Architectural notebook · Oriol Valls

About Oriol Valls: nineteen years drawing in Eixample

Oriol Valls, a Barcelona stone-draughtsman and masonry conservation lecturer, describes his architectural notebook.

I am Oriol Valls, an architectural stone-draughtsman and masonry conservation lecturer living on Carrer de Provença in Barcelona's Eixample district. For nineteen years I have walked to the basilica with the same small sequence of notebooks: one for elevations, one for light and one for observations that do not fit either category.

My training taught me to draw a stone joint before drawing a silhouette. That habit stayed with me. The helicoidal columns, stained-glass angles and spire stonework are interesting not because they are spectacular from a distance, but because their parts change with position and weather. A notebook forces me to slow down enough to see those changes.

Conservation lectures are where I explain that old buildings are not static objects. Stone is cleaned, repaired, measured and exposed to thousands of daily movements. Understanding the structure is a way of respecting the people who maintain it. When I sketch, I record what is visible rather than inventing a more dramatic version for a page.

This website is deliberately independent. It does not sell admission or pretend to speak for the basilica foundation. It collects the explanations I give visiting friends: where to stand, what to notice, when a tower staircase may be a bad choice, and why a few minutes beside one vault can be more useful than a hurried circuit.

Corrections are welcome when they are specific. If a street arrangement has changed or a structural explanation needs refinement, I prefer a clear description to a vague opinion. The notebook will remain personal, but it should also be accurate. Good architectural observation is a conversation between what we know and what the building is willing to show us.

My notebooks include mistakes as well as finished drawings. A wrong angle or an uncertain joint stays on the page because it records the process of learning the building. Architectural observation is not improved by pretending that every first impression was correct. The same principle guides this site: when a practical detail changes, the honest response is to revise it and note why. A living building deserves a living notebook.

A note on using these pages: the observations are written for general readers rather than as a technical conservation manual. Conditions can change with weather, restoration work and the daily life of the building. That is why I prefer describing a method of looking to promising a fixed spectacle. Stand still, compare one detail with its neighbour, and let the structure explain itself. If staff give a direction on the day, follow it. If your own experience differs from a note here, treat that as useful new evidence rather than a failure of the visit. An independent notebook should make attention easier, not turn architecture into a rigid script.