Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Things about Danes before I forget
Danes wait for traffic signals always, if you j-walk you get some nasty scowls
Danes ride bikes in HighHeels
Danish food is the stuff i grew up with, meat and potatos
Christmas lunch=pork roast with carmalized stuff ontop, (my host mom loves that crunchy stuff) and sugary potatos aka brown potatoes
The danes will tolerate anything
No one is obnoxious on mass transit.
Danes do not talk to strangers.
Danes know english
Danish humor can be very dark
Danish humor is full of sarcasm
My host brother loves Euro vision,
My host brother sings in his room with the new Karaoke playstation game
Thank god my host brother Morten goes to bed at 10 every night
The danes like badminton, rowing and football
The danes are probably more closely related in bloodline to the slaves of the vikings
Danes are into functionalism and the modest details
The danes like to wear black
The danish youth wear every more colors than beton has ever seen
The danes ride bikes
Danish mass transit is amazing
The mint frog is danish, the neon sign outside the factory in nyhavn is a historic landmark
Nyhavn is the city of doom, i must get a picture before I leave
Denmark is mostly rainy and flat
Denmark is alot better than upstate new york because of the later
Jeg elsker Kobenhavn
ps. thats danish
Thursday, November 29, 2007
An American brthday in Denmark
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Thursday, November 8, 2007
J-Day
The christmass brews have hit the shelf. This is a huge event in Denmark, and almost every company has special new brew. Tuborg one of the larger brewers in Denmark has helped make J-day (short for Jule day, the release date) a huge success. This year they created a mountain of snow in the main square (Rhadhus Plads) for a skiing event and sent a trailer handing out the new batch down stroget (the main pedestrian street of Copenhagen) to anybody around. As far as I can tell Jul mainly means the addition of apple in most beers, but there are some really great new flavors out there. Sure beats just egg nog.
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Hillerod in the Fall
Sunday, November 4, 2007
The Second Longest Escalator in the World
This is the second site we visited on our architecture trip through Germany and the Netherlands. The title of this post pretty much is how the trip felt. DIS faculty constantly pushing us forward up through the architecual wonders of the region, some going by too quickily, having us peering over the railing, looking back in vain to fully comprehend their design mysteries. Others of course, could not go by fast enough, like a fart from somewhere ahead when you are stuck on some jampacked holiday hell escaltor in the mall. But I am pretty sure I never felt like that on this trip, except maybe the all-night busride home.
Anyway back to the details, this grand marvel (the longest escalator located in Hong Kong) is located in Essen Germany on an old coal mine. The site, Zeche (http://www.zollverein.de/index.php?f_categoryId=3&f_menu1=3&lang=en ) Zollverein is being turned in to a culture center by the great OMA (http://www.oma.eu/) with components designed by various other architects. The starchitect Rem Koolhaas is responsible for the escalator and these orange glowing stairs that are the movment core in what is to become coal factory turned contemporary art musem. The original spaces of the factory are amazingly well suited for display art. They high cielings and large filmy factory windows create the perfect light. The textures of the factory rooms (I have probably 50 photos of this) are probably going to more interesting than much of the art displayed. Im not dissing contemporary art, its just these spaces have such strong character and history in them. I haven't yet tackled sorting through these texture pictures so you will just have to imagine them. Just combine coal with; rusted metal, bare concrete, glass, gears, you get the idea.
Our tour guide through this site was just as remarkable in himself. Classic designer, Black trench over black blazer over black turtleneck followed by black pants and boots, capped off with combed straight back neck length jet black hair and black top heay rimmed glasses. Part of me feels this dress is much to easy. He was pretty self centered and slightly dissed the design sense of our intro tourguide. I hope i took a picture of this guy, its probably lost in textures for now. Well this guy took us through the red dot museum which is a design award for everything design. Upon entrance you are blown away by this huge cathedral like hall with three story tall coal machines flanking either side. Dead end and center is a bmw or something suspended like a crucifix with its doors hanging open for additional effect. He then gives us a quick tour, tells us this vacuum inspired the macbook and then smokes a cigarette as we head off for lunch.
This is a view from the top of the Factory. That white cube in the distance is our next destination, but right now Morten needs to use the internet and im gonna take a walk to the castle on this brisk autumn day.
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