Park Guell is one of the most beautiful public parks in the whole world
The park was created by genius architect Antonio Gaudi and now it is located in Barcelona. Gaudi planned and directed the construction of the park for 14 years - from 1900 to 1914 for Eusebi Guell for a residential park intended for sixty single - family residences. But the project was unsuccessful and in 1923the park became city property. Though never fully completed, it still remains one of Gaudi's most colorful and playful works. Park Guell started to be all of Barcelona's, then the world's favourite. Gaudi let loose his imagination. While for houses he drew on natural forms, here he shaped nature into colonnades, archways and covered galleries with well-camouflaged artificial structures. This park is a playground for the mind: visual jokes, like columns that simulate palm-tree trunks, rubble-surfaced arches that grow out of the ground, quilts of ceramic tiles. A graceful gazebo is made of twisted angle iron - cheap to make, looks good, does not lie about its material yet its shape is as softly curved as climbing vines. The centerpiece is the intended covered market, a majestic forest of fluted columns. Its roof forms a vast terrace with a view of the city. It's surrounded by an undulating continuous bench, the back of which forms a balustrade, its entire surface encrusted with ceramic shards of all colors, some randomly arranged, some in patterns. The seat is really comfortable for a stone bench: Gaudi had a workman drop his pants and sit in soft plaster to record the correct anatomical curve - foreshadowing the science of ergonomics by half a century. Past the entrance a smiling dragon stretches in the middle of the divided stairway. Children love it and few adult visitors can resist patting the beast on the head - the park has that kind of spirit. Park Guell is one of Barcelona’s most famous landmarks. On any day, and especially on weekends, you can see hordes of tourists and locals staring awestruck at the gingerbread gatehouses and snapping photos of the giant ceramic lizard/dragon on the stairs that lead up the hillside. Below sits a reservoir for the park's fountains. Above rests a terrace lined with an organic, tile-covered bench ergonomically designed against the back of a worker on the site. Park Guell is one of the most important sights in Barcelona and one of Gaudi’s masterpieces.
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