THE INTERIOR NAVES OF THE SAGRADA FAMILIA ARE FINISHED

Sagrada Familia ready
The temple, finished
The interior naves of the Sagrada Família, ready
The space designed by Gaudí readies for the visit of the Pope on 7th of November

Barcelona now has its largest temple ready. The interior naves of the Sagrada Família are finished, after 128 years of work.

That is how the deputy chief architect, Jordi Faulí, confirmed it to ADN: “The architectural work is now complete”. Only the last arch of the apse remained, which has been finished “these last few days”, according to Faulí.

At a simple glance it is almost impossible to notice this completion, because the entire space is occupied by workers who are dismantling the scaffolding, paving and cleaning”. Everything must be gleaming for the 7th of November when the Pope will officiate the first great mass in the temple.

At the moment, access to the interior is limited only to the perimetral route made by tourists, and predictably this will remain the case until after Benedict XVI’s visit. From then onwards, the deputy chief architect says there will be a “totally different and spectacular view of the temple”.

The completion of the interior naves of the Sagrada Família gives way to a new phase in the building work. There now remains two sacristies, the baptismal chapel, the Santísima Penitencia chapel and the principal facade (calle Mallorca), which at the moment have only their foundations. And lastly, the six towers which emerge at 60 metres height. The central one will reach a height of 170 metres; the apse tower will reach 125 and the rest, 120 metres.

This is why Faulí considers it “almost certain” that the total completion of the Sagrada Familia will not be achieved in the year 2015, as some sources had pinpointed, although it “will not be many years thereafter”.

The numbers
2.280.653 visitors were received by the Sagrada Família between June 2009 and May of this year. This figure represents an 8,9% reduction in the number of people who visited Gaudí’s temple compared to the same period of the year before, and which is explained by the crisis in the tourist sector.