The designer of the tower is the modernist architect Josep Domènech i Estapà. The octagonal tower is built in brick and decorated with the typical ceramic trencadis, giving the structure all the aesthetics of the modernistic architecture that so well characterizes Barcelona

Many of the machinery equipment came from England, at that moment in time a country that was technically more advanced than Spain... but with the delays in the delivery of this equipment, it was impossible to test all equipment before the actual inauguration of the all machinery in the tower! And as it happened in the middle of the inauguration-party, when with an important exposure one of the big pumping machines was turned on... It failed.

So, the legend goes that to revenge this embarrassing moment, the English visitors cannot distinguish the colors and will see everything in gray tones.