Day Trip to Como, Italy

Como, Italy

Friday, April 6, 2012 -- 3:40PM

After we got back from Spring Break, our studio took a group trip to Como, Italy. Como is a small city, like Lugano, that is just barely over the border of Switzerland and Italy. Like most towns here, it is on the water and is surrounded by mountains. And apparently George Clooney lives there, but we unfortunately didn't see him. We visited Casa del Fascio (House of Fascist) by Giuseppe Terragni. This was back during the Fascist reign in northern Italy. It is a modular, aka gridded, plan. A very simple and structured plan. We spent some time just wandering around and sitting by the lake. Terragni also has a war memorial down by the lake. We then went a little bit to the outskirts to see a kindergarten also designed Terragni. Pretty similar concepts of Casa del Fascio but not a rectangle. Como is really nice, but I think a lot of us were a bit travel-packed. We had just gotten home from 2 weeks of travel and needed time to unwind and digest everything we had seen.

Como Duomo...it rhymes

Casa del Fascio

Nice Stair

Front Facade

War Memorial -- Terragni

Kindergarten

Italy Part 4 -- Roma!

Parco della Musica by Renzo Piano

February 28, 2012 -- 4:56PM

The last destination of our giro d'italia was Rome. We stayed in Rome for 3 nights. The weather finally started to get tolerable and almost warm at times, which made it that much better. Our hotel was right next to Piazza di Fiore which is really close to Piazza Navona and the Pantheon. My room was on the top floor and opened right out onto our roof terrace where we spent most mornings and nights hanging out eating and drinking beer & wine. We arrived sort of later in the evening so we had a little time to roam (no pun-intended) over towards the Pantheon and see it with the sun down. It was incredible. Such a beautiful structure that was built 120AD. It's amazing it still stands today. I believe we had group dinner that night and then a couple of us decided to walk up to St. Peter's which is absolutely gigantic! We got asked to leave around 11pm when they were closing down the area for the night so we walked over to the Spanish steps and enjoyed those for a little while. My knee started acting up a lot from all the walking from the week, especially on cobblestone. We called it a night.

View from our roof top terrace just outside of our hotel room

We had an early morning to tour the city as a studio. We first went to Piazza Navona to see Bernini's Four Rivers sculpture and Borromini's Church. We then went over to the Pantheon for a bit. It was awesome to see light pour through the completely open oculus. We then went to see some more Bernini vs. Borromini; Chisea di Sant Andrea al Quirinale by Bernini &
San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane by Borromini. Both churches on the same block with ovular domes. Frankly, I think Borromini's was better than Bernini's in this instance, but typically I prefer Bernini work over Borromini. We then went to see Bernini's Ecstasy of St. Teresa sculpture in the Cornaro Chapel.

Piazza Navona

The Pantheon

Chisea di Sant Andrea al Quirinale by Bernini

San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane by Borromini

Bernini's Ecstasy of St. Teresa sculpture in the Cornaro Chapel

Paola cut us loose for Lunch and the afternoon so Jess, Erik, Blake, Sam, and I went towards the Coliseum and the Roman Forum (aka the ruins). The line was pretty long to get inside the Coliseum so we just walked through the ruins instead. That night I went to dinner with a smaller group of people and we were actually able to eat out on the street which was awesome. We drank on the roof terrace that night and I met some kids who are studying in Florence from MICA, which was pretty cool.

Coliseum

The Ruins

The next day, Saturday, we decided to walk up to the Vatican City and try to get into St. Peter's basilica. What we didn't know was that the Pope would be inducting a bunch of Cardinals that morning. So we weren't able to get in but we were able to watch the Pope speak (in Latin) for a little bit on the screens in front of St. Peter's. Blake, Erik, Jess, and I then walked up the hill towards Il Tempietto di San Pietro in Montorio and got a pretty sweet view of Rome from a little higher up. We then had to meet with the group to head North towards the Olympic Park, Maxxi, and the Parco della Musica. I was kind of disappointed with Maxxi by Zaha Hadid. The form was cool and the stairs and walkways were awesome but the galleries kind of sucked. Parco della Musica by Renzo Piano was absolutely gorgeous. It was so inspiring and really nice to finally see some architecture from the 21st century. After seeing this complex, it has really inspired me to really consider getting into concert hall, auditorium, and acoustic design. We were able to see a Jazz Orchestra concert in one of the concert halls that evening which was absolutely incredible. I really miss being able to play music.

St. Peter's Basilica

Bernini's St. Peter's Square

Il Tempietto di San Pietro in Montorio

Piazza del Popolo

Maxxi by Zaha Hadid

Parco della Musica by Renzo Piano

Italy Part 3 -- Florence (Firenze) + Siena

At the peak of the Duomo in Firenze

February 26, 2012 -- 9:38PM

Next stop on our Giro d'Italia (Tour of Italy) was Firenze (Florence). Florence (as well as Rome) have a lot of exchange/international education so pretty much everyone I met in Florence spoke at least a little bit of English, which was kind of disappointing. I was finally starting to feel somewhat comfortable with attempting to speak italian. The city is absolutely beautiful and is filled with some amazing history. We kicked off the trip with a visit to the Duomo, aka the tallest dome/church in the city. The dome was built by Brunelleschi. I couldn't believe the mass of the building. The dome and bell tower are really tall but the basilica in general is just massive. It looks so out of place when looking at the full city's landscape. We climbed up through the skinny and narrow corridors to arrive at the peak of the dome. I'm not the biggest fan of heights but it was pretty incredible, not to mention how old the structure is and it is sturdier than anything else in that city.

The second day in Florence we went to a bunch of former Medici owned buildings. The library we visited had a dome built by Michelangelo. We had lunch at Za-Za's a pizza place picked out by Jess, since she formerly studied in Florence. It was delicious. We went to Santa Croce which was by far one of my favorite churches to enter. Many famous people were buried there such as Michelangelo, Galileo, Machiavelli, Donatello, and Dante. That night a couple of us, lead by Jess, climbed a near by hill/mountain to get an awesome view over Florence at night. It also brought us to one of Michelangelo's "David" sculptures.

Michelangelo's dome

Michelangelo's tomb in Santa Croce

Santa Croce (alter was under-construction unfortunately)

We left Florence the next morning and made a pit stop by the Chisea dell'Autostrada del Sole, a less traditional church with a very free form and interesting structural system. On our way to Rome we stopped for a couple hours in Siena to see the Campo, basically a city center plaza, and then the Duomo di Siena, which was littered with statues and sculptures on its facade and interior.

Chisea dell'Autostrada del Sole

Duomo di Siena

Italy Part 2 -- Brion + Verona

Tomba Brion

February 26, 2012 -- 7:48PM

Our second day in Vicenza we took a coach bus just out of the city to Carlo Scarpa's Cemetery at Brion (Tomba Brion). Scarpa was a pretty influential architect and had a very distinct style when it came to the question of joinery, corners, and use of material. He is also buried in this small cemetery. After spending a couple hours sketching and photographing we convinced the coach driver to take us to Verona, a nearby town with more Scarpa work. He did a renovation of Castelvecchio to add a museum of art, sculptures, and armor.

One of the tomb designs, mimicking a Venice bridge

Skylight in the chapel

Voids in the chapel

A beautiful stair in Castelvecchio

Italy Part 1 -- Venice + Vicenza

Tuesday, February 21, 2012 -- 12:23PM

Here is the beginning of many posts of our 8 day travel through Italy. I'll start with the first two days involving Venice and Vicenza. Venice was extremely cold and windy. It actually snowed for part of the time we were there which is apparently not too common. It was the beginning of carnival so there was a lot of activity and a lot of people dressed in crazy costumes/masks. Our hotel was just over the Calatrava Bridge from the train station, and if I might add, the bridge looks cool but it is kind of an awkward bridge to cross. The stair sizes were very weird and kinda hard to be able to see when there were landings and when there were stairs. We basically just made it our goal to break up into groups and get lost in the city. You can only go so far because it's an island so it was a lot of fun. Whenever we had a destination, we would end up getting lost because you kind of have to make it up as you go since all the canals make it difficult to navigate. It was a lot of fun. We saw Tadao Ando's renovation of Punta della Dogana and a couple churches. We also saw the Olivetti Typewriter Showroom done by Carlo Scarpa. I had the absolute best seafood pasta ever as the first course of our dinner. We stayed in a hotel that used to be a monastery and I got placed in a single room which was a former monk cell. For some reason it creeped me out a lot and I had a really hard time sleeping. Luckily we were only there for one night.

Calatrava Bridge

Tadao Ando's Punta della Dogana -- I had to sneak this picture since photography wasn't allowed in the gallery. His stairs and concrete treatment are absolutely amazing.

Piazza San Marco con Carnivale

My monk cell

Santa Maria della Salute

A couple people in our group got lost in the city the morning we were leaving to go to Vicenza and they made a mad dash from the hotel to the train station and barely caught the train. It was pretty incredible the amount of distance they covered with all of their luggage. They had to pry a door open to jump on the train. It makes for a pretty good story. Luckily, I wasn't one of the ones sprinting to the train. Vicenza is a much less dense city which was a nice change in pace from Venice. It was still extremely cold though. We saw Teatro Olimpico by Palladio which was made in the 1580. It was a beautiful theater. Once again we had an amazing dinner. We stayed in a much newer hotel which was much more comforting than the Venice monastery.

Teatro Olimpico wood seats & steps

Stage ornamentation

Colonnade in the rear of the auditorium

City center also done by Palladio. Beautiful sky at dusk.

Milano, Italia

This is funny

January 16, 2012 -- 11:50PM

Today we took a day trip to Milan, Italy. The city began as an Industrial Engineering city making it a hub for train travel for exports/imports. When design became to consume Western Europe a great deal of Italian design came from Milan. Beginning with industrial designs, it took off into the world of art, architecture, and fashion. Fashion took the city by storm with designers such as SuperStudio, Armani, etc. This weekend was actually men's fashion week in Milano, so we were able to see a lot of models and showcases going on. Milan has a lot of style but is extremely juxtaposed by it's almost run down looking buildings. Most of the design headquarters are located behind the elder facades in the inner-block courtyards. Funny enough, Milan is Italy's finest fashion district and one of the best for fashion in Europe/the World.

We got to see the Duomo, an amazing Gothic church.

Another castle in Milan

I wasn't as overwhelmed and impressed with Milan like I thought I would be. Part might be because it was super cold all day, or because we just toured around the streets for the most part and didn't really have main destinations in our tour. We didn't get a chance to see Palazzo Lombardia, unfortunately, so I will definitely be returning for that and some other important places. It's only 45 minutes away so this is the first of many trips. This is probably my last post for a couple days since classes will start and we won't be traveling to crazy awesome new places everyday. Maybe a trip to Mendrisio on Thursday!

Ps. Their street art is amazing!