A must visit: MODERNISTA HOSPITAL DE SANT PAU (Domènech i Montaner)

You must have included Sagrada Familia in the visits you plan to do in Barcelona. That’s ok, of course. But you may not have included a visit to HOSPITAL DE SANT PAU. That’s wrong.

 

Sant Pau interior detail.
Photo by Jaume Meneses
(in Wikimedia Commons)
Photo Licence in Creative Commons

You really should try to spend some time there. It is not just a Hospital. It is one of the landmarks of the Modernista style and it was conceived by one of the greatest architects that had work in Catalonia, ever. Check Lluís Domènech i Montaner biography in Wikipedia Biography and you will be impressed. He is also the author of such a significant work as Palau de la Música Catalana.

Additionally, it is quite near Sagrada Familia, so you won’t have to spend a lot of time just moving from one place to the other.

And there is still and additional reason to visit HOSPITAL DE SANT PAU. A four-year rehabilitation has been done to make the pavilions recover their past glory. It still to be completed, but the main building and some of the pavilions have already been rehabilitated and are open to the public in paid visits.

In this City Council link some details on the rehabilitation works are given. Unfortunately, there is no English translation. I will translate just a small piece of text so you can see the rehabilitation goals: “The works in Sant Pau have been done following the original project thought by Lluís Domènech i Muntaner and built between 1905 and 1930. A work that did not end until six years after the death of the architect, and that could be finished because the architect’s son took charge of them. With the aim to keep the primary essence of the buildings, and exactly as if they were treating a human patient, the building have been taken the maximum care to preserve every architectural detail.”

Here is the link to the visit website, which also includes relevant data regarding the Hospital history (which dates back to the Middle Ages) and the Modernista buildings:

http://www.visitsantpau.com/en/

I will include some photos of my visit to the Hospital in a separate entry.