Barcelona marked a major milestone in the saga of the perennially unfinished Sagrada Familia in June, when Antoni Gaudí’s grand achievement was officially ordained as “the world’s tallest church.” The celestial-terrestrial mashup festival featured a visit by the Pope, a citywide Gaudí fiesta and a massive multimedia drone fireworks and light show that became a viral hit.

Amid the hoopla, there was the underlying vibe that we were all celebrating the completion of Sagrada Familia, the world’s longest on-going construction project. All the spires were topped off with glowing crosses; every bit of symbolic ornamentation had been carved into the façade. Gaudí’s vision had burst into life with the Pope’s blessing and a 3D can-you-top-this, bombs-bursting-in-air extravaganza. (And I’m guessing the notoriously humble Gaudí would have hated it.)

Everything about the ceremony suggested this was Sagrada Familia’s grand ribbon cutting, the final dramatic end of the Sagrada construction story. People could rejoice that through artistry, perseverance and incredible sums of money, the great church was actually done. Headlines proclaimed that Gaudí’s epic church was finally finished. (Sample from Forbes: “Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia, Completed After 144 Years…”).

Except everyone in Barcelona knows it’s not. Not even close.

During June’s hoopla, lead architect Mauricio Cortés moved to deflate the “Sagrada is finished” narrative.

“I’ve read a few headlines that said that, this year, the Sagrada Familia will be completed,” Cortés told Dezeen. “However, the case is that the central towers will be completed with the Jesus tower, but then there are future challenges ahead.”

At the top of the “future challenges” to-do list is completion of the Glory Facade and a “Grand Staircase,” a 60-meter platform that would extend across an existing street, Carrer de Mallorca. The staircase would connect the raised Sagrada entrance to the street level, but would require the absorption and destruction of several existing residential and retail buildings. Estimates suggest current plans would displace about 200 to 300 families.

Now that the main work on the basilica is finished, the La Sagrada Família Foundation, the private non-profit group that controls the church’s construction, has made it clear it intends to push forward with the plan for the Grand Staircase, which has been a source of dispute and controversy for decades. Organized, passionate neighborhood opposition groups are in place to oppose the church’s expansion plans, and they have a strong case.

Beyond the unfairness of tearing down homes and businesses, they argue the evidence is hazy that Gaudí was even that interested in the staircase. The platform and stairs appear in his early models, but many elements changed over the years.

“These stairs are not Gaudí’s and they were designed later by his disciples to have an excuse to ask for donations,” Salvador Barroso, president of People Affected by the Construction of the Sagrada Família, a neighborhood group told Catalan News in 2021.

But the church foundation counters that the staircase is essential to achieve Gaudí’s ultimate vision. Few of his drawings or models survived a Civil War-era anarchist attack, but the church says the staircase was always part of the plan. They point to one the original models of the church, subsequent drawings and a 1916 permit application which clearly include the staircase.

Supporters argue that Gaudí specifically designed the church four feet above the road with the intent that the staircase would connect the basilica to the street level. Taking it a symbolic step further — because there is always a symbolic step further with Sagrada — the underside of the staircase is meant to symbolize hell and the area above the stairs the ascension to heaven, church officials say. Plans call for many, many symbolic elements in the Glory Facade package, including very symbolic depictions of the Seven Deadly Sins and the Seven Heavenly Virtues.

In Barcelona, everyone knows this has been coming. The grand staircase and its potential impact on the surrounding land already have been the subject of lawsuits and controversy. Several of the affected buildings were built in the 1960s and ‘70s, when the notoriously corrupt pro-Franco regime ignored the church’s plans and turned over the land to private developers. The city and courts backed the developers’ argument that the church couldn’t prove the staircase was part of Gaudí’s vision.

At the time, nobody thought the church would ever be finished, so it didn’t really matter. Many of the buyers who bought homes in the residential buildings constructed reportedly were warned about the potential for the church to expand, but moved forward anyway, according to news reports.

But now the miracle has happened. The main portion of the basilica is completed and the church foundation is ready to move forward with its plan.

The dispute will spotlight Barcelona’s traditional rivals — the church and the socialist party, which currently dominates local government. And, as always in Barcelona, it’s complicated. The process will unfold against a backdrop of years of poorly executed gentrification throughout the city, which has destroyed old neighborhoods and contributed to soaring home prices.

The current city council, which typically tries to promote the rights of working-class residents, has vowed that no plan will be approved until all the existing residents are guaranteed homes. But that’s always a tricky process, especially for elderly families that have lived in their home for years. (Some owners have expressed a willingness to sell and move, according to news reports.) At the same time, city planners see an opportunity to improve traffic flow and the pedestrian experience around Sagrada, one of the world’s biggest tourist attractions.

By some estimates, the staircase and its associated elements could take 10 years to plan and build, at least. Given the circumstances and realities of Barcelona, let’s assume that Sagrada is nowhere close to be finished.

More from Barcelona Anarchy…

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Spain is a cornucopia of wild festivals, celebrating everything from raging bulls to squishy tomatoes. Barcelona alone trots out a steady stream of traditional fiestas, which provide a great excuse for reckless merriment and blowing up shit.

That said, one festival stands out on the calendar, the annual event regarded as “the big one.” If you’re jonesing for that big festival Spain experience, this is the one you don’t want to miss.

Known simply as La Mercè, the annual festival at the end of September brings together all the elements of traditional Catalan festivals into a five-day marathon of continuous performances, events and general mayhem.

La Mercè covers all the bases. If you’re looking for a Burning Man, lets-do-mushrooms-and-dance-in-the-streets kind of vibe, you’ll find it. if you want a more cultural, folksy experience, reflecting local communities and old Catalan traditions, you’ll find that, too.

On a simple level, the festival marks the end of the summer, the bookend to the Sant Joan Festival in June, which hails the beginning of summer with bonfires in the streets and gratuitous amounts of explosions. (Catalan festivals always display a real zeal for explosions. Even the craziest, batshit fireworks lover in Waco, Texas, confronted with a Barcelona festival, would take a step back and say, “whoa, you guys really need to take it down a notch.”)

The origins of La Mercè can be traced to a plague of locusts, which is very on brand for Barcelona. Many of the city’s most storied traditions, heroes and myths stem from some sort of tragedy or noble cause that went horribly wrong. In the case of La Mercè, in 1687 city leaders prayed to Our Lady of Mercy for relief from the swarming locusts, which were devastating crops and wreaking havoc, in general.

When their prayers were answered and the locusts miraculously disappeared, the city repaid Our Lady of Mercy by naming her Barcelona’s patron saint, a move blessed 200 years later by the Pope. (The legend of the Virgin Saint of Barcelona goes back to 1218, when three people saw a vision of the Virgin Mary urging them to found an order to save another Christian sect and… it’s complicated.)

“Fiestas do not seem to me to be celebrations of the past. Some are genuinely spiritual, religious affairs. Others are expressions of local pride or chauvinism. Most, however, are about fun.” -Giles Tremlett, author of “Ghosts of Spain.”

The modern La Mercè festival flows into every community in the city, although most of the big events are centered around the Gothic Quarter. Every day features a full calendar of dancers, musicians, gigante parades and cultural events spread around the neighborhoods. The festival may be staged on a grand corporate scale these days, but there is still a low-key, community vibe to many of the annual festivities. Clubs, community groups and families spend months preparing for the festival, just as their families before them. Children walk in the parades with their parents, who walked with their parents. Drunken frat boys follow the paths of drunken frat boys of yore.

The festivities conclude with a massive “piromusical,” a grand display of synchronized fireworks music that rivals New Year’s Eve for explosions on a grand scale. I highly recommend skipping the crowds and noise of the piromusical.

For most fans, the festival really focuses on three must-do events, quintessential elements of the Barcelona festival experience.

Follow the Beat

Opening night is highlighted by the parade of drum corps that pound through the streets of the old district, usually starting in El Born. A conga line forms behind the drummers and dancers and giant figurines of dragons and beasts. You can’t help but fall into line and join the procession, pounding along with the drummers.

Throughout the festival, these drum groups randomly pop up in the district and start a march.

They represent their communities; people from all walks of life who have found their common rhythmic obsession. Together, they are finely-tuned instruments and competitive-good, ready to show off and start the party with a drum march. Their pounding beats create a great throbbing, interactive flow to the events. It’s a wonderful, communal experience.

Behold the Human Pyramids

If you spend any time thinking about it, castellers are really one of the wackier regional customs. Forming massive human pyramids and then urging little children to scamper to the top doesn’t seem like healthiest of cultural traditions. (“Don’t worry, the six-year-old is wearing a helmet!”) Nevertheless, castellers are a deeply rooted institution in villages and towns throughout Catalonia.

You can run into castellers at festivals around the region throughout the year, but La Merce is one of the premier events. Teams come from all over to show off their skills in front of the crowds in Plaça de Sant Jaume. Towers will reach nine-stories, frail examples of teamwork, strength and communal psychosis.

It is one of those postcard images: people jammed into the square, jostling for the best view, as the castellers build their human towers above the crowd, going higher and higher. It’s wild, exhilarating and a bit crazy, exactly the type of gathering that makes La Mercè special.

The Fire Parade

The nominal highlight of each’s festival is the correfoc, the fire parade, which is kind of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade for devil worshippers. Instead of floats and a Snoopy balloon bobbing overhead, the correfoc is a wild, bacchanalian orgy of fire, noise and strange symbolism that moves through the street spewing sparks and explosions.

There are many old stories behind the origin of this particular ritual. The fire parade can trace its roots back to the “Ball de Diables” (”Dance of Devils”) in the 12th Century. Nobody cares. Today, the annual La Mercè correfoc is an exuberant, fire-filled party. Sure, it seems mainly for buzzed university students and tourists, but that also doesn’t matter, once you’re part of it.

Boundaries blur as the crowd intertwines with the parade. Fire devils aggressively spray sparks at people standing too close. If they think you want a good photo, they will attack, firing sparks at you, the perfect photo op that may or may not set your hair on fire.

If you’re not a big fan of noise, explosions and the potential for third-degree burns, you really don’t want a front row seat to the correfoc. On the other hand, screw it. Wear long sleeves and a hat. Embrace the legends of the devils. Get in there and dance with fire.

You can find more information about this year’s La Mercè here. (One annoying Barcelona habit: they don’t release the full program until days before the start of the festival.)

Each year the festival chooses the work of a local artist for the La Mercè poster. Here is more info on this year’s winner.

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Instead, over the years Cerdà’s ideas were trashed, as Glòries was turned into a concrete mess of decaying neighborhoods and highway flyovers. It was best known for the crusty Encants flea market, which flowed through the streets, and the condom-shaped Torre Glòries (also known as Torre Agbar), the Jean Nouvel-designed tower that sticks out like a sore thumb from the skyline, unconnected to the city.

It took two decades, but the city has finally completed a plan to redesign Glòries around mobility and green space, creating a model for urban regeneration. It may not look anything like Cerda’s original concept, but the city has delivered on a promise to make Glòries a better place to live and work.

The new park officially opened last year and it’s amazing to see the transformation. For anybody who knew the old Glòries, stepping out of the metro station into the new district is a shock. The gray, depressing vibe is gone. There are cultural centers and green spaces that look like an organic part of the city, as if they’ve always been there.

The Glòries plan is playing a big role in this year’s World Architecture of Congress, which is celebrating the city’s commitment to architecture and urban renewal. (You can take a free tour.) There are lessons to be learned from the process and the years of aggravation that led to the final design.

There were many seemingly insurmountable obstacles to overcome, including dozens of conflicting interests, massive bureaucracies and longstanding distrust of any city plan. Redevelopment in the city traditionally meant massive displacement of locals, gentrification and gifts for the wealthy developers.

Is Spain a good place to retire? Isidra Marcos interviewed me about the challenges.

The area targeted for redevelopment was primarily private land. A large complicated public-private apparatus was developed that focused on the big ideas of urban regeneration, taking a big swing at equity, affordability and healthy living. The city took an active lead role to develop the plan and back funding, an essential ingredient. A public entity, the Consorci de la Zona Franca de Barcelona (CZFB), comprised of federal and business interests, helped facilitate development and funding, while the city subsidized affordable housing with private developers.

The first step was the development of 22@, a new technological district. But it’s interesting to note that the innovation district alone was not a catalyst for major change — a 2000-era study found only 5% of the workers in the 22@ district actually lived in the area.

The centerpiece of the redevelopment is Parc de les Glòries, a nine-hectare (22 acre) park with 30,000 square meters of green space and more than 1,000 trees. In a city not known for green space, it is now the second largest park in the city, behind Parc de la Cuitadella.

The park is designed with spaces for families and events. It’s more than a “stretch of lawn.”

The redevelopment also created a new cultural hub for the city, including the Teatre Nacional de Catalunya, spotlighting Catalonia’s performing arts; L’Auditori & Museu de la Música, focusing on musical arts; and a center devoted to design, the distinctive Disseny Hub Barcelona, which is next to the metro stop that serves the district.

During the years of redevelopment, the city also created a new central home for the flea market.

Walking around the area, you can see an attention to detail, and a willingness to push the boundaries for Barcelona design. You can also see the cooperation between different design disciplines, including landscape architecture. The metro stop features a sunken amphitheater with a cactus garden.

There is an easy test for any regeneration plan: do people use the spaces? On any given day, Glòries is alive with activity. The offices are occupied, the housing in demand. Locals have embraced the park, which is now the center of daily life for the neighborhood and a key mobility connection to the metro stop and surrounding communities.

Not everyone is happy with the final result — it’s Barcelona. Debates will continue over affordable housing, the long-term commitment to sustainability and a dozen other issues. But Glòries stands as an example of perseverance and a city’s commitment to focus on big issues and reverse the mistakes of the past.

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As UNESCO celebrates Barcelona as the 2026 World Capital of Architecture, highlighting the city’s success stories, organizers should take some time to discuss the misguided decisions and scandalous projects that continue to tarnish the city’s neighborhoods.

Throughout the city, random glass, steel and concrete edifices protrude from the famed modernist neighborhoods, unconnected to the community, style or common sense. The ideals that define the city were abandoned to approve projects that provide little value and, to this day, destroy the skyline.

These buildings didn’t happen by accident. Plans and regulations were ignored. Developers were given free rein. Leaders vacated their responsibilities.

It’s a familiar story in cities around the world. But it is particularly glaring in Barcelona, where the city’s core and identity are built around scale, nature and a commitment to healthy living.

Even in Eixample, the district of uniform blocks created by Ildefons Cerdà’s world famous urban plan, the neighborhoods are littered with shockingly inappropriate, utilitarian buildings. In many cases, they are jammed next to classic old buildings. Who would think this is a good idea?

These are the type of buildings that pop up when planners don’t care and city leaders turn over the keys to the developers. It happens in most cities and Barcelona, land o’ modernisme, didn’t escape the greed and short-sightedness of politicians and bureaucrats.

Of course, in Barcelona there is a historic twist. Many of these buildings trace their origins to the depressed decades after the Spanish Civil War, when dictator Francisco Franco brutally suppressed the city. Some buildings were hastily constructed to fill in the destruction caused by bombers during the war. (Barcelona stands out in the annals of modern warfare as the first city systematically bombed from the air.)

After the war, Barcelona suffered under Franco’s regime, which had little interest in preserving the “decadent” architectural style of the defeated city. Grand authoritarian buildings were promoted, demonstrating Franco’s classically fascist tastes. A typical example is the Banco de Espana headquarters on Placa Catalunya, built in 1955, which would seem more at home in 1930s Berlin or old Rome.

Throughout the city, random towers were hastily constricted with designs that purposely ignored the craftsmanship and spirit of the modernist movement or the urban planning elements that defined the city. The 28-story Edificio Colón, completed on the port in 1970, is an office building with a restaurant on top, designed in a semi-brutalist style that probably looked cool and trendy for maybe six months.

The 22-story Torre Urquinaona, completed in 1971, captures the essence of the cheap authoritarian stylings preferred during the Franco years. Lot’s of sharp corners and straights lines, in sharp contrast to flowing curves and whimsy of modernism and Art Nouveau. It looks like Ming the Merciless designed a condo tower.

After Franco’s death, the 1992 Olympics sparked a great building surge, a feverish effort to catch up and create the type of architecturally “significant” projects city leaders believed would make Barcelona a modern city. Developers were allowed to bulldoze huge swatches of the city. Whole communities were displaced. And Barcelona was left with a series of random projects with few links to the city’s famed design aspirations.

In the runup to the Olympics, an Olympic Village was thrown up on the new waterfront, Vila Olímpica, including the city’s new tallest buildings. Of the two, the most striking is the 154-meter-tall, 44-story Hotel Arts, which copies the distinctive exo-skeleton of Chicago’s legendary Hancock building. That’s not surprising, since the hotel was designed by Bruce Graham and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, the same team behind the Hancock building, who apparently cashed in with a small-scale version of their iconic Windy City project.

The other tower developed in what could have been a seminal complex is Torre Mapfre, a bland steel-and-glass office tower that would look great in downtown Fresno. Torre Mapre’s claim to architectural fame, at the time, was “the highest helipad in Spain.”

To add a bit more starchitect flair, Frank Gehry, fresh off earning the Pritzker Prize in 1989, tossed in a 52-meter glimmering fish sculpture, El Peix, as a canopy for the shops and restaurants. And, at the time, the complex created a pleasant image when the world turned its attention to Barcelona and The Games.

But time hasn’t been kind. Today Vila Olímpica survives as a cold, remote hotel, retail and shopping center that has little to do with the rest of the city. (Hotels Arts is operated by Ritz Carlton.) It’s a place for tourists and the crowds frequenting the casino.

In the craze to build new and look modern, Barcelona approved a series of architectural anomalies that speak to architects trying to wow architecture students. You can see city leaders grabbing at design trends, hoping to appear hip, while ignoring the elements that would later define Barcelona as the “world capital of architecture.”

Stark, charmless buildings began appearing throughout the city. In 1993, the fast-expanding, nine-story El Cortes Inglés department store on Plaça de Catalunya, occupying one of the city’s most treasured corners, was reclad into a brutalist fortress.

Beyond Sagrada Familia, the most distinctive building on Barcelona’s skyline is Torre Glòries, a round, glass-coated tower built in 2005 that sticks out of the landscape like a glowing condom. Designed by French architect Jean Nouvel, Glòries is beloved by tall building fans for its natural ventilation system and complex façade. And many locals tout it as an example of a new era of design. But it has little to do with the style, skyline and character of Barcelona, and you can’t not see it.

Architecture fans will also note that Nouvel used almost the same design to better effect in Qatar, with the Doha Tower. That makes Glòries nothing more than Nouvel’s second-best glass condom tower, which hardly stands as a great sell line for the postcards.

As a side note, in recent years the public space around Glòries has been the target of a massive urban renewal project, including new parks and cultural spaces. It is one of the success stories that will be discussed during the World Capital of Architecture events. And Torre Glòries still seems rundown and out of place.

The most hated building in Barcelona might be the W Hotel built in 2009, a glass “sail” on the waterfront with zero connection to anything in the city. The developers ignored Spain’s strict laws for building on the water’s edge. A key piece of land was wasted. Two years after it was finished Spain’s Supreme Court ruled that the construction was illegal, but refused to order it torn down. The “sail” design is also a ripoff of the Burj al Arab “sail” design in Dubai.

Nobody leaves Barcelona talking about the ugly buildings. But there are lessons to be learned from the city’s mistakes. Decisions have long term consequences, and Barcelona is still paying the price.

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Like many tourists, I didn’t really get Barcelona on my first visit. The neighborhoods seemed strangely monotonous and the crowds in the tourist spots were obnoxious. I walked La Rambla, gazed upon Sagrada Familia and joined the throngs herded into a Gaudi house. The city registered as a Paris wannabe with a cool church, little more than a nice stop on a quickie Euro jaunt.

It wasn’t until my third visit, after I had worked through the list of must-do tourist activities, that I started to understand why so many people fall in love with the place. When you sink into the city’s rhythm of life and move away from the tourist zones, you start to discover the real Barcelona, the city that inspires so much loyalty, outrage and bad poetry.

I’m often asked why I’ve become marginally obsessed with the city, a valid question. There are plenty of cities with beautiful old cafes, great history and cool art. I could just as easily be eating tasty pastries and swapping tales of revolution and architecture in a Paris or Copenhagen coffee shop.

On one level, my answer is simple: I’m an architecture and urban planning geek and Barcelona is the best designed city in the world. Fellow urban planning geeks know exactly what I’m talking about. The wide sidewalks, notched corners at the end of the blocks, the sunny corridors — they’re all the product of an urban plan developed in 1860 by Ildefons Cerdà, an innovator in sustainability and healthy cities a century before it was cool to be green. In an era when most cities planned streets around troop movements, Cerdà explored how people live and move through neighborhoods, addressing the poor conditions that plagued so many cities.

Much of the best parts of Cerda’s plans were tossed aside by greedy developers, but the results still can be seen everywhere in the modern Barcelona, from the cafés that line the sidewalks to the fresh air that flows through the wide avenues. It’s easy to walk from block to block because Cerdà spent a lot of time figuring out the appropriate length and height of a city block. The design encourages people to live outdoors in the cafes, squares and parks. Traffic, buses and the metro move naturally through the streets. It is still, and always has been, a city that works, right up until the times it turns into a crazed shitshow, which happens with sad regularity.

The more I learned about Barcelona, the more I became fascinated by the centuries of scandals, tragedies and passions that shaped the city and its culture. Barcelona’s charm and fabled quirkiness are no accident. Battles were fought, decisions made, norms ignored to make Barcelona what it is today. To understand the long-running Catalan independence movement today, you must first appreciate the region’s centuries-old battles with Madrid and Europe, and the tales of irritated queens and ambitious French operators that almost always ended badly for Barcelona.

Beyond journalistic curiosity, digging deeper, my obsession becomes harder to explain.

As soon as I arrive, I’m always amazed at how comfortable I feel in the city. Strolling the streets, I instantly feel like I never left. Within hours I’m eating weird forms of pig in dark cafes in the middle of the night, complaining about noisy garbage pickups and spending too much time sipping cortados and watching old men play bocce ball in the park.

Once you’re away from the tourist areas, Barcelona is remarkably free of the hubris and fast-food chains that provide the landscape for so many cities. Neighborhoods may look the same, but each is unique, defined by the bakeries, markets and wine stores that have been part of the block for generations. An old lady sells vegetables form her cousin’s farm; a shop offers a rare cheese from a little town in Basque country; a cobbler repairs everyone’s shoes, same as his father and his father before that. These neighborhoods have survived crazy kings, Franco and the rise of Wal-Mart.

In Barcelona, I walk obsessively, sometimes just because I’m bored. It is a city that always pays off when you make the wrong turn or decide to walk down a new alley. The city’s history can be found in the nooks and crannies, the labyrinths of old street and the sordid tales reflecting centuries of anarchists and artists; royalty and deceit; celebrations and vendettas.

A bizarre stew of cultures, tragedy and inspiration produced a city with a distinctly different vibe than any other major city in the world. The streets are named after poets and architects, not conquering generals. It is a city that treats art, theater and music as vital parts of the daily environment, from random, outrageous street performers to the opera singer practicing a mournful aria amid the old stone walls. In Barcelona, instead of a ratty dropout trying to play old Beatles songs on an out-of-tune guitar, the street musicians are often trained artists playing jazz and classical music, taking advantage of the acoustics of a secluded spot. You can tell a lot about a city by the quality of the buskers.

On a fundamental, bureaucratic level, Barcelona embraces culture, education and the outrageous. The city’s identity and tourism industry are built around the flamboyant designs of art nouveau, a movement that flips the bird to old traditions and rigid thinking. Among its long line of festivals and parties, every April the city celebrates the Saint Jordi Festival by sharing books and roses. There are no military parades in Barcelona, but there are regular massive, traffic-snarling demonstrations around global peace, worker rights and equity issues.

It is, without a doubt, a city with flaws. Tourists overrun the neighborhoods in the summer; graffiti scars the old buildings and there is a seedy veneer to many of the old streets. In the dark corners of Raval, not far from the tourist throngs, you might see hippies shooting heroin in a picturesque cobblestone alley and the guy next to you in the bar in Poble Sec may or may not work for the Russian mob. And it is true that many of the world’s best pickpockets operate in the city.

All those things are true and none of it matters. Catalonia’s historic knack for landing on the wrong side of war and politics has produced a resilient spirit, a sense of nationalism and pride that remains a very real part of the modern Barcelona. The outside world, and the scandal du jour don’t really matter. The city succeeds and grows and remains a great place to live and visit, despite all the weirdness and turmoil. In 2017, after a horrible terrorist attack on La Rambla, tens of thousands took to the streets to chant, “we are not afraid.” That is Barcelona.

In the real Barcelona, which has nothing to do with the tourist Barcelona, not everything fits the postcard images. The heroes are often damaged; the fables often end badly. The stories don’t quite fit the myths. There is context and a story to everything about the city. The great buildings are the product of craftsmen and builders who were oppressed and manipulated by the city’s elite for generations. The beach is sunny and fun and completely man-made. The rewards go to those willing to sink into the city and discover what makes it different and worthy of stirring Catalan ballads.

As a journalist, I love that there is a story behind every corner. That feeling never goes away in Barcelona. No matter how much I learn, I am constantly reminded that my perspective is that of an outsider, a dumbass American experiencing a city built over generations. After years visiting and living in the city, I am keenly aware that I am no more than a guest, and it would be arrogant and foolish of me to think I will ever really understand this place.

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A lot of cities talk big about the variety and ethnic diversity of their cuisine. Bloggers babble about “cultural crossroads” and “melting pots,” but in reality most big cities can’t compete with the choices and quality offered in the typical central Barcelona neighborhood.

I know, fighting words. But there are unique forces at play in Barcelona. The whole “crossroads” thing is real in the city. “Local” means Catalan, but the food scene is heavily influenced by the distinct cuisines of other Spanish regions, as well as nearby France. Moroccan and Eastern European inspirations are also baked into the mix, like most of Spain. And Barcelona is a port city, and touristy port cities often host a cultural stew. (OK, sorry for the cooking metaphors.)

Many cities may offer similar ethnic diversity, but the restaurants are separated into different barrios spread across the city. There’s a “Chinatown” or a “Little Italy” or a Greek neighborhood, but little cross pollination. In Barcelona, every type of food can pop up in any neighborhood. Walk around and you never know what you’ll find around the corner. In the heart of the city, everything from “fusion” restaurants led by boundary-testing chefs to fast-food Korean joints are always a short stroll away.

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To many Barcelona tourists, Josep Puig i Cadafalch is the guy who designed that really cool mansion next door to Casa Batlló, Gaudi’s main street masterpiece. Millions of travelers have stared in awe at the Gaudi house and its swirling facade, and then glanced to the left and said something like, “wow, what’s up with that place?”

The “place next door” is Casa Amatller, a classic example of the can-you-top this competition that was raging on swanky Passeig de Gracia in the early 1900s. A renovation of an existing building, Puig i Cadaflach’s Casa Amatller finished first, changing the dynamic of the street with its colorful, code-bashing façade filled with symbols reflecting the building’s owners. (In 1906, Gaudi followed with Casa Batlló, followed a few months later by Lluís Domènech i Montaner’s extravagant Casa Lleó Morera, on the other side of Casa Amatller.)

Along with his peers — known as the “Big Three” of Barcelona modernists — Puig i Cadafalch helped shape the city’s aesthetic and the emerging ideas of art nouveau and modernism, even though his name might not be as well known around the world. His work leaps from the cityscape, full of towering Gothic and medieval references.

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With much fanfare, the Catalan Department of Culture released a study this week confirming that a remote chalet in the mountains north of Barcelona was, in fact, designed by famed architect Antoni Gaudí.

The announcement attracted international coverage proclaiming the discovery of a “lost” Gaudí. But it’s unlikely the notoriously prickly Gaudí would be happy about the news, considering he didn’t want his name on the three-story, wedge-shaped building when he was alive.

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Last year, shortly before his death, Pope Francis declared that famed Barcelona architect Antoni Gaudí had displayed “heroic virtues,” a key step in efforts to elevate the city’s best-known modernist to sainthood.

For decades the Diocese of Barcelona and an advocacy group of civic leaders, the Association for the Beatification of Antoni Gaudí, have been making the case for the creator of Sagrada Familia, who is often called “God’s architect.” The Vatican began a formal review in 2003, after advocates produced a 2,000-page positio, with studies and documents supporting the application.

Pope Francis was a fan; he called Gaudi “a great mystic.” By classifying Gaudi as “venerable,” his saint application cleared a major hurdle.

Gaudi supporters point to Sagrada Familia, the “last cathedral,” as a saint-worthy achievement. “Can anyone acquainted with [Gaudí’s] work believe that all which one contemplates could possibly have been produced only by cold thought?” Barcelona’s then-Cardinal Ricardo María Carles Gordó said in 2003.

But many issues remain before Gaudi can be declared a saint, including the thorny question of miracles. There is speculation that supporters might point to a miracle attributed to Gaudi after his death. Or it’s possible the Pope could simply waive the miracle requirement, according to published.

There are concerns about the precedent of anointing an artist as a saint. Many artists could claim God’s involvement in their transcendent work, to one degree or another. And Gaudi was no Mother Teresa helping the poor; most of his work was at the behest of wealthy patrons, eager to spend money on an original Gaudi.

Either way, the canonization discussion will certainly alter Gaudi’s public image. Many of his fans revere Gaudi as a pioneer in naturalism and connecting design to the organic world, not a religious zealot. His role as “God’s servant” doesn’t fit the image of the “King of Modernism.”

“In certain important respects, Gaudí was not a modernista architect at all; his religious obsessions, for instance, separate him from the generally secular character of modernisme,” wrote former New York Times art critic Robert Hughes in his opus, Barcelona.

For Common Edge, I dove deeper into the Gaudi sainthood campaign and it’s effect on Gaudi’s reputation as an architect.

Read the article here.

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In a crowded café on Barcelona’s Plaza Molina, they chant his name, exuberant at the flash of magic. Waiters pound their metal trays on the counter, college students throw their arms in the air, and old men shake their heads in disbelief. Together they shout his name with abandon, over and over again. Messi! Messi! Messi! He’s done it again. On this night, the shining light of Barcelona football has created a moment of legend, the type of play that turns mortal players into a name that is chanted into the night.

I found this café by accident, wandering down the hillside from my flat in Putxet. Plaza Molina, a busy Metro stop, was not my destination. Typically, I strolled past the bustling square on my way into Gràcia, skipping the little restaurants on the border of the plaza filled with commuters and business people stopping for drinks on the way home.

But the lights of a small place on the corner caught my eye. My only goal was to find a place to watch the Barca match and have a beer. The café was small, but I spotted an empty stool at the cramped counter. Drowned by the sound of the announcers booming from the TV, I shouted an order for patatas bravas and slid between a stoic older couple and two surly-looking young men in black. Everyone was glued to the TV, ignoring the chatter and bustle of the restaurant around them. The game progressed; people cheered and drank. And then it happened: a flash of greatness, something wild and wonderful that would leave us flabbergasted, excited, and mesmerized by the ability of an athlete to create something mythical.

Lionel Messi is no ordinary superstar in Barcelona, and this was no ordinary match. It was the semifinal of the Champions League, Europe’s biggest tournament, an event that surpasses the Super Bowl on the world stage. The opponent was German power Bayern Munich, a team that many believed was destined to win the tournament, led by the stars who had won Germany the World Cup title the year before. Every café and bar in Barcelona was filled with fans, as the city ritualistically ceased activity to focus on the crucial match for La Blaugrana.

The goal was pure Messi. More than simply a quick kick or a lucky header, it was executed with Messi’s particular style and flair. It was his second of the match, a dagger to the heart of Bayern’s hopes. In a sport that reveres the “beautiful game,” Messi created a piece of art. At the 80th minute, just three minutes after his first goal, he took the ball at the top of the box and moved toward the goal. With one juke to his left and a stutter step to his right, he completely turned around All-Star Bayern defender Jérôme Boateng, who did an awkward pirouette and fell to the turf. And then, as the coup de grace, Messi used a deft touch to lift the ball over the outstretched arms of goalkeeper Manuel Neuer, one of the world’s best, who at 6 feet 4 towers over 5-foot-5-inch Messi, known as La Pulga, the Flea.

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In the opening scenes of “City of Shadows,” a man is hung from the roof of Gaudí’s famed Casa Milà, a UNESCO World Heritage site, and burned alive. Viewers who stick around will be treated to visual tours of several other Gaudí sites and old Barcelona’s neighborhoods, some with a burning body and others without.

For fans of Barcelona, “City of Shadows” embraces the city like few productions, taking full advantage of the city’s charms and mysteries. Almost every scene finds a new eye-catching Barcelona locale to spotlight, to the point it can seem like a tourism bureau video, except, of course, for the burning bodies.

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