Santa Maria del Mar

It might seem strange that a building whose insides were devastated by fire over 70 years ago is considered by many to be Barcelona’s most beautiful church – but that is true of the Església de Santa Maria del Mar; the Church of Saint Mary of the Sea.

To be found at the south-western end of the Passeig del Born, where jousting tournaments were once held, the church is probably best approached from Las Ramblas direction. In that way, the magnificent towers will loom ahead of you, with the enormous main door and rose window forming an impressive façade. As you draw near the main door, look at the two carvings of the workers carrying stones across from the quarry on Montjuïc during the church’s construction.

Architecturally, if you need a building to encapsulate everything about Catalan Gothic, then Santa Maria del Mar would fulfil your criterion – lots of strong horizontal lines, buttresses, wide open spaces, flat roofing, rib vaults, octagonal towers with terraces – and it has that wonderfully striking rose window which dominates the west end. But the total beauty of Santa Maria del Mar is so much more than the sum of its parts – however impressive they might be.

At the time of its building, which began in 1324, the church was right on the seashore, at the place where the apostle James is thought to have preached. With its first mass being held in 1384, the church was completed in only 55 years, despite a fire causing considerable damage during the construction. The original rose window was destroyed by an earthquake in the fifteenth century but the present one was added only 30 years afterwards.

The church was again subject to damage in 1714, the time of the War of the Spanish Succession, but then the interior was completely burned out in 1936 when anticlerical feeling in Barcelona during the Civil War was at its height. Although many of the stained glass windows have been restored, the simple, breathtakingly elegant interior has been largely left alone; and its beauty is emphasised because of that.

Santa Maria del Mar is truly one of those places where the visitor will simply want to ’stand and stare’; the huge space and the total majesty of the building is quite uplifting. If you are fortunate enough to be in Barcelona when a concert is performed in the church, then apparently the acoustics are sensational.

In the middle of a complete maze of narrow stone streets which offer tantalising glimpses of the church as you approach it, the church of Santa Maria del Mar is, in many ways, one of Barcelona’s least well-known gems, which is a great pity. There are some lovely little street cafés around where you can sit – and perhaps read Ildefonso Falcones’ 2008 novel ‘Cathedral of the Sea’ which is set at the time of the church’s construction.

The church is open daily for visitors from 9 until 1.30 and from 4.30 until 8.00; the nearest Metro station is Jaume I on Yellow Line 4.

It really shouldn’t be missed.

Next: Barcelona Cathedral