What’s Left to Build on the Sagrada Família’s Glory Façade?

The Glory façade is the largest unfinished element of the Sagrada Família — the grand main entrance Gaudí designed to represent the path to God, and the most ambitious of the building’s three great façades. Even after the central Tower of Jesus Christ was structurally completed in February 2026, the Glory façade remains a work in progress, including its elaborate sculptural programme and the monumental approach and staircase Gaudí envisioned. It is, in many ways, the final great chapter of a 144-year project. Here’s what the Glory façade is meant to become, and what still stands between the building and its completion.

The three façades, and why Glory is the grandest

The Sagrada Família was designed around three monumental façades, each telling a different part of the story of Christ:

• The Nativity façade celebrates his birth. It’s the oldest and most intricate, much of it built under Gaudí’s own supervision, dense with naturalistic detail — plants, animals, and figures that seem to grow out of the stone.
• The Passion façade depicts his suffering and crucifixion. It’s deliberately stark and angular, with harsh, skeletal figures that convey pain and grief — a striking contrast to the Nativity side.
• The Glory façade represents his glory and the road to salvation. Gaudí intended it to be the grandest of the three and the basilica’s principal entrance, the climax of the whole architectural narrative.

While the Nativity and Passion façades are essentially complete and open to view, the Glory façade is the one still taking shape — fitting, perhaps, that the representation of ultimate glory should be the last to be finished.

What the Glory façade is meant to include

Gaudí’s vision for the Glory façade was enormous in scope. Without overstating specifics that are still evolving, its conception includes:

• A monumental main entrance intended as the principal way into the basilica, far grander than the entrances currently in use.
• An elaborate sculptural programme depicting themes of death, judgement, glory, and the path toward God — the theological culmination of the building’s narrative.
• A grand approach and staircase leading up to the entrance, designed to give the façade the sense of scale and ceremony Gaudí wanted.

It’s this grand approach that connects to one of the most debated issues around the basilica’s completion: the space Gaudí’s full design requires extends beyond the current footprint, onto land now occupied by an existing city block — a sensitive question of heritage versus residents that remains unresolved.

Why it’s taking so long

The Glory façade is genuinely the hardest part to finish, for several reasons. It’s the most complex and ambitious of the three façades, both structurally and sculpturally. It involves the unresolved question of the land needed for its grand approach. And it represents the theological climax of the whole building, which means there’s enormous care taken to get it right rather than rushing it.

There’s also the simple matter of sequencing. For most of the project’s history, the priority was getting the building’s structure and its defining towers built. With the central Tower of Jesus Christ now structurally complete, attention and resources can increasingly turn to remaining elements like the Glory façade and the interior finishing that continues through 2027 and 2028.

A note on certainty and timelines

It’s important to be honest here. The Glory façade is a long-term, evolving project, and precise timelines for its completion are not something to state with false confidence. The structural completion of the central tower in February 2026 was a landmark for the building’s height and silhouette, but it did not complete the Glory façade, which remains on a separate and longer trajectory.

Anyone wanting the very latest on the Glory façade’s progress and the surrounding planning questions should consult current local news, since this is a developing situation rather than a settled one. What’s clear is that it represents the final major frontier of the basilica’s construction.

Can you see the Glory façade now?

You can see the Glory façade side of the building from the exterior, though as a visitor you don’t enter through it — the working entrances are near the completed Nativity and Passion sides. Walking the full perimeter of the basilica lets you compare all three façades and appreciate just how different in character they are, and how much more work the Glory side still represents.

A guided tour is the best way to understand what you’re looking at. A knowledgeable guide can explain Gaudí’s intentions for the Glory façade, why it’s the last to be completed, and the significance of its place in the building’s overall story — turning what might otherwise look like an unremarkable construction area into one of the most interesting parts of the visit.

Why this makes 2026 a fascinating time to visit

There’s something compelling about visiting the Sagrada Família at this exact moment. The building has just reached its full height and become the tallest church in the world, yet its grandest façade is still being brought to life. You’re seeing a 144-year masterpiece at the precise point where its defining structure is complete but its final great element is still emerging.

Future visitors will see the finished Glory façade and never know what the building looked like at this threshold moment. Right now, you can stand in front of it and witness the last great chapter of Gaudí’s vision still being written.

The bottom line

What’s left to build on the Sagrada Família’s Glory façade? Quite a lot — it’s the largest unfinished element of the basilica, encompassing the grand main entrance, an elaborate sculptural programme on the theme of glory and salvation, and a monumental approach whose required land remains a sensitive, unresolved issue. It’s the final great chapter of the project, on a longer timeline than the now-completed central tower. For visitors in 2026, it’s a chance to see Gaudí’s masterpiece at a unique moment: structurally crowned, yet with its grandest statement still taking shape.