Mosaic-making class in Barcelona: Souvenir experience for the whole family
Thank you to Mosaiccos for hosting our family for this experience. All opinions are my own.
While in Barcelona, we were completely in awe of and inspired by the mosaic artwork of Antoni Gaudí as we visited places like Basilica de la Sagrada Familia and Park Güell. In fact, the entire city of Barcelona is filled with the most beautiful mosaics.
We loved the colorful mosaics in Park Güell the most. The park sits up on a hill looking out toward the sea and is a beautiful space originally built as a housing development. It was designed by Antoni Gaudí and it now serves as a municipal garden.
We toured the grounds and were inspired by the beauty.
So much so, that we knew we wanted to learn more about Gaudí and his art style. We decided to take a family workshop at Mosaiccos, an art studio located near Parc de la Ciutadella in the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona.
Mosaiccos was founded by Angelika Heinbach, who has spent nearly three decades in Barcelona studying and creating art. She dreamed of a space where people, but especially families, could experience a taste of the art that is so iconic in Barcelona.
Mosaiccos offers mosaic classes from beginner to adult and also teaches mosaics in schools in Barcelona, hosts team-building activities, birthday parties and art tours.
We did a family class, where the boys were both able to work on tiles in the Roman mosaic style, while Jon and I worked together on a picture frame in the Trencadis style mosaic, which is what Gaudí did.
Mosaiccos recommends children be three years old for the class. Connor, who will be 3 in four months did fine, but didn’t have quite the attention span to completely finish his tile and Spencer finished it for him.
We loved our instructor, Franziska, who taught us all about how to create Trencadis mosaics, as well as the Catalan history.
Antonio Gaudí was known for taking broken ceramics from China to create his masterpieces. Trencadis is the Catalan name for the creating these art pieces with broken ceramics and the occasional glass pieces or even sea shells or beads.
The boys absolutely loved doing this art project. They were both given cork coasters and were able to do the project almost completely by themselves. They just needed a little help with make sure the glue was in straight lines in the right place.
They had a plethora of colorful and patterned plastic square tiles to use to create their masterpieces. They did was is called Roman mosaic, which uses square pieces and is much easier than Trencadis. All they had to do was pick a color and line it up.
They both did a great job picking a variety of colors and I love seeing their imaginations coming forth. Spencer had so much fun that he was sad when he finished. Franziska was kind enough to bring out a magnet for him to decorate as well. I think he would have stayed all day if he could.
In fact, here’s a direct quote: “I wish I could do that all day!”
They were so proud of their final pieces!
Meanwhile, Jon and I decided that we wanted to do a picture frame that we could hang up on our souvenir wall with a photo from our time in Barcelona.
We got to choose different tile pieces that we wanted to use and break them down into smaller pieces. I loved the surprise element of seeing what the edges looked like and shaped into when the pieces were broken.
We found some broken plates with letters on them and decided to create the work Barcelona out of mosaic pieces at the top of the frame with a neutral background and then create a mosaic of pinks, reds and blues for the bottom two-thirds of the picture frame.
I loved all of the pastels and blues at Sagrada Familia and Park Güell and knew that this frame would always remind me of our time in Barcelona.
Mosaiccos is stocked with the entire rainbow of both glass and ceramic pieces, including colors and patterns.
You can choose to do either a glass or ceramic mosaic. We opted for ceramic for a more true Gaudí feel.
My husband and I both love to do puzzles and so it was really a game for us to try and fit pieces together and make everything line up to the edges of the frame.
The most important part is to create solid, straight edges so that the grout can be straight around the frame or coaster or whatever it is that you are making.
We had two different styles though. My husband liked to plan out 4 or more pieces and then glue them all once he had them fit together and situated the way he liked. I, on the other hand, would place one piece and glue it and then work around that! I love trusting my own decisions and believing that everything will work out.
That’s a bit like we are in real life too. My husband does way more research and considering of all options and weighing things out in his mind. I am much more of a jump in with both feet type of a girl.
We balance each other out 😉
The class was about an hour and half long. The boys were done in an hour, but the picture frame took a little bit longer. Luckily they were both content to help us pick out pieces for our mosaic.
Once we were done creating and gluing our masterpieces, we left them with Mosaiccos to dry and for the grout to be added by the staff.
When booking your class, make sure that you leave yourself at least one day (or two if you are like us and take the class on a Saturday) because you will need to leave your pieces overnight to dry and be grouted and pick them up the next afternoon.
When we went back to pick up our pieces we were so excited to see them!
We’re home now and I printed out a picture from our time at Park Güell and have the frame in our entry way. I absolutely love that it’s a souvenir we made together to remind us of our time in Barcelona!
Mosaiccos was such a GEM of a find and definitely the highlight of our entire trip to Spain! We have the boys creations on our fridge and they love to point them out everyday. Such fond memories!
Make sure to book a class with them next time you are in Barcelona!
What type of souvenir would you make? Let me know in the comments!
