Exclusive Casa Vicens Tour: Gaudí´s First Masterpiece

This guided tour will take you to discover the first house built by Antoni Gaudí, a house with an unusual oriental and Mudejar aroma, covered with spectacular green and white tiles. The building is the prelude to Gaudi’s body of work and hints at the future of Art Nouveau (Modernisme) in Catalonia.

Casa Vicens was built as a summer house between 1883 and 1885; it was designed by the 31-year-old Gaudí for Manel Vicens i Montaner (1836-1895), a broker-dealer. It is Gaudí’s first building in Barcelona where he was able to display his enormous talent.

In Casa Vicens, Gaudí recreated the figurative worlds that were fashionable at the time, but in a highly personal way. The house is built following Catalan construction traditions, which the architect interpreted in unexpected ways, while he also incorporated his own decorative and symbolic elements. As a whole, it heralds and displays the creative freedom that would become the hallmark of his entire life’s work.

In addition to being one of the starting points of Gaudí’s career, the architect created an innovative, original work in Casa Vicens which is different from anything that had been built in Catalonia before. Casa Vicens thus became one of the first examples of the aesthetic renewal of art and architecture that was taking place all around Europe in the late 19th century.

It is the eighth building in Barcelona listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the last to be opened to the public. The tour is available in English and Spanish.

The visit ends at Casa Vicens. Located in the quiet neighborhood of Gracia which is well connected with public transport.