.All Trips / Europe / Spain

Doors of La Sagrada Familia, Barcelona

00 Doors, La Sagrada Familia

One of my favorite buildings in the world is La Sagrada Familia.  In today’s post I thought I’d share photos of some of the doors and entrances to this beautiful (still unfinished) cathedral.
The photo above features what will be the cathedral’s main entry when the building is completed, and is known as the Doorway of Majesty.
The first completed entrance to the cathedral was themed after the Nativity, and the doors at this entrance show some imaginative details:



Even this more traditional cathedral entrance has an interesting skylight feature….

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.All Trips / Europe / Sweden

Some Doors of Stockholm

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A sampling of some of the interesting doors I encountered during my exploration of Stockholm during a recent visit.
(Click on thumbnails to enlarge, right arrow to advance slideshow)

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.All Trips / Asia / India

Some Doors from Jojawar, India

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Jojawar is a fairly small community in the Rajasthan region of India.  We spent several days here and I really enjoyed this part of our trip.  It’s a more traditional community than many of the others we visited, with, for example many men in Jojawar having beards and wearing turbins — something you don’t see much of in India’s bigger cities anymore. 

 As I was sorting through my images from this community it became clear that there were many interesting doors in this small community, which is the theme of today’s blog.

I hope to share more stories from Jojawar with you in the future. 

(Click on thumbnails to enlarge, right arrow to advance slideshow)

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.All Trips / Europe / Italy

Doors of Milan’s Duomo

06 Doors of the Duomo

Construction of Milan’s great Cathedral (Duomo) began in the late 14th century and continued for half a millennium.  One of the last details to be completed were the main central entry doors, which date to the late 1800s. 

The church is lovely and its grand entry doors fit well with the overall opulence of the structure.  They are often admired, but only rarely opened.  These doors were crafted between 1894-1908 by Italian sculptor Ludovico Pogliaghi, themed on “stories from the life of Mary”.  Here are some of the features and panels which caught my eye.

The doors are busy and it’s easy to overlook the many exquisitely detailed panels in it. including scenes of Jesus’ life and death, as well as those …

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.All Trips / Europe / Poland

Some Doors of Krakow

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During my travels I’ve started to focus on certain features of the destinations I’m visiting, especially signs and more recently doors.  I find them to be quite interesting and often reflective of the folks that built and use them.

The doors we encountered in Poland were as about as expected.  Strong, sturdy, solidly-built and often utilitarian, but with some having a unique and interesting artistic flare.

Here are some of the doors we saw in Krakow:

(Click on thumbnails to enlarge, then right arrow to advance the slideshow)

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.All Trips / Asia / India

Some Doors of India

Doors of India (43)

India is a fascinating destination with an amazing assortment of places and experiences in which you can indulge yourself during your visit.   The country is large, but it’s often the attention to smaller details that interests me most.  As many of you know, I like to keep an eye on signs and doors when I travel.

I’ve never been to a place that had a greater diversity of doors than India — ranging from monstrous elaborate affairs protecting the entry to a castle, to simple doors in small homes.  I believe the largest doors I’ve ever seen in my life were on some of the UNESCO World Heritage sites in India.

Here then are a look at some of the doors of …

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.All Trips / North America / South Carolina / Southeastern USA

The Doors of Charleston

23 Doors of Charleston

Besides enjoying grand panoramas of a city, I think it’s good to look at the smaller things, too.  It’s often these that makes a place interesting and reveal a lot about its character.  Details of architecture are among these facets, providing a sense of style, color, sometimes even grace.

My wife has been taking pictures of doors for years.  I have to confess to being sensitized to entryways by her careful eye.  In modern towns and cities, doors tend to be fairly ugly things — prefabricated, mass-produced, often of low quality.  They lack character.  That’s not at all true of older buildings and older cities, like many of those in Europe, and it’s certainly not true of Charleston.  Here the doors …

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