once we were finished with them, we headed across the street to visit Casa Milà which is also known as La Pedrera ( The Quarry.)

I was really excited to see building and the rooftop. It was kind of one of those small regrets I had from my previous trip to Barcelona. Why hadn't we gone up it?  Well I had returned and we were going to enjoy it. 

The building costs €16.50 to enter which is a bit daunting as thats quite a bit of money for some people. We paid the price and entered into the central courtyard of the building. Looking up we admired the architecture of the window frames and checked out the scale model of the apartment buildings.

Yes, this is an apartment building which people actually live in today. I am sure it costs a pretty penny to call this home. The section of the building you are allowed to see are the rooftops, the attic and the floor below which is decorated as an apartment would have been when it was first opened.

The building was financed by Pere Milà i Camps, a weathy business man and his wife. They hired Gaudi to build them a home which included apartments that they planned to rent out. They presented the project to the City Council on February 2, 1905 and work began shortly after. Unlike Casa Batlló where Gaudi did not demolish but renovated the building. The building that stood was demolished and they started from scratch. The building was completed in December 1910, and in October of 1911 the Milà family moved into the building.

In order to reach the top you have to take an elevator which is a relief as I would have hated to walk up a million stairs to reach the top. When we got to the top we were greeted by the beautiful sculptures on the roof which are actually functioning chimneys and fans for the building. Nothing was built without purpose.  We had blue skies but the temperature was not too hot which was disappointing. We were just glad it was not raining though.

Yes, lots and lots of photos were taken. I had a really good time exploring the roof and taking in all of the things to see. After we had tired of roaming around we took the stairs down to the attic area of the building which houses a lot of Gaudi's inspirations as well as models for the different buildings he has designed. Our tour guide from the Gaudi Modernism tour that we took recommended if we had to pay to get into any of the Gaudi buildings that it should be La Pedrera because of how much information about Gaudi you get out of it.

This model shows the outside of the building which is very amazing. I did not take any pictures of that as it is currently covered as they are cleaning it. Gaudi decided to use a type of stone on the exterior that though pretty gets very very dirty due to the pollution from the city's car traffic.   You continue around the attic and look at all the objects on display before heading down into the apartment level. 

We really enjoyed wandering around the building and I was glad that we went. In the gift shop I found these Mucha vases and nearly died for want of them. Of course they came with a pretty price tag and I settled on admiring them. I also found a pop up book of The Petite Prince. I wanted to buy that but settled again to just wish and want for it.