Parc de la Creueta del Coll, Barcelona

Parc de la Creueta del Coll is a park formed from an abandoned quarry, created during Barcelona’s urban-planning renewal for the 1992 Summer Olympics. Architects Martorell, Bohigas and Mackay designed the park. The quarry’s hollow now gives the place its distinctive setting: a broad open basin where art and water meet.

Look at Eduardo Chillida’s Elogi de l’Aigua, a massive reinforced-concrete claw hanging from steel cables above a shallow pool. The sculpture dates from 1987. Near the entrance gate, Ellsworth Kelly’s Tòtem provides another striking landmark, also made in 1987.

The park extends across 16 hectares, with terraces, slopes and a lake that becomes a swimming pool in summer. Its most unexpected detail is the suspended concrete form: heavy, angular and apparently held in the air above the water.