The Magic Fountain of Montjuïc
Why is it significant?
Stand at the rim of this wide oval basin and look at the clusters of nozzles and glass in the water. In daylight it can look like a quiet municipal pond. After dark, on the right evenings, it turns into one of the great free shows of Europe.
Key Facts
| Place | The Magic Fountain of Montjuïc |
|---|---|
| Address | Plaça de Carles Buïgas 1, 08038 Barcelona, Spain |
| Geo Coordinates | 41.37120, 2.15170 |
| Part of Walk | Montjuïc, the Hill of Big Dreams: Barcelona's 1929 Expo, Olympic Ring & Castle |
| Generated | Generated |
Stand at the rim of this wide oval basin and look at the clusters of nozzles and glass in the water. In daylight it can look like a quiet municipal pond. After dark, on the right evenings, it turns into one of the great free shows of Europe.
The Font Màgica was designed by Carles Buïgas for the Exposition of 1929, and it was built at speed, in less than a year, by a huge workforce. Buïgas was obsessed with what he called the architecture of light and water. He did not stop at the fountain: he also arranged the beams of searchlights that fanned out behind the palace on the hill, so that at night Montjuïc seemed to wear a crown of light.
Music came later. In the 1980s the fountain was restored and synchronised with sound, and in 1988, at a great outdoor concert on this hill, Freddie Mercury and the soprano Montserrat Caballé sang their duet Barcelona, the song that became the unofficial anthem of the city's Olympic dream. Mercury died in 1991 and never saw the Games. When they came, it was his recorded voice that carried the song around the world.
Now look just above the fountain, towards the staircase. Four tall Ionic columns stand there in a row. Puig i Cadafalch first raised them in 1919, and everybody understood the message: four columns, for the four red stripes of the Catalan flag. In 1928, on the eve of the Exposition, Primo de Rivera's regime had them torn down. They were rebuilt only in 2010. Some buildings make speeches... these four were silenced for eighty years.
So the fountain you are looking at is not just a spectacle. It is the place where Barcelona has always come to celebrate, and occasionally to argue about who it is. Now walk to the right of the basin, to a low, flat building of glass and stone that hides behind it. It may be the most influential small building of the twentieth century.