Spain – Page 4 – From Pyrenees to Pennines

Geometry at Glòries

Yesterday, returning from Ciutadella Park on the tram, we broke our journey at Glòries. This is an area that is being re-invented and opened up to the pedestrian in a big way, though it IS a work in progress. Here’s where you come for the huge flea market that is Mercat dels Encants (The Market of Charms), which is indeed an astonishing place to visit. Hundreds of stalls selling cheap clothing, fabrics, electrical goods, and the fag-end of a thousand house clearances and jumble sales have been re-homed into an astonishing building, the underside of whose roof has been plated with thousands of rectangular mirrors reflecting the teeming activity going on underneath.

Here’s the actual scene:

The roof also reflects the building and excavating and walkway-making going on below.

Or your eyes can look further, and see the distant Sagrada Familia …

… or the much nearer Torre Glòries, which we really need to climb one day to see the views.

An engaging way to spend an hour or two, and once the work on the area has been completed, it’ll be a wonderful addition to the Barcelona experience.

GeometricJanuary.

Geometry in a School

There’s a school here in Premià de Mar that I always enjoy walking past. It’s a handsome Modernista building that’s next to impossible to photograph, set as it is in narrow streets and surrounded by a high wall. It wasn’t always a school.

It was built in 1898 as a textile factory, dealing with almost every process: spinning, weaving and finishing. But here, as in England, and in the Ariège where we once lived, this once-thriving industry declined rapidly during the twentieth century. The factory closed in 1928, but re-opened in a last gasp attempt to make it work, as a silk-sceen printing works, the first of its kind in Spain. The owner was a man from Lyon, a M. Badoy, and locals came to call the factory La Lyon. The factory was forced to close its doors for good in 1979, but everyone saw that this important building must be saved, for historic and artistic reasons. So it reopened as a school in 1984. And it’s now called La Lió, and is quite the local landmark, with its tall – and entirely unused these days – factory chimney.

GeometricJanuary.

Geometry in Cabrils

We’ve just spent an hour or two in Cabrils. It’s a rather desirable little town near here that’s got itself a bit of a reputation as a gastronomes’ haven. The cafe we chose for a mid-morning break didn’t bear that out, but it was good enough. We were more struck by a clutch of fine buildings: the church with its glazed tile bell-tower; the original town school, now repurposed as a School of Music, ordinary houses with handsome windows; and especially , round and about in the surrounding countryside, castle after castle. The one at the edge of town, which had probably never been defensive and is now abandoned seemed a bit sad. It looked ripe for conversion into fine flats or a luxury hotel.

Sorry about the TV ariel by the church. I couldn’t find a view, in those narrow winding streets that avoided it, Here, below, is that castle I mentioned, and one outside town too. All with geometry firmly employed in their contruction.

GeometricJanuary.

Geometry in an Iconic Door

Premiá de Mar, like most towns round here, has its share of Modernist architecture. Today I’m showing you a splendid door from 1918. Originally a cinema, this building known as El Patronat became a parish hall, before returning to its roots and becoming a local arts centre for performances and film screenings. I always enjoy its exuberant doorways when I pass by.

GeometricJanuary.

Geometry at Espinaler

Here in Catalonia, the thing to do before a Sunday meal or when out meeting friends, is to visit a vermuteria, and sit down for a chat and a vermouth, negro o blanco. And if you’re on this part of the Maresme coast, you may very well choose to go to Espinaler in our next door town, Vilassar de Mar. It’s been part of the local scenery since 1896.

While it started as a simple bar, it’s gone on to bigger and better things: producing its own vermut; developing a piquant sauce, also called Espinaler that brings a little spice and je ne sais quoi to whatever you’re eating; preserving seafoods; and finally developing, in 2012, a gourmet store-tavern-warehouse in Vilassar. That’s where Malcolm and I went today – to window-shop ahead of buying a few treats to take home with us. Here are a few of the things we spotted. Before of course sitting down for a vermut and a tapa or two.

You might notice they even have the odd item from England. I haven’t any photos from the appetising cheese and charcuterie counters, because – well – they weren’t very geometrically-packed products.

GeometricJanuary

Geomètric Cavalcada del Reis Mags

Did you know that the Three Kings who brought gifts to the baby Jesus arrived in a ship? No, neither did I till this evening. Look.

They’ve already done what they had to do by visiting the Christ child. Now here they are approaching Premià de Mar, preparing to bring gifts tonight to all the good children in town. The ship flies the (geometric) flag of Saint George, patron saint of Catalonia. And the port itself is geometric enough, with the masts of so many sailing ships as a foil to the choir singing to welcome the three monarchs.

Later, they put in an appearance at the town square, then processed round the town. I have better (I hope) photos of the event on my camera, but for now, let’s make do with a few mobile phone snapshots – and not very geometric at that. Not so much of the kings, but of their elephants; drummers; coal wagons (naughty children get coal, not presents); post-people receiving letters written by hopeful children. Pictures of the kings, of the distributors of sweets, and other assorted bits of fun will have to wait for another day.

GeometricJanuary

Above the Clouds

Here in the UK, we know a lot about clouds. And at this time of year, we know a lot about grey clouds. Looking out of the window just now yields an unending vista of smoky grey, darkening over Mickley way to gunmetal and slate. No cotton-wool puffs of cumulus for us.

So let me whisk you to a day in June, when the plane transporting me from Barcelona to Leeds offered me a constantly changing cloudscape below me, with tantalising glimpses of beaches, landscapes and the Pyrenees, the Atlantic coast, and then crowded old England. The featured photo shows us just leaving Barcelona – hardly a cloud in the sky. And then …

Although generally a big fan of monochrome, on a grey day like this, I’m not sure I like these clouds and vistas in black and white. My memory of that summer day was of clear bright and optimistic colours. But needs must. This is for Monochrome Madness, and hosted this week by Brian, of Bushboy’s World.

Where Words Fail, Music Speaks

Where words fail, music speaks: so said Hans Christian Anderson. And when Leanne invited me to host Monochrome Madness for One Week Only, I thought Music might be a good theme. We bloggers come from all over the world. Though many of us, in many nations, have English as our first language, there are dozens of different ones in the WordPress melting pot. But we can all enjoy music together, whether singing, playing instruments, or dancing, Or all of the above at once. Let’s do it.

My header image was taken at the neighbourhood Festa Major in Gràcia, Barcelona. It’s out of focus, and I don’t care. It captures I think the verve and enjoyment of those performing drummers.

Here are some dancers in neighbourhood festivals: in Catalonia; and in England – Morris Men.

Instrument players now. The drummer accompanying the Morris dancers; drummers celebrating Chusak in South Korea, and brass players marching in London in those heady optimistic days when some of us still thought Brexit might not happen.

Of course some instrumentalists out in the street are trying to earn a living. Here are buskers in Ripon and Bath.

And a harpist playing at a friend’s wedding in the grounds of the ruined Abbey at Jervaulx ….

Here are singers in Seville, relying simply on the beauty of their voices; and a singer-instrumentalist, heavily dependent on a supply of electricity to produce a sound.

Of course, first you have to have your instrument. Here’s a music shop in Málaga.

This thrush is a musician from the natural world. He commandeers a high branch here, spring after spring, and simply sings his heart out from early morning to early evening, almost without stopping. I wish you could hear him.

And while we’re in the Great Outdoors, is there anything more musical than a tinkling and plashing stream, tumbling tunefully over rocks?

Please do join in with your own musical offerings. And link back both to this post, and to Leanne’s site too, here.

Workaday Staircases

This week’s Monochrome Madness theme is proposed by Aletta of nowathome: and she’s chosen Steps or Stairs. It’s an interesting idea, and one where I could have chosen the grand and elegant staircases gracing the finest palaces and country houses of the rich, titled or famous.

Instead I’ve chosen the steps trodden by ordinary folk on their daily round in Barcelona (featured photo), Newcastle and Sitges; or by monks engaged in their spiritual duties at Fountains Abbey; or by a hiker, needing to nip over a few drystone walls on her several mile journey from A to B.

Or there’s the worker helping construct la Sagrada Familia in Barcelona. It might be one of the most famous buildings in Europe, but shinning about its heights looking for footholds is just part of his 9 – 5, every working day.

Works conttinues at La Sagrada Familia, Barcelona

And I’ll leave you with one little treat. A harpist at Jervaulx Abbey this summer, playing at the wedding of some good friends of ours. She was working, even if the rest of us weren’t.

Reflections in Spain

A few weeks ago, I posted a picture of the Puente del Mar in Valencia. Today, my feature photo displays a different image of this bridge, because this week, Leanne has asked us to post reflections for Monochrome Madness .

And I’m going to stay in Spain, and take a stroll round maritime Barcelona. Yet not a watery reflection in sight.