Casa Milà (La Pedrera)

Casa Milà lit up at blue hour on the corner of Passeig de Gràcia in Barcelona, its undulating stone façade glowing gold beneath a deep blue sky, with street lamps, trees and light trails from passing traffic
Location: Barcelona, SpainType: ApartmentYear: 1912Architect: Antoni GaudíPhotographer: Marco Almbauer, Richard Mortel, Joaquim Alves Gaspar, Fred Romero, Mstyslav Chernov, Benjamín Núñez González
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Casa Milà (La Pedrera) by Antoni Gaudí in Barcelona

Casa Milà, the apartment building better known as La Pedrera, was the last private residence designed by the Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí, and it stands on the corner of Passeig de Gràcia and Carrer de Provença in Barcelona, where it was built between 1906 and 1912. Its undulating stone façade, tangled wrought-iron balconies and rooftop of sculpted chimneys drew ridicule when new, and the nickname, meaning “the stone quarry”, began as a joke. Today it is one of the great works of Catalan Modernisme, and since 1984 it has been part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site that gathers the Works of Antoni Gaudí.

Looking up at the waving stone façade of La Pedrera, curved window openings and slender stone columns at the base, with tangled black wrought-iron balconies wrapping each floor

A commission on Passeig de Gràcia

The building was commissioned in 1905 by the developer Pere Milà and his wife Roser Segimon, a wealthy widow. Segimon had bought a house and garden at Passeig de Gràcia 92 and, unlike at Casa Batlló, the old house was demolished rather than remodelled; the project went to the city council in February 1906. They planned to live on the main floor and let the rest as apartments. The city fined the Milàs for exceeding the permitted height, and after the anticlerical riots of the Tragic Week in 1909 Milà dropped the statues of the Virgin Mary and two archangels that Gaudí had planned to crown the façade. Gaudí certified the whole building complete on 31 October 1912.

Organic iron entrance gate of Casa Milà seen from inside the painted hallway, irregular glazed openings like cells framing the street beyond, beneath a hanging lantern

A façade of stone waves and iron

Gaudí conceived Casa Milà as one continuous curve, inside and out. The façade is built of large limestone blocks, from the Garraf massif for the lowest floor and from Vilafranca for the floors above, each cut to follow the plaster model so that the stone flows in unbroken waves around the corner. The stone skin carries no floor loads; it is tied back to the structure by curved iron beams, which allowed windows of varying sizes to pull light deep into the flats. Across it hang the balconies of twisted wrought iron, designed with Gaudí’s collaborator Josep Maria Jujol, whose tangled forms recall seaweed and kelp.

Looking up into a courtyard of Casa Milà, curving walls of windows and iron-railed balconies rising past painted soffits to an oval of sky

Courtyards and a free plan

Behind the façade, pillars of stone, brick and cast iron take the place of load-bearing walls, so the partitions inside the flats could be moved freely without affecting the building’s stability. The plan wraps around two courtyards of different size and shape, giving it an asymmetrical figure-of-eight footprint and bringing light and air to nine levels: a basement garage, ground floor, mezzanine, main floor, four upper floors and an attic. Visitors pass through massive iron gates, their organic design attributed to Jujol, into hallways painted with mythological and floral scenes, and the courtyards rise as tall, light-filled wells.

Dramatic upward view from the base of a La Pedrera courtyard, dark rings of windows and stone framing an irregular opening to a pale grey sky

The garden of warriors

The roof terrace is the most famous space in the building. Its stepped deck rises and falls over the attic vaults, crowned by six stair exits, ventilation towers and 28 chimneys in several groups, all built of brick and finished in lime render, broken marble, glass or pottery. The poet Pere Gimferrer called it the garden of warriors, because the helmeted chimneys seem to stand guard over the skylights, and a later restoration removed chimneys added after Gaudí’s time.

Undulating roof terrace of La Pedrera with visitors walking on its stepped paths among sculpted chimney stacks and stair towers, the Barcelona skyline beyond

The attic vaults and the Pis de la Pedrera

Beneath the terrace, the attic that once held the laundries and drying rooms is carried on 270 catenary arches of thin Catalan-vaulted brick, spaced about 80 centimetres apart, which grow taller where the space narrows and lower where it widens, like the ribs of a great animal. It now houses the Espai Gaudí, an exhibition on the architect’s work. On the fourth floor, the Pis de la Pedrera recreates a family apartment of the early twentieth century, with period furniture, rippling plaster ceilings, handcrafted timber doors and hydraulic floor tiles, and a café-restaurant sits beneath sculpted white plaster ceilings.

Spiralling stair tower on the roof of Casa Milà clad in white broken-marble mosaic and topped by a cross-shaped finial, with warrior chimneys on either side under a cloudy sky

Restoration and credits

After Milà died in 1940, Segimon sold the building in 1946 but lived on the main floor until her death in 1964. Its attic was turned into flats in 1953 and by 1971 stones were working loose from the façade. Declared a historic monument in 1969, Casa Milà was bought by Caixa Catalunya in 1986, which restored the façade, roof and attic and opened the main floor as an exhibition space in 1990. Since 2013 it has been the headquarters of the Fundació Catalunya La Pedrera. The photography is by Marco Almbauer, Richard Mortel, Joaquim Alves Gaspar, Fred Romero, Mstyslav Chernov and Benjamín Núñez González, shared on Wikimedia Commons under CC BY 2.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 and CC BY-SA 4.0 licences, with Marco Almbauer’s night view released into the public domain.

Casa Milà (La Pedrera) gallery

Casa Milà lit up at blue hour on the corner of Passeig de Gràcia in Barcelona, its undulating stone façade glowing gold beneath a deep blue sky, with street lamps, trees and light trails from passing trafficCasa Milà by day seen across Passeig de Gràcia, the rippling cream limestone façade and dark wrought-iron balconies rising behind plane trees and café umbrellas under a pale skyLooking up at the waving stone façade of La Pedrera, curved window openings and slender stone columns at the base, with tangled black wrought-iron balconies wrapping each floorClose-up of a twisted wrought-iron balcony on Casa Milà, its seaweed-like black ironwork curling over a grid of glazing set into the soft curves of the carved limestoneOrganic iron entrance gate of Casa Milà seen from inside the painted hallway, irregular glazed openings like cells framing the street beyond, beneath a hanging lanternGrand stair to the main floor of Casa Milà, stone steps and a curving handrail rising beside oval windows and a carved timber door under a ceiling painted with mythological frescoesLooking up into a courtyard of Casa Milà, curving walls of windows and iron-railed balconies rising past painted soffits to an oval of skyPalms and ferns spilling from a planted stair balcony in a Casa Milà courtyard, its curving painted parapet set against the tall walls of windows aboveDramatic upward view from the base of a La Pedrera courtyard, dark rings of windows and stone framing an irregular opening to a pale grey skyView from the roof of Casa Milà down into a courtyard, the cream rendered parapet pierced with small openings and the tiers of windows falling away belowUndulating roof terrace of La Pedrera with visitors walking on its stepped paths among sculpted chimney stacks and stair towers, the Barcelona skyline beyondGroup of helmet-like stone chimneys known as the warriors on the roof of Casa Milà, cream rendered masks set against a deep blue skySpiralling stair tower on the roof of Casa Milà clad in white broken-marble mosaic and topped by a cross-shaped finial, with warrior chimneys on either side under a cloudy skyAttic of Casa Milà, the Espai Gaudí, a corridor of brick catenary arches lit softly from below with display cases receding into the darknessSunlit brick catenary arches in the attic of La Pedrera, the parabolic ribs of thin Catalan vaulting curving over a dark floor towards small windowsDining room in the Pis de la Pedrera, a red-clothed table with flowers and upholstered chairs beneath a fringed pendant lamp, a carved Modernista sideboard and tall shuttered doorsHallway of the period apartment at Casa Milà with curved frosted-glass panels, a potted palm on a pedestal, Modernista chairs and patterned floor tiles in soft daylightCafé-restaurant at Casa Milà under a rippling white sculpted plaster ceiling, bentwood chairs and white-clothed tables between stone columns and tall windows

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