Parc del Laberint d'Horta, Barcelona

The Parc del Laberint d'Horta is a historic garden whose clipped cypress maze gives the park its name. On the lower terrace, the maze runs through about 750 metres of carefully shaped hedges; Ariadne and Theseus appear in a marble relief at its entrance, while Eros stands within it. This garden began in 1791 on the Desvalls family estate, with its design developed by Joan Antoni Desvalls and the Italian architect Domenico Bagutti.

Its original phase was completed in 1808, and the grounds bring together an eighteenth-century neoclassical garden with a nineteenth-century romantic one. As you follow the terraces, you can see the contrast between formal geometry and more expansive planting, with sculptures, fountains, pools, a waterfall, and a water channel woven through the grounds. The romantic garden was created under Elies Rogent, while the channel linking the upper and intermediate terraces was added in 1853.

The estate hosted royal receptions and open-air theatre, including Goethe's Iphigenia in Tauris in 1898. After restoration, the park opened to the public in 1971; today it functions as a garden-museum and includes a municipal gardening institute.