In Barcelona, An Afternoon Of Art Can End With A Swim
Bogatell Beach is the reset button after modern landmarks, museums, and vintage racks.
After moving through independent shops, wine bars, and landmarks, writer Amy Louise Bailey pauses her Barcelona itinerary at the water. She built the guide from her own return visits and addresses passed between friends.
Bailey puts it this way: “Barcelona’s particular advantage is that an afternoon of galleries, vintage and Modernisme can still end in the Mediterranean.”
By culture, Bailey means a compact afternoon circuit. It includes the glass, steel, marble, and onyx pavilion created for the 1929 International Exposition and credited to Mies van der Rohe with Lilly Reich, Catalan artist Joan Miro’s work in architect Josep Lluis Sert’s hilltop building on Montjuic, and architect Antoni Gaudi’s first major residential commission, Casa Vicens.
By vintage, Bailey leans on Juliet Lash, a senior director for VIP clients at Moda Operandi who lives in Barcelona. Lash starts with 1812 for its cool, Y2K energy and adds Alabama Collect, where the owner mixes designer vintage with well chosen no-name pieces. Shopping and sightseeing overlap at the CASA LOEWE flagship, which sits inside Casa Lleo Morera, the Modernista building on Passeig de Gracia designed by architect Lluis Domenech i Montaner, in the famous cluster of facades known as the Block of Discord.
Bailey writes of Bogatell Beach, “When you have had enough architecture for one afternoon, there is Bogatell Beach.”
Questions people ask
Where exactly is Bogatell Beach?
Bogatell is northeast of the old port, past Barceloneta and Nova Icaria. It draws a more local crowd than Barceloneta and has showers, toilets, lifeguards in season, and nearby places to eat and drink.
When is the water warm enough for a swim?
The sea is usually warm enough from late May to early October, most reliably July to September. Read on November 5, the water is not warm now, so treat Bogatell as a walk, not a swim.
What is the Block of Discord?
It is a row of grand, competing facades on Passeig de Gracia, including Casa Lleo Morera. The name comes from the striking clash of styles, and it is now one of the easiest places to see Modernista architecture while shopping.