Explorer Barcelone

The Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya occupies the Palau Nacional on Montjuïc, a domed palace built for the 1929 International Exhibition. Its collection runs from Romanesque wall paintings taken from Pyrenean churches through Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque art to Catalan modernisme and noucentisme of the early 20th century.

Torre Glòries, formerly Torre Agbar, is a 38-storey office tower of 144 metres on Avinguda Diagonal, designed by Jean Nouvel and opened in 2005. Its rounded body is wrapped in coloured panels behind glass louvres. The Mirador on the top floor, 125 metres up, gives a 360-degree view over the city, and its dome holds the climbable installation Cloud Cities Barcelona.

The Barcelona Pavilion is a reconstruction of the German Pavilion that Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich designed for the 1929 International Exposition on Montjuïc. The original was demolished in 1930 and rebuilt in 1986; its thin flat roof, walls of marble, onyx and travertine, and shallow pools are shown with the Barcelona chairs designed for it.

Poble Espanyol is an open-air architectural museum on Montjuïc, built for the 1929 Barcelona International Exposition. Its 117 full-scale buildings reproduce streets, squares and houses from regions across Spain, and now hold artisan workshops, restaurants and the Fran Daurel museum of contemporary art.

Casa Vicens in Gràcia is Antoni Gaudí's first major house, built between 1883 and 1885 as a summer residence for the stockbroker Manuel Vicens. Its walls of rough stone and brick are banded with green and white tiles in a Neo-Mudéjar style; the restored rooms, garden and roof terrace are open as a museum, part of a UNESCO World Heritage site since 2005.

Sant Pau Recinte Modernista is the former Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau, a complex built between 1901 and 1930 to designs by Lluís Domènech i Montaner. Its 12 pavilions, linked by underground galleries and set among gardens, served as a hospital until 2009, reopened after restoration in 2014 and form part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Casa Rocamora is a two-storey Isabelline-style villa from the mid-19th century in the Putxet district, home of the collector Manuel Rocamora from 1935 until his death in 1976. Kept by the foundation he inspired, it shows his collections of painting, Alcora ceramics, ship figureheads, automata and advertising posters on guided tours.

Gaudí Experiència is an exhibition centre about the architect Antoni Gaudí on Carrer de Larrard, about 100 metres from Park Güell, opened in 2012. A ten-minute 4D film is the centrepiece, alongside large touchscreen walls on his life and work and models of Park Güell and the unbuilt Hotel Attraction in New York.

Park Güell is a hillside park in the Gràcia district, designed by Antoni Gaudí for Eusebi Güell and built between 1900 and 1914 as a planned garden estate; it opened as a public park in 1926. The ticketed monumental zone holds the two entrance pavilions, the dragon stairway, the Hypostyle Room and the great terrace edged by a serpentine bench in tile mosaic.

Camp Nou is the stadium of FC Barcelona in the Les Corts district, opened in 1957 and the largest football ground in Europe. Since 2023 it has been rebuilt and enlarged towards about 105,000 seats, and matches returned in November 2025 with part of the stands open. The club museum, opened in 1984, shows trophies and club history, and its tickets include a stadium viewpoint.

Bellesguard is a modernist country house in Sant Gervasi, designed by Antoni Gaudí and built between 1900 and 1909 on the site of a residence of King Martin of Aragon. Its stone walls, battlements and slender spire topped by a cross recall medieval Gothic forms, with mosaics by Domènec Sugrañes, and a garden with remains of the royal residence surrounds it.

Tibidabo Amusement Park sits on the summit of Tibidabo, the highest point of the Collserola ridge above Barcelona; its funicular opened in 1901 and the first rides followed in 1905. Several early rides still run, among them the Avió aeroplane and the Talaia, alongside a Ferris wheel and roller coasters with views over the city and the sea.