The Hypostyle Room

The Hypostyle Room is the feature that most separates people who visit Park Güell with a guide from those who visit alone. Self-guided visitors often pass through quickly on the way to the terrace above. But the room rewards attention: 86 columns each individually positioned, a water management system concealed within them, a ceiling that is one of the great works of applied art in Catalan Modernisme, and acoustics that make it feel like a cave or a cathedral depending on how many people are inside.

What Is the Hypostyle Room?

A hypostyle hall is an architectural term for any large enclosed space whose ceiling is supported by a forest of columns. Gaudí borrowed the term from ancient Egyptian and Greek architecture — the Hypostyle Hall at the Temple of Karnak in Luxor, the Parthenon precinct — and applied it to what he designed as the marketplace for Eusebi Güell’s planned residential estate.

The room was built between 1906 and 1914 and was never used as a market: the housing project collapsed commercially, only two private homes were ever built, and the estate became a public park in 1922. The Hypostyle Room became instead the grand covered entrance hall to the park’s central terrace — an unplanned but fitting role for a space of such theatrical presence.

The 86 Columns: Structure and Innovation

The Hypostyle Room is sometimes called the “Hall of a Hundred Columns” — a misnomer that reflects how many columns the space appears to contain. There are 86.

Gaudí designed the columns with deliberate structural deviance from classical rules. The interior columns stand vertical, as convention demands. But the outermost ring leans outward at a calculated angle — an innovation derived from Gaudí’s study of Greek temple columns, which also have a slight outward lean (called entasis) to resist the lateral spread of load from above. Gaudí exaggerated this lean dramatically, making it visible and expressive rather than subtle and corrective. The result is a forest that appears to breathe — columns that seem to press outward against the weight of the terrace above, their structural role made aesthetically evident.

The columns are not solid stone. Each is hollow — a ceramic pipe within a stone casing — forming part of the park’s rainwater drainage system. Water from the Main Terrace above passes through the hollow column interiors, descends to the underground cistern beneath the room — see the History of Park Güell for the original marketplace concept, and exits through El Drac’s mouth on the staircase below when the cistern overflows. The architecture is simultaneously sculpture, structure, and infrastructure.

The three-nave effect: In certain sections, the columns are spaced farther apart, creating wider openings that Gaudí described as simulating the naves of a great church. Standing in these sections, the room acquires a genuinely sacred quality — the sense of being in a temple rather than a market hall.

Josep Maria Jujol’s Ceiling

The ceiling of the Hypostyle Room is among the most important works of Catalan Modernisme. It was designed and largely executed by Josep Maria Jujol i Gibert — Gaudí’s most gifted assistant, who also created the trencadís mosaics on the Serpentine Bench.

The ceiling is composed of small clay brick domes between the column capitals. The faces of these domes are decorated with 18 circular mosaic medallions: four large ones and fourteen smaller ones. Each medallion is made using the trencadís technique — broken ceramic tiles, fragments of china, glass, and crockery assembled into patterns representing celestial and natural cycles.

The four large medallions are variously interpreted as representing the four seasons, the lunar cycle, the sun, and the cardinal directions. Some scholars have noted cryptic symbols embedded in the fragments — Catholic motifs, abstract signs, even upturned teacups used as rosettes — added by Jujol with what appears to have been genuine playfulness. He was working partly in Gaudí’s shadow but expressing himself as fully as the material allowed.

Jujol’s contribution to Park Güell is historically underappreciated. He also designed the Serpentine Bench mosaics and contributed to Casa Batlló and the Sagrada Família. The Hypostyle Room ceiling is his most concentrated single work.

The Acoustics

The Hypostyle Room has acoustics that surprise almost everyone who discovers them. The combination of a low ceiling, numerous parallel hard surfaces, and a shallow dome profile creates an unusual reflection pattern. Sound travels laterally between opposing surfaces before dissipating, rather than bouncing randomly upward. The effect is that voices carry clearly across the room in a way that feels architectural rather than accidental — which is exactly what it is.

Gaudí designed the room as a marketplace where vendors would call prices and buyers would respond. The acoustics serve that purpose: a voice from one end of the room is clearly audible at the other, without becoming reverberant or muddled. In quieter moments — early morning or the last slot of the day — stand at one side of the room and speak at normal volume. The transmission of sound through the columns is distinctly different from any other room in Barcelona.

What to Look For

Photography Tips

The Hypostyle Room is challenging to photograph well because of its scale and the crowds that concentrate here.

Best angle: Stand at the eastern end and shoot west down the length of the room, using the columns as a natural frame. A wide-angle lens (or wide mode on a phone) captures the forest-like quality better than a standard focal length.

Best time: The 09:30 entry slot gives you the room before the first tour groups arrive. By 10:30 the room is often congested. The last entry slot of the day is also good — the room tends to clear in the final hour before closing.

Looking up: The ceiling medallions are best photographed directly from below in the centre of the room. Position yourself under the largest medallion and shoot straight up. In good morning light, the trencadís fragments catch the light beautifully.