Description

The Colonia Güell is a small working class colony belonging to the municipality of Santa Coloma de Cervelló; it is considered a benchmark for the study of Antoni Gaudí’s architecture and is also one of the most important Modernist groupings and tourist attractions of Catalonia.

Unlike the vast majority of industrial colonies in Catalonia, Eusebi Güell strived to procure social improvements for the working class exercising his position as patron of culture. He equipped Colonia Güell with cultural and religious facilities and incorporated new Modernist constructions. Dominating the scene is the church designed by Antoni Gaudí though unfinished, it lays the foundations for what would later become Barcelona’s Sagrada Família.

The project of a worker’s colony devised by Güell availed of a hospital, an eatery, schools, shops, theaters, cooperatives and a chapel in addition to the factories and workers’ housing. Gaudí overlooked the mapping of this cluster with the collaboration of his assistants Francesc Berenguer, Joan Rubió and Joseph Canaleta. He personally took charge of the design of the church of which only the crypt was built, however, after the Count’s death in 1918 his sons abandoned the project.

The other buildings were carried out by employees of Gaudí: Francesc Berenguer built the Cooperative (with Joan Rubió, 1900) and the School (with his son Francesc Berenguer i Bellvehí, from 1912 to1917); Joan Rubio built several private homes, such as Ca l’Ordal (1894) and Ca l’Espinal (1900); Francesc Berenguer also built the Sant Lluís Cultural Center (1915-1917) and the Parish House (1917).

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