Batllo House - Table of Contents ....................      Architecture Around the World

Exterior - Batllo House/Casa Batlló
Barcelona, Spain  

1887
Remodeled 1904–1906 by
Antoni Gaudi
(Pronounced an TONIO gow DEE on the La Pedrera museum English version Audio Guide)

Style:  Art Nouveau (Modernisme)

PHOTOS

Facade
The facade of the Casa Batlló is made of sandstone covered with colorful trencadis (a Catalan type of mosaic). Typical of Gaudí, straight lines are avoided whenever possible. The first floor features irregularly sculpted oval
windows. Balconies at the lower floors have bone-like pillars, those on the upper floors look like pieces of skulls. These features gave the house the nickname 'House of Bones'. The enlarged windows on the first floor gave it another nickname, 'House of Yawns'.


Scaled Roof
T
he colorful scaled roof recalls a reptile skin. According to some authorities on Gaudí architecture, the roof represents a dragon; the small turret with a cross would symbolize the sword of St. George stuck into the dragon. The bones and skulls on the facade represent all the dragon's victims. 

- Casa Batlló   (1/2011)
Mighty pillars that appear to resemble the feet of some giant elephant are the first thing to meet the eye of the passerby from street level.

The roof reminds him of a completely different animal: it is bordered by a jagged line similar to the backbone of a gigantic dinosaur.

A facade extends between the two, including a number of small, elegantly curved balconies that seem to stick to the front of the house like birds' nests on the face of the cliff. The facade itself glitters in numerous colours, and small round plates that look like fish scales are let into it.
There are no edges or corners here; even the walls are rounded in undulations and have in essence the feel of the smooth skin of a sea serpent about them."

- Rainer Zervst. Gaudi, 1852-1926, Antoni Gaudi i Cornet Đ A Life Devoted to Architecture. Cologne: Benedikt Taschen Verlag GmbH & Co. KG., 1988. p162.   (1/2011)



"Apple of Discord" - buildings of different architectural styles


The exaggerated size of the windows on the street facade earned Casa Batlló the nickname "the house of yawns."

 


"One way that Gaudí violated the civic building regulations was to push the lower three floors two feet (60 centimeters) into the public sidewalk. For many years the Batlló family rented the ground floor to the proprietor of an antique shop. Having the bone-like sandstone columns "jump out" into the Paseo de Gracia was the best form of advertising this merchant could have wanted.

"The gallery on the second floor, corresponding to the Batlló's living room, is marked by elaborately carved sandstone and appears to assert the family's economic power in Barcelona. The third floor, housing the bedroom quarters of the Batlló apartment, has two full-length bay windows that extend over the pavement. More discrete vaulted balconies characterize the top three floors, which were rented out to others."  - Rachel Grossman


Gallery on the second floor



"The roof is arched and was likened to the back of a dragon or dinosaur. A common theory about the building is that the rounded feature to the left of centre, terminating at the top in a turret and cross, represents the lance of Saint George (patron saint of Catalonia, Gaudi's home), which has been plunged into the back of the dragon." - Wikipedia (1/2011)




"For the mosaic that covers the upper section of the exterior wall, the architect applied pieces of recycled glass and custom-made ceramic disks. When the sun hits the front of the building during the day, the facade magically materializes and dematerializes in a celebration of color. By chipping away at the brick of the original building and then covering the uneven surface with lime mortar and mosaic, the architect intensified this optical effect. He then crowned the building with an attic covered by scale-like tiles and completed the composition with a medieval-style turret."    - Rachel Grossman








Photos and their arrangement © 2009 Chuck LaChiusa
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