Parc del Laberint d'Horta

When Barcelona boomed in the 1960s, it was at the expense of the old aristocratic estates that skirted the lower Collserola foothills. One, however, escaped the bulldozers: the romantic, atmospheric Parc del Laberint d’Horta, a great place for a picnic or a lazy afternoon.

Originally occupying 133 acres (now reduced to 17), the park was the brainchild of the Marques de Alfarràs, a true son of the Enlightenment.

He designed the master plan for the gardens in 1791 on the theme of Love and Disappointment and hired Italian architect Domenico Bagutti to lay out the gardens, lake, waterfall, canals, pavilions, statuary and a not-so-easy cypress maze, its centre marked by a statue of Eros.