El Born

Small, intimate, friendly and funky, 'Born' (as those in the know call it) is where just about everything fashionable is happening now - in art, clothes design, interior decoration, smart restaurants, cool cocktail lounges, chic wine bars and hip dance clubs.

The neighbourhood is a complex maze of narrow street where you can continuously explore and uncover hidden bars, artesan shops, retail outlets and cavernous bodegas.

The heart and soul of this community is the wide open, tree-lined Passeig del Born, a wonderful place to walk through at night or to stop and watch the world go by.

From the thirteenth to the seventeenth centuries, this was pretty much the main square of Barcelona, the site of the city's public festivities, which included jousting tournaments, carnivals and even the burning of heretics during the Inquisition. It's still a very active place with happenings during religous feast days and public holidays.

At one end of the Passeig is an impressive metal and glass structure, the former Mercat del Born covered market, which is being converted into a museum, while at the other end is one of the most important Gothic churches in all Catalonia, the beautiful Santa Maria del Mar.

Known as the People's Cathedral or the Cathedral of the Sea this is one of the most popular and frequented religious centres for city inhabitants, and whenever you choose to visit there is the feeling that this is an authentic, functioning place of worship rather than a tourist attraction.

Built in the fourteenth century, both the exterior and interior have been wonderfully preserved and restoration work on paintings and stained-glass windows is in continual progress to ensure everyone's favourite church stays in an immaculate state.

The ambience inside and around its walls really gives you a timeless feeling, all the streets around the cathedral are named after the craft guilds who financed it all those years ago. Recently the subject of a book called "Cathedral of the Sea", it's truly the center of gravity for the whole area around it.

El Born has two distinct personalities, one daylight, the other nocturnal, the former geared up to shop till you drop, the latter dedicated to some serious partying.

Here are a mixture of day and night locales, but just remember that to explore the neighbourhood's vibrant nightlife, you need to pace the evening well by not starting out too early. Most bars and restaurants do not even open till 9pm.

Whether by day or by night, the Born is beautifully relaxed and has an infleunce on your wellbeing in her company for a minute wishing you had more or for an evening full of great memories.   

Barri Gotic

The Barri Gòtic ('Gothic Quarter' in Catalan) is the centre of the old city of Barcelona. Many of the buildings date from Medieval times, some from as far back as the Roman settlement of Barcelona. Remains of the squared Roman Wall can be seen around Tapineria to the north, Avinguda de la Catedral and Plaça Nova to the west.

The Barri Gòtic retains a labyrinthine street plan, with many small streets opening onto beautiful squares like the Placa del Pi and the magnificent Placa Rieal which has it's own special character late at night. 

Constructed in the 19th and early 20th centuries, some parts of the Eixample were heavily influenced by modernist architects, chief among whom is Antoni Gaudí. His work in the Eixample includes the Casa Milà (nicknamed La Pedrera) and the Casa Batlló, both of which are on the wide Passeig de Gràcia, as well as the Sagrada Família.

The Eixample is characterized by long straight streets, a strict grid pattern crossed by wide avenues, and truncated-square blocks (named illes in Catalan, manzanas in Spanish).

This was a visionary, pioneering design by Ildefons Cerdà, who considered traffic and transport along with sunlighting and ventilation in coming up with his characteristic octagon-shaped blocks, where the streets broaden at every intersection making for greater visibility, better ventilation and (today) some short-stay parking space.

The grid pattern remains as a hallmark of Barcelona. The important needs of the inhabitants were incorporated into his plan which called for markets, schools, hospitals every so many blocks. Today, most of the markets remain open in the spots they have been from the beginning.

The most important avenues in the Eixample are Passeig de Gràcia (that links Plaça Catalunya with the old town of Gràcia), Avinguda Diagonal (that cuts the grid diagonally), and Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes (that crosses all Barcelona from southwest to northeast). Other wide avenues in the area include Carrer d'Aragó and Passeig de Sant Joan. 

The Eixample is well known for it's nightlife, there is a hige choice of bars, clubs and restaurants scattered over a wide area. What makes the Eixample special though is the unique atmosphere over every block, each having its own tightly integrated community.