Barcelona Balconies by Cité Création

Close up photo of 2 balconies from the mural Balcons de Barcelona including Antoni Gaudi, Ildefons Cerda and Pablo Picasso — Balcons de Barcelona mural by Cité Création

Balcons de Barcelona (Barcelona Balconies) is a large scale Trompe l’oil style mural painted on the southwest elevation of an apartment building in the l’Eixample neighbourhood, near the Sagrada Familia.

Part of a campaign called Barcelona posa’t guapa (Barcelona get pretty) the mural was painted in 1992 in the run-up to the Olympic games.

Despite the fact that the façades of many of the buildings in this area of Barcelona are elaborately decorated. The sides are normally left plain and unadorned, ready for the construction of adjacent buildings.

The 450 m2 mural meticulously recreates the façade of an elegant early 20th-century building, complete with balconies, full-length shuttered windows and shopfronts at street level.

The balconies are occupied by famous Barcelona residents and visitors, including; Antoni Gaudí, Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso, Carmen Armaya, Pau Casals, Ildefons Cerdà, Lluís Companys and Francesc Macià. Not to mention, barely visible up on the top floor, Christopher Columbus.

Life size mural of a building painted on the side of a building in Barcelona's L'Eixample neighbourhood — Barcelona Balconies by Cité Création

About the artist

Cité Création is a French artists’ co-operative founded in Lyon in 1978. The group specializes in the creation of large scale trompe-l’oil designs that combine art with urban planning.

Their earliest works include The Canuts fresco and The Lyonnaise mural which were both painted in Lyon city centre. To date, they have created more than 700 projects in cities as far afield as Mexico City, Berlin, Shanghai and Paris, Quebec and of course Barcelona.

As is the case with Barcelona Balconies, the subject of their murals is normally connected to the history and heritage of the city where they are located.