In full knowledge of the fact that he would not see the temple finished, Gaudí decided to plan the construction of the Sagrada Familia in modules, starting with the apse and the Nativity facade, knowing that if he managed to leave one of them finished, it would be more difficult to abandon construction.In his desire to overcome the defects he saw in Gothic structural systems, Gaudí aimed to create a new architecture with balanced and self-supporting structures. In his workshop he experimented with and refined the constructional solutions he used on the building by using models. This way of working has been used by all his successors and is still practiced in the temple’s technical office. The Sagrada Familia was and still is a constructional challenge: it is one of the largest testing grounds for construction methods in the world.Gaudí took his inspiration from two sources; the Christian message and nature. One was derived directly from the Holy Scriptures, tradition and liturgy. The other came from the observation of the natural world, providing him with a conceptual and methodological framework. Gaudí did not copy nature but analysed the function of its elements to formulate structural and formal designs which he then applied to architecture.