The Palau del Baró de Quadras on Avinguda Diagonal is one of Puig i Cadafalch's most accomplished buildings — a 1904 neo-Gothic Modernista mansion whose exterior presents one face to the Diagonal (European Gothic) and a completely different face to Carrer Rosselló (Moorish-Mudéjar). The interior, now the Institut Ramon Llull (open for cultural events and periodically for visits), is the architectural argument: the entrance hall combines geometric patterned floor tiles, bench seating in black-and-white geometric tilework, painted friezes of botanical and geometric motifs, dark wood and stained-glass double doors, and a ribbed vault overhead. The sources are multiple and deliberately synthetic — Romanesque, Gothic, Mudéjar, Arts and Crafts — held together by a decorative intelligence that Domènech i Montaner shared but expressed differently. The building is one of four Puig i Cadafalch houses within three blocks of the Passeig de Gràcia that together constitute the Manzana de la Discordia (Block of Discord) with works by Domènech and Gaudí.
Diagonal, Barcelona, Spain