Sagrada Familia Church of the Holy Family

Barcelona, Spain
The 328-foot-tall (100-meter) spires of the Church of the Sagrada Familia dominate the skyline of Barcelona, the chief city of Catalonia, in northeastern Spain. This unique church, which, in the tradition of the medieval cathedrals of Europe, remains unfinished more than a century after it was started, is one of the great pieces of world architecture. Its fantastic forms defy our vocabulary and confound any attempt at stylistic classification. It marks the fin de siecle rejection of historical revivalism perhaps it is the last true Gothic church but unlike the willful forms of the contemporary Art Nouveau (a category to which some historians have consigned it), it is respectful of the past in its local context and the broader sphere. To repeat, it is unique. Around 1874, Jose Mar