Santa Maria del Mar

In front of you rises Santa Maria del Mar, for many the masterpiece of Catalan Gothic. No king or bishop paid for it: the Ribera district did, its merchants, shipowners, sailors and dock workers.

1A church built in a hurry

The first stone was laid on 25 March 1329, in a city grown rich on maritime trade. The work, led by Berenguer de Montagut and Ramon Despuig, was finished in 1383, just 54 years later. For a church of this size that was astonishing speed, and it explains its unity of style: three soaring naves and slender, widely spaced columns that create a sense of space you won't easily forget.

2The bastaixos

The bastaixos were the porters of the harbour. According to parish records, they pledged to carry the stone on their shoulders, unpaid, from the quarries of Montjuïc to the building site. Their effort is carved into the church itself: you'll see them on the bronze panels of the main door and in other reliefs inside. Ildefonso Falcones' novel «Cathedral of the Sea» made their story famous in 2006.

In 1936, at the start of the Civil War, a fire raged through the interior for days and destroyed the Baroque altarpiece. That is why the inside now feels bare and full of light, perhaps closer to what its builders had in mind.

A neighbourhood church that, through the will of its people, became one of the great works of European Gothic.

3What to look for

• The bronze bastaixos on the main doors.
• The rose window, rebuilt in the 15th century after an earthquake.
• The Fossar de les Moreres, along the side: the memorial to the defenders who fell in the siege of 1714.