On the second day of our visit to Barcelona we headed to the neighborhood known as "El Born". I had picked this neighborhood to explore as it houses the Textile Museum - but it is also just a fun, hip area with lots of things to see.
We passed by a park near our hotel on the way to catch a bus to El Born that had an interesting art installation. This is the Diagonal Mar Park:
The park was designed by a Catalan architect (Catalunya is the region where Barcelona is found and Catalan is the language - in addition to Spanish - that the people speak) Enric Miralles. Water sprays through the metal structure and big mosaic pots house plants.
It's a pretty park and a lot quieter than Parc Güell!
Our first stop in El Born neighborhood was...another park!! This is the Park Ciutadella which - although a bit smaller - reminded me a lot of Balboa Park in San Diego. It has some lovely water features, statues and also contains museums like the Zoological Museum, the Geological Museum, the Modern Art Museum and the Zoo itself. One of the prettiest features of the Park is the Cascada Fountain:
It was built in 1888 for the Universal Exhibition in Barcelona and Gaudi collaborated on the design - although he was just a student at the time. This park felt really lighthearted and fun to me. Even the statues seemed designed to put a smile on your face. Case in point, this statue of a wooly mammoth:
There are so many pretty spots to photograph in this park. This is a building that I think just houses plants for the park - it didn't look like it was open for any kind of touring, but I thought it was pretty and it had a nice fountain near it:
Next we were off to the Textile Museum, but first we passed the old El Born market ("mercat" in Catalan) which used to contain all the fruit, vegetable and meat stands for the neighborhood. They have a new and very cool new market but I loved the old building and snapped this photo walking up to it:
The Textile Museum is down a little street and just past the Picasso Museum.
Of course the Picasso Museum seems like the obvious choice to see when you only have two days in Barcelona - and I've heard it's an excellent museum. However, we toured the Picasso museum in Malaga and have been to the Reina Sofia a few times to view their Picasso collection and Hubby was definately all Picasso'd out. I suppose this is why he didn't put up a huge fuss over spending time in the Textile Museum - at least it wasn't Picasso:
The photo is from the Textile Museumsite. As you can see, the building is very old which makes the contrast with the interior, which is modern and stylish even cooler! The collection of antique clothes and fabric is fascinating and the Museum also had pieces from modern designers mixed in with some of the antique collections. It was interesting to consider the contrast in the old and the new, to see the difference (or similarity) in construction of the clothes, and the different fabrics used.
For instance the dresses in the display above, date from I think the 17th century - except for the dress in the middle which is a Vivian Westwood design. Fits right in though!
Of course, I was in embroidery heaven as there were all sorts of embroidered fabrics, gloves, stockings, and undergarments.
I can't even imagine how many hours it took to embroider those robes.
We spent a little more time in the Born neighborhood. There were so many cute cafes and picturesque streets:
We did some wandering, some eating and some people watching then headed back to the hotel to grab our stuff and catch the train. By the way - the Franca station in Barcelona is so pretty:
It almost makes you look forward to four hours spent in cramped train seats eating horrible Spanish train food. ALMOST.
So that's it - a quick trip to Barcelona, but as it's only 4 hours away by train I foresee several more trips before we leave Spain. I'm looking forward to exploring the rest of the city.
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