Museu Frederic Marès — Attraction in Barcelona

As you go through the museum, you'll find yourself wondering about the collector as much as about the items in the collection. Mares didn't believe in half-hearted collecting, getting one representative object for the collection, or in having just one or two specialties.This museum holds not just one of the biggest collections in the world of polychrome wooden religious sculptures from the Gothic period, but a fine collection of religious art from other periods, and a fair number of antiquities. There aren't any famous artists represented here, and some of the works are rather crude, suggesting that Mares was interested in quantity as much as in quality.

It also holds an utterly fascinating collection of ephemera from the 18th through early 20th century, with an emphasis on the 19th century. Was Mares obsessive? Or was he astute? Or both?

Imagine collecting about 300 pipes, several hundred early photographs, dozens of apothecary jars, hundreds of ladies' fans, thousands of cigarette cards, erotic match boxes, thousands of decorative designs, hundreds of holy water fonts, and hundreds of iron keys. Most of these belonged to middle-class families or churches, rather than wealthy ones, and some items, like cigarette cards, were available even to poor families. Mares knew that these kinds of items are full of valuable insights into a culture and I'm sure that design and cultural scholars everywhere bless him for collecting and preserving the kinds of things that usually got thrown away when no longer in use.

If I were a set or costume designer for 19th century period dramas, I'd probably just move in.

Entrance is relatively cheap compared to other Barcelona museums, 4.20 euros in...

This museum is an incredible attraction in Barcelona where you get to experience the personal collection of Frederic Mares with objects, sculptures and all kind of things from different eras, countries and subjects. The entry is around 4 euros per person reaching lower prices if you enter with a group, but can also be free on Sundays after 3pm (first Sunday of the month from 11am to 8pm,) The ground floor is mainly religious sculptures and artefacts, the bottom floor has beautiful pillars and arcs and artistic capitals on display. From the first floor onward you can find a lot of objects, some of them similar to each other but again, the man was a collectionist so it is highly understandable. Especially now in summer the place provide a fresh space to relax a little, and benches can be find inside here and there to rest a little. The bottom floor and the third floor were personally my favourites. At the third floor there is a beautiful library and somewhere around there is also an area with old weapons of artillery like pistols, crossbows and swords that are just very cool to see. Hope you enjoy this place as...

This is now my favourite museum! Full of wonderful and interesting items I spent hours going through the place. And I can use my ticket again for free in the next 6 months! Makes me want to go back and see it all over again. Everything is so beautifully laid out and the sculptures are really given the right sense of space that they each deserve. The only thing I found negative was the fact that the staff working the different floors seemed to follow me around (as a woman on my own I found this particularly unsettling) and I was told about 5/6 times to not use flash on my camera, even though I hadn't once. The staff at the entrance were lovely, just the staff in the galleries that were a bit...