new city, new city
i left copenhagen about a month ago. in the interim, ive spent some time with the home clan in new jersey, with the school clan at MIT, weekending at dartmouth, a little bit in new york city, and now i am settled in the bay area for the summer.
like i wrote in my Dear City essay, i am forever comparing each new place i visit back to my experience in copenhagen. i wonder if this is irritating to my friends at home.
11am at 31st x 8th in new york. why are there only 3 people sitting and basking and taking advantage of these sunshine-drunken stairs??? if this was copenhagen, people would be all over that beautiful urban seating like flies on a caramel apple
while waiting for my megabus to boston, i couldn’t help but silently egg on the few lone bikers weaving in and out of the arrogant manhattan car traffic.
much improved! i couldn't believe my eyes when i exited the subway in times square. thanks to janette sadik-khan, the current Commissioner of the NYC Department of Transportation, and her admiration of Copenhagen's bicycle+pedestrian culture, this 'radical' pilot program in times square has finally gotten people strolling and relaxing without fear of becoming roadkill.
i’m working as Dwell‘s online editorial intern for the summer in San Francisco, and my first blogpost was actually about the opening of the High Line in Chelsea/Meatpacking, and all this relatedly good stuff happening in new york.
jackson square/columbus ave near the financial district in san francisco -- a 5 minute promenade from the dwell office. fantastic variety of food choices in the vicinity (italian, thai, chinese, vietnamese, mexican, sandwichy, + more more more) but not enough restful green public spaces to sit and enjoy lunch outdoorsily.
this is the nearest park: the smallish transamerica redwood park filling in and around the base of said building.
after a semester of wanderlusting nomadicness, it’s nice to be sort of anchored for awhile. i’ll be living in hayes valley soon, and hopefully riding my new pretty bike, courtesy of christine!), but for now, i’m currently settled in san mateo with john for june. he has just finished U.S. Puzzle Championship, which occurred this morning from 10am-12.30pm.
next week, the Dwell crew will be trekking down to the Dwell on Design 09 conference in LA in two raucous caravans, and i’m so excited.
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Tags: copenhagen, dwell, new york, san francisco, travel, urbanism
my eyeballs are still reeling
going to the Salone Internazionale de Mobile this year has been one of the most mind-boggling experiences of my entire life.
little did i know what was in store after capriciously buying my $80 EasyJet roundtrip ticket to Milan back in early February. our first impression after exiting the unbreathably-sardiney metro at Rho: billowingly snakey, glass-net volumes that enveloped the fairgrounds with an overwhelming sense of expectation.
russell, abe, and i wandered around these halls for an entire day (with our eyes re-bulging after turning every corner), but there was just absolutely no way to see everything. i think what was most overwhelming was the glamour of it all — we were in the middle of what was simply la creme de la creme of the design world, and we were able to touch, sit in, and sprawl over it all.
after studying interior architecture for the bulk of the semester, i found that i was often more fascinated by each store’s overall exhibit and its spatial/emotional effect, rather than the individual pieces themselves. i probably spent the most time in hall 12, which housed most of the (few, but now expanding) furniture designers i was faimilar with. in my whirlwind of wanting to retain it all, i just couldnt sketch fast enough, so i was relegated to jotting down soundbyte associations/metaphors for the pavilions that were most memorable to me.
some of the 'big boys' in hall 12
kartell: a celebratory photomontage [celebratory of their 60th anniversary, celebratory of ‘diversity’]
arkitepo: a purple, webby, atom of biomimicry
thut mobel: ribbons of woody fluorescence…edgy organic!
horm: snowflake tapestries
artek: presumptuous one-liner [“ONE CHAIR IS ENOUGH!” on shigeru ban’s 10-unit system]
campeggi: tornado of compressible doghouses
edra: madonna pop-glam
giovanetti: white concrete igloo, laced with flower pods
emeco: another one-liner [this time less exuberant, more one-hit-wonder-esque, with gehry involved]
in and around milan - fritz hansen, 'design virus' at zona tortona, images from salone satellite, various showrooms, and the duomo
but it wasn’t just the fairgrounds at Rho — the entire city turns into a giant festival, with everything going on at zona tortona, the showrooms in and around the center of the city, at the Triennale… i spent a day at each, and consistently, i was attracted to the smaller, younger exhibitors who were eager to talk to you and connect with you and explain their ideas. my favorite part of the fair by far was the Salone Satellite, the area all the way at the very back of the fairground by halls in the 20s, where it was so inspiring to see ‘youthful, creative talent’ at its best, and be in awe of students who are the same age as me and have already accomplished so much.
russell and i explore some Ear Chairs at SuperStudio in Zona Tortona. "A group of Ear Chairs facing each other will create a place for private conversation. It is one of two collections Rotterdam-based Studio Makkink & Bey have created for the Dutch firm Prooff"
after three days, all i can say is — i want more.
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Tags: cities, design, furniture, future craft, interiors, travel
last sunday, these three animals embarked on a journey to the irish countryside. yearning to bust out of dublin, we lapped up a delicious irish breakfast [complete with black pudding] and were quickly on our way towards the glacial valley of Glendalough.
andrew, roger, and i had an unfair share of obstacles earlier in the weekend — including a roguish debit-card-chomping ATM machine, an 8am mariah carey hostel crisis, and a wandering australian named ben elliot. but after playing among the rolling green hills like our adopted animal namesakes, gulping the (hopefully) pristine babbling brook water, and one ice cream cone with chocolate flake, these worries were all but forgotten.
andrew leads the pack on our 10 km loop
every old civilization seems to have a roundtower… Glendalough was once a monastery, and now the gravestones sit all angley and look as if some of the dead became chummy friends and some didnt
guide description: 'you might be able to catch a glimpse of feral goats on the miner's trail....'
roger looks
back in dublin city - the spire, which does not serve any real purpose other than 'being the tallest sculpture in the world.' it claims to be a symbol for urban revitalization. yet it's not even a monument saluting some profound historical achievement, but a seemingly blank icon, erected solely for the purpose of being an icon. successful dublin branding? donno...
ben and i have a pensive moment on one of my favorite parts of dublin: the palette of bridges that span the river liffey. each one is different, and makes for exciting 'just around the riverbend!' singsongy thoughts.
to me, dublin had its fine points (fiercely exciting historical stories, a few nice greens spaces, guinness, the best live street music i’ve ever heard), but it also had distinct sour spots (a river so polluted i could not see my reflection in it, temple bar’s uncanny likeness to an american frat party, heroin junkies sprawled on every other bench, a building color scheme of blacks and browns). overall, it just couldn’t hold a candle to copenhagen’s charm.
it’s been quite exhilarating to be flying off to a new city every weekend, but a part of me just wants to stay put in copenhagen now. with the lovely sun and my lovely bike, and with only three weeks left to this danish shebang of a semester, my desire to be continually jetsettery has waned some.
but!
not before Design Week at the Salone Internazionale in Milan this weekend =)
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Tags: branding, cities, copenhagen, nature, travel
longer, lighter, later
the days are so much longer now — after studio ends at 17:00, i have nearly 3 whole hours to sit and read at a park, before i have to hop from sunspot to sunspot to escape the creeping evening shadows.
another reason (and probably most importantly) why i adore copenhagen 1 googolplex times more now than i did before the three-week spring break: Elijah Lake.
Elijah Lake is my new darling on two wheels from Baisikeli [= bicycle in swahili; ‘the best bike rental for the world’, ‘rent a bike and help us send bikes to Africa’] — he is 11 days old, shiny black with a single piece of green tape, basketless, and beautiful. my relationship with Elijah has been absolutely amazing so far, and i don’t see the honeymoon period ending anytime soon.
Copenhagen is lovingly known as the cycling capital of the world. ogsa, Roger named his bike Ursula so I think Elijah Lake is pretty good, comparatively.
several memorable trips over the virginal week:
- biking to school every morning and breathing in a gallon of freshness everytime the lakes come into view
- biking to frederiksberg plads, walking around copenhagen business school + the faculty of life sciences at univ of copenhagen, sniffing and learning about trees, and searching for that elusive 2 hot dogs for 24 kroner deal at 7-11
- biking past the 16 football fields in Amager [yet another development by B.I.G.] on the way to the beach at Amager Strand for a picnic on thursday, and hiding among the sand dunes for shelter
- biking to the boardwalk on Islands Brygge on friday and, yes, having another picnic.
along islands brygge: with fresh french bread, pepper salami, creme fraiche, wine, and a box of strawberries
a baby swan came over to philipp to honk hello
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Tags: biking, copenhagen, happiness, sun
mosque
i had never been in a mosque before this week. at sunset on tuesday, after tea + hookah with the turkish students, we explored this hilly area in beyoğlu, on the european side of istanbul, north of the golden horn harbor. in our typical itinerant style, roger and i stumbled around for a bit…and ended up in this mosque [it was bound to happen in a city of 3000 of them]
a welcoming nod from an elderly local was all we needed — we creaked open the heavy stone door, took off our shoes, and tiptoed onto the soft [and somehow luscious?] green carpet. my thoughts, from a highly non-divine perspective:
-there is something about the physical feeling of carpet being gingerly squished underneath toes that conjures in me a feeling of protection and homeyness.
-mosque architecture – the space underneath the domed roof, the bright colors of the walls, the absence of statures/figures/icons, and others praying in silence – gives me an incredible sense of serenity.
-this physical feeling + spiritual feeling added together makes me want to duck inside every single mosque i pass here in istanbul. [there are many.]
-however, it is not unaccompanied by an unbalancing feeling of ignorant unfamiliarity…what do i do with my hands? how should i sit? is my uncovered head disrespectful? should i try to pray along with everyone else?
praying at the windows of the blue mosque
inside the hagia sophia, now a museum (thanks to ataturk)
being in istanbul and seeing all of the layers of christianity/islam, old/new, east/west, this/that all piled on top of each other, shaken around, and expected to play nicely together throughout the course of history has opened up my spirituality perspective a great deal. at this point in my life, i don’t think i want to be a fully religious person, but i want to experience other religions. i want to see what they see, feel what they feel…without commitment, without a lasting label, just to get a tasty learning morsel without being forced to call it my own. i realized that this mentality is how i deal with many things — major of study, scheduling too many appointments, dating habits, menu choices…
is this selfish?
hagia sophia and the blue mosque - they face each other as peers, but while blue has six minarets to sophia's four, she is a millennium older
patriarchal cathedral church of st. george (pronounced 'Yorgi') - the worldwide headquarters of the Greek Orthodox Church. a rather unassuming building from the outside, but definitely makes up for it in splendor and interior gildedness
looking up and listening to the entire history of christianity at this (one of many) church-turned-mosque
amsterdam's got nothin on turkey's tulips
how many abandoned cats do you see here at the topkapi palace? (hint: you may or may not be able to count them on one hand.) it was said that while obama was in istanbul on tuesday (during which all of the roads were closed, forcing us to change our schedule around his), he pet a cross-eyed cat. i may have pet the same cat that obama did.
after riding a ferry from the european side....sunset greets us on asia minor, while looking out from the anatolian side
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Tags: architecture, cities, religion, travel
russell and i stood atop that regal iceberg in Stortorget, and delivered jewels of information about stockholm’s old city to our faithful student subjects down below. it was a mildly intense feeling, giving a presentation about a place that we had modeled in detail and labored over for a week in studio – and now actually seeing it in person, standing in the middle of it, for the first time.
Stortorget ('large square' and the oldest one in stockholm) - see the little iceberg?
view of gamla stan from sodermalm, 'the southern isle' -- like venice?
laura, russell, steve, and i proudly display our gamla stan models on the day of review, week 2 of the semester
the fishermen’s alleyways, tyska brunnsplan, jarntorget, mårten trotzigs gränd [the narrowest alley at only 90 cm wide!] were almost exactly how i imagined them. i was amazed at the topography of the island [being in flat denmark for 2 months has made every molehill into a huffing mountain] — how it made a huge impact on the way we walked up to the square, and the way we experienced discovering all of its narrow crannies appendaging from it.
martin trotzigs grand, the narrowest alleyway in all of stockholm
a part of me wished there was more…life? and not just the touristy streets on västerlånggatan. in fact, gamla stan really is all touristy =\
also, by poking my nose into an old swedish church, i got stuck inside during a sunday service and couldn’t leave. i had to peer over at the boy sitting next to me constantly to see what song page we were on…and then sing accordingly in swedish. being that i do not understand swedish, i wasn’t forced to listen to what was being preached at me, but only had to enjoy the space and the music. it was wonderful!
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Tags: cities, scandinavia, studio, urbanism
or like a herd of spindly elk wandering across the bering strait during migration…
or like a bunch of eager beaver architecture students on the quest for alvar aalto’s experimental summer house…
we trekked across a frozen lake in central finland last week.
in muuratsalo, an incredible expanse of flat, sparkling whiteness
we each soon figured out our individually preferred method of snow travel:
1. the sszwee! of sliding speedily+dangerously across icy patches,
2. the crample crample of crunching/trampling on softer, safer snow pockets, or
3. the chomp…plop, chomp…plop of standing elevated on top of several inches, and then (embarassingly) sinking down, two seconds after each step.
we climbed up to a small promontory where the house was supposedly perched — and at first, we didnt see it. the outside-facing brick walls were painted white, which camouflaged very well with the surrounding winter landscape. standing from inside the courtyard, these massive walls framed a perfect view of the lake.
summer view, winter view, lake view
and behind the house was the sauna*, quite the cornerstone of finnish culture.
hands down, it was the best surprise of the entire week.
more aalto delights + nature-inspired details
auditorium on jyväskylä campus
![look at the butterfly trusses [exaggerated, but beautiful] that hold up the ceiling of the city council chamber](https://ytiffanie.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/aalto-butterfly.jpg?w=500 "aalto-butterfly")
look at the butterfly trusses exaggerated, but beautiful that hold up the ceiling of the city council chamber)
when you see leather-wrapped door handles inviting you in, you know it can't be anyone but aalto (säynätsalo town hall)
finnish octogenarians on cross country skis whizzed by us on the frozen lake
cattails and me
- * sauna = sweat out every globule of moisture from your pores while baking the scorching heated room. add more water onto the hot coals, producing copious amounts of steam. when you can breathe no longer, take a deep breath and stampede out of the sauna, into the negative 10 degrees celsius outside air, down the icy neck-breaking flight of stairs, and plummet your battered body into the frigid lake. repeat as many times as needed.
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Tags: aalto, architecture, nature, travel
my family came to copenhagen this weekend, and in typical chu family craving fashion, we wanted to eat asian food in a non-asian environment. so we went to wagamama, the newest restaurant addition on the Tivoli grounds. [started in london, this chain has made its way around europe and into harvard square as well]
what impressed me:
- very cute minimalist branding [black + white + darling red star amidst a sea of hip lowercase sans serif letters]
- equally delightful interior design [sleek wooden tables, canteen-style seating, open kitchen plan, fun white webby balls surrounding the light fixtures]
- the small, useful glossary of japanese culinary terms on the side of the menu. and the attractive graphics of the placemat settings.
what made me roll my eyes:
- how wagamama tries to brand itself with a number of ‘features’ that are really not special at all. the waitresses say, ‘welcome to wagamama, have you been here before? oh, no? well then! at wagamama, we want to ensure the freshness of your food, so it is served once it is cooked — meaning some dishes may arrive before others! enjoy the wagamama experience!’ how does that constitute an experience?! i feel like this happens all the time…
- on their menu: ‘side dishes – these are not starters but the perfect complement to your meal’ — why cant you order side dishes for the sake of ordering side dishes? if wagamama is truly based on the noodle bars that have been popular in asia for centuries, you should be able to eat just edamame as a roadside snack!
- the diction that the menu uses to describe the dishes is so painstaking and annoyingly detailed — it seems like they are adding such exotic, diverse ingredients [i.e. topped with seasonal greens, sliced marinated pods of asian mushroom, embellishly garnished with a garden-fresh springlike spriggy sprig of slightly fucking yellow-green tinted onion, etc.] ….where in actuality all of these things are already expected to be in the most basic of ramens.
- food quality = ordinary.
wagamama probably has the worst, most asymmetrical restaurant environment : satisfaction ratio i have ever experienced.
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Tags: branding, copenhagen, food, restaurants
a question indirectly posed to me by sam kronick one late lasercuttery night, and one that i am starting to rethink this semester:
is studio really the best-designed environment for design?
what makes doing your design work in studio better than, say, in your nicely-decorated dorm room? or the buzzy woodshop? or one big round table with lots of seats? or smaller, more focused conference-esque rooms?
at MIT, maybe it’s those rolling pin-uppy dividers that make it so conducive to sharing ideas. i love walking around and admiring other people’s creativity when i’m stuck. or maybe it’s the communalness of it all — our generous materials sharing [/mild pilfering] habits, the food table, the fridge… or the expectation for course 4 kids to always be in studio creates an automatic sense of gathering and livability, and it becomes comforting to know that there will always be someone there if you need inspiration.
here at DIS, it’s been a little different. our project is an exhibition space in Rundetårn [the round tower], and the smaller scale makes me feel closer to my project, knowing that what i design coulllld potentially be constructed. interior architecture itself claims to ‘solve the meeting between architecture + individuals!’, and seems to be more about a story and some kind of feel-good humanistic journey. and i think that’s what i love most — creating the narrative, the back story behind an experience.
but i don’t spend half as much time sitting in studio in denmark, and i wonder why. even though there are similar amounts of design thinking to be done this semester [notice i did not say work, because that to me is all too wrapped up in the idea of production], i don’t feel as inspired at my desk. instead, i feel inspired when i am walking around copenhagen, at museum exhibits, at the black diamond, the danish architecture center.
(i guess i didnt really answer the first question, but here’s another question anyway…one that might be worm-canny)
why is it that ‘studio’ disappears after college and grad school? why is there not more of a studio culture in professional architecture firms? why oh why is the education so different from the profession?
archibabble updates from michelle + jon’s ‘This Week in AD and CPH!’:
last week: liminal spatial exchange.
this week: replace the word effect with Affect to achieve more active presences in your building; be sure to over-pronounce/capitalize the A (depending on if the term is being spoken or written).
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Tags: archfamily, architecture, denmark, design, interiors, studio
spain escape
friday = best flight ever day.
lamb + goat cheese sandwiches, red wine, and chocolate creme cookies. thank you KLM.
i will mention that after this bottle, two more magically came along
we emerged from the danky depths of the metro (‘renfre’) and slowly rose to the level of Passeig de Gracia. a breathtaking [and slightly wobbly, due to airplane wine] vision of wide, tree-lined avenue warmth! i took my jacket and socks off and twirled around. we were definitely not in denmark anymore…
after roger and i meandered around a couple more Eixample streets [that widen at intersections and have cut-off corners, making an octagon-type shape that sort of ‘celebrates’ the intersection and also forces pedestrians to skooch off to the right side if they want to cross], we ended the night with tapas [grilled garlic cod, bread topped with tomatoes, + another delectable fishy dish], and of course, sangria.
saturday = feet day.
what a surprise to find that our hostel was twenty skips away from gaudi’s Casa Batlló!
casa battlo : visceral, organic, skeletal, modernisme...and perhaps a little reptilian
roger insisted on galloping all the way to Plaça d’Espanya so he could sign in for the marathon and snatch a highly-coveted size S t-shirt. at the runner’s expo, i felt extremely vigorous and athletic by association. another vigorous-looking person even gave me a powerbar sample.
a premature victory lap
we walked all the way back towards catalunya, and encountered many fascinating affairs along the way: two raucous food markets, pleasant triangular garden plots punctuated by playgrounds, a bird woman cuddling up to and whispering to a fine-feathered friend. and countless ‘street entertainers’ drowning in spray paint — such as the jilted goth bride with raven, the ever-popular gold metallic winged Maleficent, and leafy fruit tree woman. initially shocked and soon bored, roger refused to look at them after about two blocks, and adopted a no-peripheral vision policy along La Rambla. (which may have been a factor in the near-successful pickpocketing of my eyelash curler in my backpack the following night.)
it was soon evident that roger and i were captivated by different things. i, by alluringly cheap spanish clothing vendors, narrow, laundry-laden alleyways, and any waft of paella; and roger, by spiral earring spacers, curiosity shops, and the puzzling photographs and life stories of argentinian nomads. it worked well together.
sunday = ISFP day. [introverted sensing feeling perceiving]
roger ran a marathon while i snoozed at the hostel. he also wrote me an excessive note of what i was supposed pack and bring for him at the end of his run. among the items listed: socks, shoes, new cardigan, 2 oranges, my brain, and a sunny disposition.
i expected nothing less
we went our separate ways in the afternoon. i went to the MACBA (museu d’art contemporani de barcelona) — and when i turned the corner and saw massive planes of glass and overwhelming whiteness, i thought to myself, why hello mister Richard Meier.
other places of note: Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, the Montjuïc area, mies van de rohe’s barcelona pavilion!, parc joan miro, the old city/ciutat vella: el raval, barri gotic regions — the most perfect street layout for ‘discovery-making’ that i have ever experienced.
monday = power day.
7.30am wake up. 8.00 breakfast. 8.30 leave hostel. 9.00 la pedrera. 10.00 leave for parc guell. 10.30 walk steep path to parc guell. 11.00 sit/people-watch amongst the teacups. 12.00 play in parc. 12.30 leave to gather belongings from hostel. 1.00 get on the wrong renfre away from the airport. 1.30 fix our mistake, get on the correct renfre, scamper to the airport. 2.00 check in for flight. 3.00 drink wine and fly away back to copenhagen.
the weekend in more pictures:
mercat de san antoni
street 'entertainers' along la rambla
laundry = life, activity, and community, and one of the most subconsciously pleasant sights for humans
mies van der rohe - from 4.205 to real life 🙂
la pedrera/casa mila in the morning light
playing in parc guell. (which included careful observation of the various power symbols of tour group leaders. personal favorites: pinwheel wand, long metal back scratcher, mickey mouse baton.)
making discoveries
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Tags: architecture, cities, travel
copenhagen café culture
never have i been more excited to do 200 pages of reading for class than when each homework assignment equals trying out a new danish cafe.
on my daily journey home from school, i pass at least ten cafes, and they’re not just any euro-ish starbucks or panera-esque chain appendage — but all so charming and full of character. [and in my opinion, so individually worth the 40 dkk/$8 that copenhagen has decided is a normal price for hot chocolate…] my happiness level seems to be directly correlated to the number of hours per day that i spend in a coffeeshop.
>> there is Paludan Bøger on Fiolstræde [an adorable walking street], which is also an antique bookshop with delicately wrought iron chairs and has become my favorite for a quick getaway between classes.
>> and Robert’s Café [now called ‘The Living Room’ in a questionably psychedelic font] with huge brown leather armchairs and lit only with candles + a fireplace, is so incredibly cozy/dark that sometimes i can’t distinguish between reading + dozing off.
>> Jazz Kælderen on Skindergade plays the best background music, doubles as a record store, and is slightly raised above ground level so you can look at everyone’s gorgeously blonde windswept hair/balding spot.
>> Pussy Galore’s Flying Circus down the street from my kollegium in nørrebro is quite a good studying environment with the added value of its chuckle-worthy name.
>> and my most recent favorite:
i am currently sitting at the Laundromat Cafe on elmegade — where JD says he has been every single day this past weekend — and four washers + a dryer rumble comfortingly in the background, amidst rows of color-coded bookshelves. [perhaps not the most efficient system, but rather aesthetically pleasing.] one man is sipping wine and playing solitaire, one couple is giggling and smooching over a game of backgammon, a few students are catching up on reading homework, and two mothers are hanging up their laundry to dry.
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Tags: cafes, copenhagen, denmark, happiness
a conversation snippet about design with a non-design person:
John: design people always add some part that doesnt make senseand put a question mark next to itlike…curves -> planesplanes -> objectsobjects -> 4D??
strikingly insightful…
when i see concept boards for the beginning of some design project’s life cycle, they are littered with grand [and often completely disparate] ideas and manifesto-sounding categorizations of as some profound way of organizing those ideas.
i am certainly not excluded from this sometimes tiresome designsperson’s malady:
my first concept board for an exhibition space in Rundetaarn (round tower in central copenhagen) - the second project for the interior architecture studio
look at all of those presumptuous ???? marks
yesterday, we had a gallery critique at school, where everyone walks around to different studios and presents/critiques each other’s projects. with over 100 students, all of the groupings and sessions were efficiently scheduled in such a meticulous manner [–a 3-page excel spreadsheet complete with a cross-reference numbering and partner system] that both impressed me and disoriented me, coming from the casual, homey 15-archies-per-year environment at MIT.
after significant exposure to aspiring architects, interior architects, and urban designers all afternoon, i noticed a distinct difference in the jargon of each species.
phrases that i heard multiple times throughout the course of the afternoon:
from the architect species: “articulate the spirit of the facade!” “how can daylighting and the structural system INFORM the identity of the infill?!” [i.e. the constant rhetorical struggle to marry and justify frustrating technical restrictions with beautiful conceptual theories]
from interiors people: “curate full bodily experiences that heighten the senses with figurative expressions of movement and interactive involvement” [i.e. concept is God, forget anything structural and based in reality — because who wants to be bothered with that stuff anyway when we can just wallow in our sumptuously succulent abstractions]
from the urban designer camp: “the typology and morphology of the context should be directly influenced by ‘form follows cities’ and revitalized by the 12 crucial points of urban quality and consideration of the different speeds of life” [i.e. in love with their perceived ability to spontaneously generate community and love and green space and happiness from asphalt]
every monday, i eagerly anticipate the email update from michelle beaulieu and jon mayfield of the Architecture + Design department at DIS, so that i can savor and let the archibabble term of the week roll off of my tongue with joy.
week 1: “Our archibabble term of the week is: emotional texture.”
week 2: “The archibabble* term of the week is: streamline extensible rhizomes.**”
week 3: “The archibabble term of the week is: architectonic symbiosis.”
(**Jon says, referencing rhizomes is still “quite hip.”)
if you are interested in learning more, do see jean’s entry on AJMPP, the fledgling Architecture Jargon Magnetic Poetry Project.
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Tags: architecture, design, education, interiors, studio, urbanism
jutland jaunts
last weekend, the architecture + design program went on a study tour to western denmark – including the cities of arhus, aalborg, and kolding. they all reside on the jutland peninsula, which forms the mainland of denmark and ‘juts’ like a finger into the north/baltic seas:
before embarking on the ferry from zealand (island that copenhagen is on) >>> jutland. where does water end and sky start??
jyllinge hellig kors kirke (new church in jyllinge) by KHR Architects. made from all fiberline compsite material...+ fresh snow!
arhus town hall, by arne jacobsen + erik moller. the exterior seemed to be less than magnificent, but the instant we walked in, the use of light and attention to detail (all the way down to the light fixtures + ashtrays, like typical jacobsen) was...perfect
ARoS art museum in arhus by schmidt, hammer, and lassen. can you say ...guggenheim
'the horse sacrifice', piece exhibited at ARoS. aka a horse killed + chopped up into chunks + crammed into a gajillion preservation jars. = art? (really?)
yes we got to see some alvar aalto! interior of nordhyllands kunstmuseum in aalborg, the only aalto in denmark (my favorite sitting + sketching spot on this whole trip) -- look at the way he bends + reflects light to make this museum one of the brightest indoor spaces...anywhere
koldinghus: awe-inspiring castle restoration work by inger + johannes exner. (interlock your fingers together with both hands and that is how the interweaving of old+new here is described by the danes)
playing along the wall leading to the entrance of the trapholt museum of art in kolding (that's me peeking out on the right)
at the end of a weekend of sketching
the cities in western denmark are just like smaller, quieter, quainter copenhagens — although perhaps not necessarily as cosmopolitan, there is a distinct cozier feel. perhaps it is the exclusively danish chocolate flakes (‘pålægschokolade’) that were served to us for breakfast at the hostels =)
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Tags: architecture, cities, copenhagen, denmark, design, travel
the to do list on a newly decorated wall in my kollegium room
classes i am taking this spring [@ DIS + university of copenhagen] :
1. danish design
2. interior architecture studio
3. european urban design theories
4. turkey at the crossroads
5. human rights in africa
fully comprehensive list of meals that i have cooked for myself thus far :
1. omelette
2. stir fry vegetables
3. tortellini with tomato sauce
4. ravioli with pesto sauce
5. fried rice
7. fried potatoes
8. cereal
different housing in cph, and what i am jealous of in each :
1. kollegium [where i am living now – the closest to a ‘dorm’ environment, with predominantly international students. more on this in a future post.]
2. host family [well-fedness, i.e. 3 homecooked meals a day…drool.]
3. danish roommate [constant closeness/friendship to a danish peer.]
4. folkehøjskole [a more rural folk high school outside cph with a tight-knit group of danes; also well-fedness.]
5. shared DIS housing [apartment-style right in city center]
americany habits [which i still do but i don’t mean to] that are simply not done in denmark :
1. unnecessarily saying ‘sorry’ all of the time. [i.e. when skooching towards a seat on the bus] – danes might use the word ‘undskyld’…but only very sparingly.
2. jaywalking. [danes on street corners are so patient and law-abiding! i guess the $200 fine helps…]
3. gabbing loudly on public transportation, asking mundane questions such as ‘how are you doing?!’ [because danes, frankly, do not care…and really when i think about it, neither do we]
4. eating meals with fork in right hand. instead, the ‘proper’ way here is knife in right hand/fork face down in left hand. [why is this so hard for me to do? i feel neanderthalian, not being able to place food in my mouth in a stable manner. i heard from my visiting sister, rikke, that she wouldn’t be caught DEAD with her fork in her right hand by her mom or else she would get a right scolding]
i wish i had packed :
1. my furry indoor slippers
2. more fiction books
3. trace paper [kicking myself in the shin, i was forced to buy a little roll today for 100 kroner = $20, a;sdfjkl;asdjk;asdf]
4. an extra left glove
things that are less expensive in denmark than in america :
1. wine [can be 15 kroner which is < $3 at Netto, my ultimate savior in grocery store form]
2. that’s it.
travel plans for the semester :
1. feb 27-mar 2: barcelona, w. roger
2. mar 6-8: cruise to oslo, w. keops kollegium krew
3. mar 11-16: chu family comes to visit! germany??
4. mar 21-28: sweden/finland [including stockholm + helsinki], w. architecture study tour
5. mar 29-apr 4: paris/southern france? w. john
6. apr 5-10: istanbul, w. turkey class
7. wknd of apr 25: milan? [for the salone internazionale del mobile, aka the milan furniture design fair]) w. tbd
8. may 18: back in the united states
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Tags: cities, copenhagen, denmark, travel
a visit to Ørestad
after getting to know mainly copenhagen city center for the past two weeks, my European Urban Design Theories [EUDT] professor scooped us up from class this afternoon and whisked us to the metro. i love the metro here because the big windows grant me this view if i squeesh into the very front cart:
its like a tranquil roller coaster
our destination: Ørestad City, the new developing town on Amager [pronounced ‘AHma(r?gh??)], a tear drop-shaped island to the east of copenhagen.
the question: young + modernized + star-chitecture-saturated [daniel liebeskind, jean nouvel, etc.] as Ørestad is, would people want to live here?
main street...
as a true T.O.D. – transport-oriented development, Ørestad City is pretty much centered around the metro. which is good for public transportation and accessibility to copenhagen, and bad/sad because it bisects the town’s ‘main street’ like a knife down its spinal cord. apparently, humans need a minimum of 20 meters distance to recognize a person’s face as friendly…and this main street [you can barely see the other side] spans 56m. i think about all the times that i have waved hi to people standing on the other side of skinny little Vestegrade outside DIS…and hmmm, narrower streets can be very nice.
Ørestad gymnasium (or high school) by 3XN
the entry. yes, this is a high school.
(not my photo) -- but i wanted to show this...i was so charmed by the lovable beanbag reading lounges on top of the cylinders!
so Ørestad is currently 998238% housing and very very little commercial shops, except for the monstrous Field’s mall next to the metro stop. A mall is a mall…meaning that it has a long, closed unfriendly street facade, and makes everyone go inside to bat around for their whatever human needs, leaving the streets empty and forlorn. so instead of mixed use/shops along the streets, there are lots of landmarky condos instead:
VM Husene by PLOT. (who are now BIG.) why is it facing a random patch of grass instead of the street? and where are the people?
!['...the only people who live in Orestad are wannabe architects, easily-persuaded d.i.r.k.s. [double-income-no-kids], and...exhibitionists'](https://ytiffanie.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/img_19791.jpg?w=500&h=280 "img_19791")
'...the only people who live in Ørestad are wannabe architects, easily-persuaded d.i.r.k.s. (double-income-no-kids), and exhibitionists' (that girl up there was waving/dancing at me)
small private roof gardens for each tenant in the VM Bjerget by BIG. aka 'the mountain,' and aka...
probably the most beautiful and diagrammatic parking garage in the world (this is from the back). along what a very tiring perspective...3 kilometers of uninhibited vision straight....down....the road.
before today, i guess i had really never understood what it means for a city to be ‘at human scale.’ (we’re always taught to ‘design for the human’ in studio, but all that meant to me was making sure not to have monstrous ceiling heights and mousey-sized staircase widths.) living in boston, new york, and new jersey, and traveling to taiwan, singapore, and bangkok, i guess i’ve only encountered urban environments that were somewhat condensed and crowded… which i had formerly seen as potentially claustrophobic, but now, compared to this futuristically barren Ørestad, seem scarily comfy.
sigh — i love site visits.
EUDT, i think you will be my favorite class this semester.
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Tags: architecture, cities, copenhagen, denmark, urbanism
hello copenhagen!
i stepped off the plane last weekend, right into the welcoming arms of 1) my wonderful new danish visiting family and 2) a grey, damp, overhanging mist whose icy fingers tickled the bone marrow of my sunshine-worshipping skeleton.
[little did i know that mister icy mist would would be looking over my shoulder…every…day. anders, who led us to our kollegium in Norrebro on the first night, cheerily informed us that he had not seen real sunlight for about six weeks.]
except for tuesday! on tuesday afternoon, the sun came out. and then, so did the rest of the city =) as part of the DIS orientation, we embarked upon a summer camp-esque scavenger hunt, and it turned out to be one of the best parts of my first week. armed with our metro passes and cryptically colorful maps, my ‘survival danish’ classmates and i trotted from the fountain at Amagertorv [Amager market], to Trinity Church [with the round tower], to Magasin [the city’s biggest department store], to Rosenborg [summer palace+gardens of king christian IV], to Amalienborg [royal palace], to Christiansborg Square [danish parliament].
i guess i had tried to mentally prepare for denmark’s weather, but i severely underestimated exactly how malleable my mood can be by the presence of sunlight.
![monday, at radhuspladsen [city hall square]](https://ytiffanie.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/img_1705.jpg?w=500 "img_1705")
monday =( at radhuspladsen, city hall square
tuesday! =) at Amagertorv
even the tiniest little swathes of sunlight make me extremely giddy. and at such a northern latitude, the shadows are so long that they’re almost….dreeeeamy.
walking to the grocery store to learn danish food names such as 'kylling' (aka chicken, but pronounced 'kuuueling' and not 'kiiilling' unless you want to be handed a kitten)
a little danish hot dog stand where i grab 20 kroner (~$4, very sad) sausages when i am famished between classes
amagertorv again, my favorite open spot in the city (so far). it sits at a natural widening of the streets at stroget and kobermagade, and used to be an old marketplace, but is now a gathering spot where little fashionable danish teenagers sit and gossip at the fountain during lunchtime
at rosenborg / kongens have, the royal garden of king christian IV, denmark's famously spendthrifty, alcoholic, round-tummied, and most beloved monarch.
i’m really excited to trot all over and soak in more sunlight patches once daylight explodes from eight to sixteen hours as this semester unfurls =)
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Tags: cities, copenhagen, denmark, happiness, sun
over winter break, i’ve been burying my bookwormy-aspiring nose into elizabeth gilbert’s eat pray love, which is turning into a delightful appetizer to my impending study abroad semester in denmark.
although i have neither a lucrative book advance, nor a messy personal divorce from which to cleanse myself, nor an intense three-pronged travel attack of 1. eating, 2. praying, and 3. loving, i do hope to spend my days soaking up new experiences with a similar spirit. specifically, finding the things make my heart sing, gaining a more international+diversified outlook on education and design, learning how to be by myself, and overall just making a teensy bit of headway on my journey towards — ah, dare i say the term? — …self-discovery.
as i am becoming (alternatingly) more apprehensive/excited! about my first solo expedition to continental europe, i am making a mental list of all of the cities i would hate to miss. that is ever-scarily-expanding.
[prague, paris, amsterdam, stockholm, istanbul, um….budapest, berlin, barcelona…]
ambitious, green-nosed, and wallet-wrenching, here i come!
american apparel's cities bag for gloating/poser globetrotters, which i do not own
a cities shirt from Snuglo.com, a funky fashion line for cheeky kiddies
in eat pray love, there is an ‘ohhh!’ chapter in the italy section where Liz and her Roman buddy Giulio talk about how ‘every city has a single word that defines it, that identifies most people who live there.’ [‘ohhh!’ in the sense of ‘what a perfect way of expressing that idea i always had fluttering in the back of my mind which i never knew how to string together properly’]
Giulio asserted that if you could walk down a street in that city and read people’s thoughts, you would discover that the majority of people would be thinking the same thing — and that thought would be the word of the city. [and if your word isn’t the same, you better get a move on and find another city to call your own.] he asserted that the word for rome = SEX. [apparently, SEX — ‘thinking about it, dressing for it, seeking it, considering it, refusing it, making a sport and game out of it–that’s all anybody is ever doing in Rome,’ says Giulio]
liz replied that new york city’s word = ACHIEVE.
and los angeles = SUCCEED. [subtle, but different.]
after awhile, they decided that naples = FIGHT.
and that the vatican = POWER.
Liz’s friend Sophie from sweden soberingly stated that stockholm = CONFORM.
initially, i balked at the idea of subjectively summarizing anything into one word. but as i thought about it some more, i realized that we did it all the time: nicknames, magazine subtitles, simple word associations, overgeneralized categories… A one-liner, or better yet, a one-worder, is just obviously one of the best ways to explain things, remember things, classify things, and market things — and cities are no different. we just adore putting things in boxes. it’s so organized to us. is this unfair labeling? blatant stereotyping? marketing by pure soundbyte? yes, yes, and yes. but it works, doesn’t it? how many times has someone asked you how was your vacation to some exotic locale?!?!, and a one-word answer tumbled out of your mouth, either out of laziness or simplicity of explanation? [tropical! luxurious! festive!] how important is it for a desirable city to have a single, unified image? how much does rome just looove to keep up their reputation and exploit their word? new york? san francisco?
if i had been sitting at their table in the Roman outdoor cafe, i wonder what i would have contributed. from my temporary stints in various cities, in my humble opinion:
boston [new england culture, youth-stimulated] = LEARN.
san francisco [countercultural, accepting] = ECLECTIC.
new orleans [carefree, sinful] = INDULGE.
bridgewater, nj [okay fine, not a real city….but suburban, cul-de-sacked, without a single non-chain store] = GENTRIFIED.
i wonder what copenhagen’s word will be.
…and what’s mine?
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Tags: bags, books, cities, copenhagen, marketing, san francisco, travel
an elegy of sorts to studio
studio, who are you?
traditionally, you are supposed to be one large room for the sole purpose of being an artist’s workspace…a beautiful breeding ground of creativity, visioning, and inspiration. but you can also be a bleeding mound of frustration. you swallow architecture students for eons at a time, enslaving them to that spiraling, nonlinear tornado we like to chuckle and call ‘the design process.’
you are also storage.
and much-sought-after sleeping space.
you were the place where archfamily could engage in midnight duels with naked plotter paper rolls and empty egg cartons as swords and shields; a resting base for us after an exhaustingly inspiring site visit; a home to many a birthday cake celebration, mika dance party, Titanic tears, 6am ken nordine ‘colors’ jam, stacy’s pita chip veg session, a memorable secret santa soiree, and disney singalongs.
jean and jack engage in playful studio banter as the scale figure camels look on
sign reads: "Le Chateau Archfamily" - complete with pillow, blanket, sliding doors, + ipod charger outlet
sky community in the north end
communal food table (photo courtesy of ruifeng)
peering through a hole in the walls (ruifeng)
some of my sketch models (and of course some of renee's)
final studio cheers with jan
i guess you were a way of life?
all in all, dear studio on the fourth floor of building 7, it was a life-changing experience to be with you for the past four semesters of my college career. you’ve been like a hearth and made our whole class more tight-knit and caring than i could have ever imagined. i’ve appreciated your constancy through my undulations of love and hatred, when i didn’t come to visit for entire weekends, and even during times of intense flirtations with other subjects. during the semester, you were the one i always went to when i knew i had to get something done, but didn’t really know what. you’ve made me upset, yes, but sometimes i take for granted the times you’ve made me really happy.
however, now that i have switched to course 4B and will be studying abroad in copenhagen, i think the time has come when i really need to step back a little bit and discover whether or not your path is the one for me. i’m so lucky to have learned so much about myself from you — about work ethic, collaboration, motivation, encouragement, and how close people can become when overcoming challenges together.
it’s been great, and i thank you. who knows when our paths shall cross again.
"Point to your site!"
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Tags: archfamily, architecture, design, happiness, mit, studio
the origin of women’s dresses in the 19th century:
“Dresses increased dramatically to the hoopskirt and crinoline-supported styles of the 1860s; then fullness was draped and drawn to the back by means of bustles. Dresses were generally one-piece garments from 1800 through the 1840s; after that it became common for a dress to be made as a separate skirt and bodice, and many dresses had a “day” bodice with a high neckline and long sleeves, and an “evening” bodice with a low neckline (decollete) and very short sleeves.’
a. how many times have you had to wear a large fancy gown to some intrepid formal function and wished that you could crawl away into somewhere so that you didn’t have to be there anymore?
NEW YORK - SEPTEMBER 11: A model walks the runway during the Betsey Johnson 2008 Fashion Show at The Tent in Bryant Park during the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2008 on September 11, 2007
a dress? or battleship? from a show at the National Institute of Fashion Technology, NIFT, in India
b. wouldn’t it be interesting for instead of to find a way to be able to wear nature, and then fully envelop yourself in it, or have it consume you?
c. what are they many functions of a tent, and how can those be incorporated into a skirt for everyday usage?
concept example: Tent Skirt from Climate Change Preparedness Center [apparently a Harvard startup that may or may not exist anymore?]: ‘This attractive skirt has two components: a crinoline underskirt opens into a mosquito net, and an apron-style overskirt becomes a tarpaulin with grommets for optimal positioning. The well-prepared nomad can distribute the weight of her tent for daytime travel in style.’
some materials - wire, canvas, thread
the hoop pattern
the process of stictching + stacking
the full layered hoop skirt, on a masonite girl model
hidden ---- layers unravel, fabric opens up, and wire skeleton will allow it to stand
mock up of 'using nature' as the fabric, inspired by project runway
top view of 'tent', with leaves as embellishment....further inspiration for fashion via found materials??
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Tags: DIY, fashion, future craft, nature, project runway
some bodycraft ideas
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Tags: design, fashion, future craft, green
a space for favorites 
