Claire McCall/Supplied
Puppy by Jeff Koons, left, and Spider by Louise Bourgeois outside the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in Spain.
This story is from the team at NZ House & Garden magazine.
The french doors in our Airbnb in the old Spanish town of Bilbao frame a timeless tableau: a pink-plastered apartment block and wrought-iron balconies festooned with pots of geraniums. It feels very Mediterranean (although this port city is actually on the Bay of Biscay), and the colourful baroque buildings that typify the ancient quarters of southern European cities are in abundance on this side of the River Nervión where seven streets form the heart of the Casco Viejo, or Old Quarter. But all it takes is a stroll across the nearby bridge to the left bank, past the opera house and, 15 minutes later, you’re on the doorstep of one of the world’s most celebrated modern structures – the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. For lovers of architecture, this highly walkable city has a taste of all eras.
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Is there a better way to get into the Basque Country groove than by hanging out on the balcony with an early evening glass of rioja and watching the passing parade on the mosaic-paved streets below? Well, actual participation of course! We were soon drawn down to the Plaza Nueva – a lively square surrounded by pintxo bars under an arched colonnade including the long-established Casa Victor Montes with its elaborately gilded facade, white marble tabletops, fresco ceilings and chequerboard floor. The idea, though, is to bar hop around the square, choosing from an array of skewered snacks. A trick for young players: spirit measures are far larger in Spain than we’re used to. One stiff G&T was enough to send us on our merry way.
Claire McCall/Supplied
From left, fuel up on iberico ham sandwiches temptingly displayed in the storefronts in the Casco Viejo district; the market is the place locals go for its orderly offerings of fresh fruit and fungi; the entrance to the Mercado de la Ribera.
Double-shot coffees at the Mercado de la Ribera the next morning gave fuzzy heads short shrift. Housed in an art deco building overlooking the river, the market’s airy spaces are orderly, each stand beautifully presented, the fish and shellfish glistening, cheeses stacked high, myriad mushroom varieties, curtains of iberico ham and, yes, more pintxos. Leaving the locals to prod the produce and barter for bargains, we wandered along the riverside, past the four iron maidens of Bilbao – statues representing the sirgueras who used to tow river boats from land during a series of civil wars – and the graceful white curve of the Zubizuri bridge before a stop for an obligatory photo beneath the gigantic legs of Louise Bourgeois’ giant bronze spider that has eyes on the Guggenheim.
There are many buildings that don’t live up to the hype of their photographic depiction but this Frank Gehry masterpiece is not one of them. Its scale and complexity make an audacious statement while somehow simultaneously tying into the urban fabric like it was meant to be. Guarded on one flank by Jeff Koons’ Puppy – a giant west highland terrier covered in flowers that are replaced twice a year – the Guggenheim, for all its immensity, feels welcoming inside.
Claire McCall/Supplied
From left, a busker plays for his supper on the scenic historic streets of Bilbao, Northern Spain; Bilbaoâs worm-like subway station entrances; the four iron maidens of Bilbao represent the sirgueras who used to tow river boats from land during a series of civil wars.
To properly explore it would take an eternity, but we were content to focus on the magnificence of Richard Serra’s coiled The Matter of Time and Snake, the latter a colossal work made up of three serpentine ribbons of hot-rolled steel that tilt and curve alongside each other. The passageways between these metal walls feel dangerous and exciting and, I wonder, would the artist himself have been moved to scold us for running through them, as the security guard did? To experience their gravity-defying scale in person is a visceral experience even for those who, like me, have no clue as to the physics or to the exemplary engineering that brings them into being.
There are many other gems held within the museum – the existential awesomeness of Anselm Kiefer’s The Renowned Orders of the Night, a painting of a man prone within a universe of stars, for instance – but design lovers will also be torn between their appreciation for the exhibits and the experience of walking through this titanium-coated building that boosted the local economy and globally changed the shape of museums to come.
Claire McCall/Supplied
An abandoned grand mansion looms forlorn but nevertheless formidable in Getxo. Right, The Matter of Time (foreground) and Snake by Richard Serra are two magnificent works on display at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao.
Such is the hype that you could be forgiven for thinking the Guggenheim is the be all and end all of Bilbao’s contemporary architectural contribution, but take another day at least, as we did, to unearth the layers of built interest in this city. British “starchitect” firm Foster + Partners would no doubt resent my description of their subway station entrances as “gigantic, glazed worms” but, in my defence, they do emerge from the ground in segmented sections with a fluidity that seems animate.
Another big-name intervention came in the Azkuna Zentroa building when Philippe Starck was commissioned to transform this former wine warehouse into a culture and leisure centre. We wandered through the cavernous ground-level spaces supported by 43 chunky columns decorated in palladian, art deco, modern and renaissance styles (among others) and strained our necks to observe the shadowy forms of swimmers in the pool with a glass bottom suspended above.
Claire McCall/Supplied
The Vizcaya Bridge at Getxo, a fun day trip on the metro from Bilbao, is a Unesco world heritage site. Right, this artwork welcomes you to the Plaza Nuevo.
Bilbao enjoys an oceanic climate which makes it cooler and wetter than other Spanish holiday destinations, so a visit to the beachside town of Getxo was less about slip, slap, slop and more about house spotting. We caught the super-efficient, incredibly clean metro north to the suburbs to take a self-guided tour of the grand mansions on the waterfront, built at the end of the 19th century and into the 20th for the bourgeoisie of the region.
The trip began with a brisk walk over and back across the 164m-long Vizcaya Bridge, declared a world heritage site by Unesco which deems it “one of the outstanding architectural iron constructions of the industrial revolution”. While the estuary beaches are well groomed, they aren’t a patch on the New Zealand coastline but the homes overlooking them are worth the trip. It took us the best part of two hours to promenade along the seafront and take in the villas with their diverse, but all grandiose, styles. Information panels background the palatial buildings for those who want to delve deeper than the purely visual, offering a microcosmic history of Basque architecture. A fish lunch harbourside, toasting the discoveries with a glass of sparkling very dry wine called txakoli (so many x’s to get your tongue around), was a lazily luxurious end to a perfect day.
