-Another review this week. Not quite the disaster of 2 weeks ago, though it was certainly an improvement. Mateo said no less two times, it was the best images I had produced all semester. He never said it was good, or that the design itself was okay-- but certainly better than what I got two weeks ago.

-I've been watching this stuff about UC's budget cuts via the internet. I don't really know all the details, but is this 931million figure correct? If these numbers were passed on from the state, shouldn't protests be directed at the state level? It would seem like the hands of the university system are tied to generating 931million in one way or another.

-Another political debate--- but this time on my side of the pond. In Switzerland there is a fierce battle ragging over a proposed ban on new construction of Minarets at mosques. These posters have been put up all over the city and I am sure the rest of the country as well.

Here is the poster, it is quite scary.


And here is the logo of the SVP (the political parties largely behind the initiative)


My head is pounding from all the subliminal messages that just got rammed into it. More information about the controversy here.

Themals Vals this weekend. Hoping for snow.

Oh yes-- and buying a Thanksgiving turkey (Turten) in Zeurich is not easy. For future reference, they have frozen turkeys at Migros (the 10th place I went) but none bigger than 6.2Kg. And they still cost an arm and a leg.

As you may have deduced from my previous entry, my computer is more or less dead at this point (thus a lack of updates, photos, etc). I managed to turn it on again after a 2 full sweeps of the harddrive and giving it about a week to think about what it had done, but I am heistant to start investing time restocking it with applications, etc.

But another quick entry today because I am on my way out of town. (Paris, oh la la)

Had a review on Tuesday. A lot of work put into it... for what turned out to be the absolutely worst, most negative review I have ever received. Not one single positive thing was said about my project-- which might I add is "not architecture". Hm.

So perhaps I will try to fix that. The critics did not want to listen to anything I had to say and in general seemed a bit taken back when I tried to challenge them with my design's reasoning. (Which may also have simply fueled the fire for more negative criticism.) I think they made up their mind very early on and the fact that they all spoke broken[ish] english did not help my cause. I did not understand them--- they likely didn't understand me.

So I guess it was just a big misunderstanding, right????


ANYWAY.

Saw this about a free U2 concert yesterday and found it funny. Personally I wouldn't be there in the first place (u2 is not my cup of tea), but you have to admit it is a bit ironic.

Oh yes, and a final note:

I am going to the Zumthor's Thermal Baths for the weekend in 2 weeks. Be jealous.

updates!

-Barcelona was great. Posted photos online. Sketches are better, but i haven't scanned them yet. Of course I didn't get to see everything I wanted, but that is just the way it works, right?

-People everywhere in Barcelona wear white glasses. In my [not so important] opinion, white glasses look good on only one person: Karim Rashid. On everyone else they look bad. (And as a sidenote, Karim designed his own white glass-- one more reason he is allowed to wear them.)



-Midterm review in 1 week. Lots to do. Footprint and sections pretty much set. Still a bit of tweeking necessary, some beginning thoughts about detailing. Renderings. I could use some renderings.

-Oh yes, my computer is about to die. I have had the blue screen of death 3 times in the past 5 days. And don't even give me the Apple talk, because I don't want to hear it. PC for life. 4.5 years of architecture school simply takes its toll. How long did my fellow archinects notebook computers last from architecture school? I think 4.5 years is pretty good.



-Switzerland's daylight savings switch is a week earlier than in the US. But just like in the US, it is depressing to get out of studio in the dark. Especially when you went in and it was still morning.

-Finally made it to the jungfrau region this weekend. Absolutely unbelievable. That's the north face of the Eiger, aka: Mordwand. Or "murder wall" in English. More photos posted on picasa.



-People in Zurich are always exercising and running at night. The other day I saw a guy running at 11pm, 50 degrees outside, and raining. Good for him, I hope he was enjoying himself because that seems miserable.

-That's all.

Review #2 went well. A lot better than I was expecting actually. Main criticisms spawned from how the drawings were reading (compared to what I was saying), but that is just a consequence of rushing to complete before the pinup today.

I am still really intrigued by the relationship we are afforded with the chair of the design studio here. It is still very foreign to me that he is only here once every two weeks. And when he is, i have never seen him coming or going, he always just descends out of the upstairs of the pavilion and then later slowly floats back up the stairs. (It is a very surreal-- not kidding.) It's like he is an angel. A Spanish one.

Leaving for Barcelona on a night train tomorrow night. Thanks for the suggestions-- I'll post photos and sketches when I get back.

In the meantime, enjoy this pumpkin which is currently gracing/ haunting my front stoop.

Bullet points today because I'm bussssy.



-Design project coming along. Facade/section/structure falling in place. (Until I get told to change it all at the review on Tuesday.)

-Obama wins the Nobel Peace Prize? okay.

-I'm going to Barcelona next week for 4 days. Rough list of things to see below. Anything missing? First time in the city. (And Spain for that matter.)

MACBA
BARCELONA PAVILLION
MERCAT SANTA CATERINA
LA SAGRADA FAMILIA
PARK GUELL
PICASSO MUSUEM
LAS RAMBLAS
LA BOQUERIA
ARC DE TRIONF, AND PARC DE LA CIUTADELLA
LA PLAYA

-Trying to rate all my songs in iTunes - only 4917 left. Made a "never rated" smart playlist and giving each song it's fair chance to earn an appropriate amount of stars.

-Yesterday this woman sat next to me on the bus and she smelled literally like a wet dog. Not a wet person- a wet dog.

-This video is hilarious. UT at it's best. (ps. "Eric Berry- yo, he scary.")

Four years of architecture school in Imperial Units is not easily unlearned. The metric system is such a pain in my ass.

I don't care if it is superior, base ten, whatever- I can't quickly reference it in my head.

Rode my bike to Basel this weekend. 95km (In miles??? 60ish.) It was so great though- we did probably 90% of the trip on dedicated bike/walking paths completely separate from the vehicular road. The regional connectivity of the network is absolutely unbelievable.

Studio tomorrow and Wednesday. Another review next week. Working on structure, thoughts about materials, detailing site plan/ first real iteration of floor plan. And a nice section. And a rendering. Turns out I have more to do than I thought.

Saw a lecture from Mark Lee from Johnston Marklee & Associates today in my Urban Mutations class today. More about the class later.

Posted new photos yesterday (fourth album)


Pop quiz: an 18inch concrete wall is approximately how many centimeters wide?

I have been watching the IOC selection process for the Olympics. I think it will go to Rio. (Has anyone been to Rio? I would like to go some day- not necessary for the Olympics, but I wouldn't mind that either.) Chicago was just eliminated in the first round of voting. I kind of saw that coming, personally. I think their entry was so strong it started to work against them. I can just imagine everyone voting saying something in their heads like, "Oh, I won't vote for Chicago, but I know everyone else will- so I don't feel bad about it."

Probably not the case, but disappointing none the less. When the Olympics were in Atlanta (which is only 2 hours from where I grew up) we didn't go down to see any events, but I would have made serious considerations to go if they were in Chicago. The tickets are outrageously expensive though- all my friends that went remember telling me their parents bought really obscure, preliminary events because everything else was too expensive. I guess they have to offset the cost somehow.

Studio related: I talked to my assistant yesterday and he said to leave my site plan like it is and keep moving forward. So that was a bit of surprise (because I received a lot of negative criticism about being perpendicular to a long, horizontal site) but I guess that is what I'll do. It is a risky move, so I will have to execute it just right for it to work. [COME ON SAMUEL, YOU CAN DO IT.]

Going on an extended bike ride tomorrow. Finally fixed my flat tire- turns out it wasn't a flat, just someone had let all the air out of my tube. I don't have a pump here (I brought a small one, but then bought a bike with presta valves, rendering it useless. Do they make adapters?) otherwise I would have figured this out a long time ago. The weather continues to be gorgeous here, although the temperatures are beginning to slowly creep downward. Tomorrow it is 67degrees. And no, I don't know the Celsius scale yet. 30 is hot. 0 is cold.

shameless self promotion:
Finally updated my webpage and all the links for my trip (photos, sketches, videos, etc

Just got out of our first formal review with Professor Mateo.

Maybe it is just me, but spending literally the entire day (8 hours) to talk about schematic programming of every project in the class just doesn't seem like a good use of time.

I see the point in participating in/ watching the review of other people's work as well (because everyone usually runs into the same problems usually). But for 8 hours? Is this like a standard European thing or something? Everyone else seemed relatively unphased by an entire day of program placement.

It was really odd the beginning of the review (maybe this is a european thing too). We came in and no one knew anything about what to do, etc- so we were just all standing around. One of the assistant came down from the offices above our studio and put up a schedule and told the first two groups to pin up. We did. Then we stood around for a while. Then we started to mull over to the pin up wall. Then the assistants all came down and everyone starting getting quiet, etc. Then we waited. Just sitting. Then Professor Mateo came down and I really had the feeling like we should be clapping or something. Then the review started and it felt relatively natural.

Ok- not completely. There wasn't a lot of discussion I felt like (how could there not be in 8 hours!?) and was mostly one way criticism. And no one from the class said a word during other students reviews. At UT we present for 2-5 minutes (depending on the scope of the project) then pretty much field questions and just talk with the critics the rest of the time. And at least a few people speak up during the review.

Just observations. Overall it went well. Need to put some more thought in my "situation plan". (aka, site plan. this makes sense I guess- just never heard it before.)

I got into that video class, did the 4 day workshop- and now the class is over. Very long weekend of filming, editing, reviewing, etc. My thursdays are now free every other week. Woot.

Ok, that's all. I haven't been hiking in like 3 weeks. I am getting antsy. Going next weekend for sure. This weekend hopefully at least a day.

And afterward i'll make architecture.

Not a lot of posts lately. "Things" have been getting increasingly busier. I hate it when people start out blogs like that, but hey-- it'll be okay.

Studio started on Wednesday. Officially we are in class from something like 8am-6pm on Tuesday and Wednesday. This is obviously a bit different that my UT studio model and quite a bit different that any other undergraduate class I can imagine. So it should be interesting to see how the studio dynamic is of off and on instruction, class meetings, pinups, critiques, etc for the entire day. I'm excited.

Professor Mateo seems great and the assistants are all young and enthusiastic-- which is of course nice. I think there are...3 or 4 primary assistants. Then several more that will come in for specialized things? Rendering and digital stuff, CAD/CAM workshop, etc.

We are designing a factory for the Henniez mineral water company in Western Switzerland. I will post more details about the program and such soon. We have an entire book with information about the project-- I'll try to find the PDF when I figure out server access stuff.

Thursday I went to a building materials course that was entirely in german. eek. I didn't really catch much of what he was talking about, but since I have had a similar course already I could make some educated guesses based on the tables, diagrams, etc. That is not a good way to learn anything new though-- just assume they are talking about something I *kind of* could tell you something about. Not going back to that class.

I am in a video course that is promising to be interesting if I can make it in the course that is. (very limited space) More details on that later-- but here is a website in the meantime.

I am moving to my new flat today. ick. I will be much closer to campus, but I sure hate moving. This is like 5 times in 12 months now.

And I will leave you with this. Yes, this is a real place. I can confirm because I was there. I didn't believe it either.

Hoi. (look i speak swiss german)

Two weeks of German class just about finished. It is hard to make an honest/ accurate assessment about where I stand now vs. where I stood before 60 hours of classroom time, but I feel at least a lot more comfortable speaking and not worrying so much about making mistakes. It sure doesn't make it any easier when everyone here speaks english (for the most part - especially if you are under the age of 30).

Real classes start next week and I am looking forward to getting into my design coursework. I haven't finalized my schedule yet, but can confirm I will be in the Josep Louis Mateo studio for this semester. Got an email today telling me to bring portfolio and CV to the first day of class.

CV: check.
Portfolio: not check.

Seems one of my tasks that never was completed/started from this summer has caught up with me. I am only supposed to bring three A4 sheets though, so it would seem it's not a full-on presentation, thankfully. I can pull something together in a night or day or weekend or starting right now or so.

The weather here is pretty wonderful right now. It's in the 40s every morning, then gets up to high 70s during the day. Sun, sun, sunny. Very nice.

Did I mention I got my bike working? Finally got my derailleur i ordered from EBAY and installed it surprisingly problem free. The bike is a early 90s Giant with carbon tubes, shimano RSX group (pre105, it's OKAY), nice deep rims, climbs well, pretty quick-- I like it. Payed $70 (CHF is more or less $). Invested $70 in parts (derailleur, tubes, tires). Pretty good deal. Don't know if I will fall in love with it enough to pay another 100 to bring it home to the states, but we'll see. It's not much of a looker, but it's a good bike.

In other news, yesterday I climbed an enormous mountain. (on foot, not bike.) Pictures posted in a new Picasa album below. Quite an amazing view from the top. Smokey mountains....psssh. Just kidding.

Moving out of my flat in about 10 days. Found a new place. Not quite the same character, but only 1km from the arch campus. Nice.

New Picasa Photos Added