Two new towers of the Sagrada Família in Barcelona in northeastern Spain were illuminated for the first time on Sunday evening. Archbishop Juan José Omella had previously ceremonially consecrated the two 135-meter-high towers, whose construction was completed in September. The tops of all four evangelist towers then glowed impressively in the dark for the first time. The world-famous basilica by Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí has been under construction for 141 years and is the most visited landmark in Barcelona.
The two new towers are dedicated to the evangelists Matthew and John, and their tops are decorated with huge white figures of a man and an eagle. The other two Evangelist Towers, dedicated to the Evangelists Luke and Mark and bearing a bull and a lion at the top, were completed in 2022.
With the completion of the two Evangelist towers, the construction of the Sagrada Família is slowly approaching completion. However, the 172.5 meter high main tower, which is said to be dedicated to Jesus Christ, is still under construction. Gaudí began building his church in 1882 without a building permit – this was only granted long after construction began in 2019. He worked tirelessly on his work until he was hit by a tram in June 1926 and died.
The basilica was actually supposed to be completed by the 100th anniversary of Gaudí’s death in 2026 – but construction work was temporarily interrupted during the corona pandemic and was severely delayed. “If we don’t have another problem as big as the pandemic, the Sagrada Família will be finished in a maximum of ten years,” said the president of its board of directors, Esteve Camps, on Sunday to the local newspaper “La Vanguardia”.
