Children’s Books about Antoni Gaudi

 

After seeing Antoni Gaudi’s work in Barcelona, I have been reading books about him.  I also found these two children’s books about Antoni Gaudi that I read to Simon and Ben about this amazing architect and his life.

They both have beautiful illustrations of Gaudi’s work.  I think it would be fun to use the pictures from these books to make Gaudi-inspired construction paper mosaics.

The first story, Building on Nature, by Rachel Rodriquez with illustrations by Julie Paschkis is about Gaudi’s life as a young boy and how much he loved nature.  He used nature as his inspiration for everything.  You can look to nature to understand his propensity to rid buildings of straight lines and edges.

Park Guell is one of the most whimsical places I have ever been, and this book captures its beauty and its personality.

The second book, Gargoyles, Girders and Glass Houses by Bo Zaunders with illustrations by Roxie Munro is actually about seven different master builders.  Gaudi is included along with Filippo Brunelleschi and Alexandre-Gustave Eiffel in this fun book about some of the world’s most amazing architectural wonders.

The few pages about Gaudi’s life in this book include a more detailed account of his death.  We learned in Barcelona that he was hit by a streetcar, probably as he stepped out in the street to look up at tower that had just been completed on La Sagrada Familia, but this book explains that he was not recognized immediately because in his later years he had foregone his finer clothes for simpler ways.  He was mistaken for a tramp and so he did not receive medical attention soon enough to be of any help.  He died three days later.

I loved reading both of these accounts of Gaudi’s life to the kids.  Both stories mention that Gaudi was different from others even as a child, which, I like to remember, is a good thing.  He had an unusual vision that he harnessed to create some of the most breathtaking structures in the world.