13-19.July_In Pickchas

These photos are from my last week spent in Sydney pertaining to the previous post about my last week spent in Sydney. I recommend reading the entry first, then viewing these photos, then standing on one leg in the yard with your eyes closed. 

Final Presentation Space

UNSW_College of Law

You can probably tell what this building is

UNSW_College of Law

Surry Hills Library

Surry Hills Library

Picnic Lunch in Hyde Park_

       Figs, Octopus, Peppers, Bread

Mona Lisa in Coffee_Each cup had real coffee in it with different amounts of milk to change the color

Can't resist a picture of a Pirate Ship_

     It's actually part of a restaraunt

Chaos of the Aroma Festival

Enjoy.

13-19.July Countdown Sydney

13.July_Monday

                  As I mentioned, our final project, after working on it for three weeks or so, is due on Thursday. This week is going to be focused on actually doing that project. So Today, we presented our ideas and projects so far to Adrian who has yet to see any of our studio work. It was nice to have her feedback as well as Michael’s. After presenting, we all (the ten students) went back to the hostel and ate dinner together, just whatever we happened to have, but it was cool to eat altogether and we shared a few bottles of wine and discussed our projects in a less formal setting. Oddly enough kinda helpful.

 

14_Tuesday

                  More studio all day today, it was a long day, full on production mode trying to actually have some legit work done for Thursday.  I spent about 10 or 11 hours building a physical model of our project while Jenna worked on a digital model for the majority of that time. Pretty long day.  On the bright side, it was $5 pizza night again at Eagle Boys so we all got pizza and hung out on the terrace at studio to eat. These long days and nights promote camaraderie in the studio environment.

 

15_Wednesday

                  Stu stu studio. Yep another day of the same.  I spent another hour or two finishing up the model and then Jenna and I met with Michael to discuss said model and our presentation ideas. Michael then proceeded to take my model apart with a utility knife and a bit of force. Granted, his idea better represented the project and left more viewing options for the final review, but I had imagined it at least making it to the crit before anyone ripped it apart.

                  So I rebuilt the model with much fewer permanently glued pieces and then we cranked out some drawings, diagrams, collages, photos, etc to make a nice little presentation, in bed by 3AM, not too shabby.

 

16_Thursday

So, going to bed at 330AM means we got our project completely finished outside of printing it out and Jenna and I decided to sleep in, which is weird because generally the morning of the day your project is due is spent finishing your project. It was kinda nice though, odd, but nice.  So I rolled out of bed between 1030 and 11, took my time showering, shaved off my ‘beard’ (I’ll pause while you all laugh at the thought of me referring to that thing on my chin as a beard, go on) and then we headed for studio about noon, stopping to print on the way.

                  Everything went beautifully, we met with the group in studio and headed to Richard Goodwin’s studio in Leichhardt where we would be presenting our ‘final’ projects.  Richard is formally trained as an architect but spends his time now as an artist, often taking brand new motorcycles and blowing them up at different scales, the welding all the pieces in place as a sculpture of a motorcycle as its blowing up. Really cool looking actually. So we got to his studio and he wasn’t there and we’ve never met him anyway so how would we know, but one of his employees opens the door to ten students with pieces of projects and cardboard to pin up drawings in tow. She greeted us with a smile, said oh sure come in everyone how you going etc etc, then stops to think “Wait, who are you guys?”

                  So she let us in and got everything set up for our crit. Richard showed up a little later along with Steffen Lehman, architect and PHD very involved with art and architecture in Australia.  Nick Seeman, principal of Constructive Dialogue whom we’ve met with on several occasions. Jannie Lawrence, artist etc. Naomi, artist from Matchbox Projects whom we met with once before, and finally Michael who had stopped for some cookies.  Once everyone was there, we got everything underway and it all went really well. The critics had great feedback and plenty of ideas to share with us. It was an awesome final presentation.  After about 4 hours of crits, we all went to dinner together in Leichhardt.

 

17_Friday

 

                  Friday was once again a day filled with things to see, places to go, etc. No need to get used to not moving around all the time, we’re right back at it.  We started by meeting at studio to clean up our things and say farewell to our temporary space (which we almost got kicked out of around 1AM the night before our project was due).  From there, we met with Michael and too a bus to the University of New South Wales for a tour of the campus to look at their interesting buildings. Oddly enough, their architecture building is also none too easy on the eyes and even less functional than DAAP. Nice.  We got a tour from an Australian girl called Sally and a guy named Andrew who happens to be from Toledo. Outside of Australia, the majority of people we’ve met here have honestly been from Ohio. What the hell?

                  After that, we took a bus to Surry Hills, pretty nice little suburb of Sydney, to visit their library, very sustainable, but not at all in your face, just good design that works well. It was fairly small, but seems to be used by a good number of people and it was a nice building to be in.  After that, we headed back to Newtown, trying to figure out what to do for dinner/lunch since it was 4 and we hadn’t eaten yet. What would you do for lunch?

Burritos, clearly, don’t kick yourself for not thinking of it, just don’t let it happen again.  Yep, Andrew and I went to Guzman y Gomez on King Street for some sizeable burritos (no chipotle, but come on, what is?)  Anyhow, the burrito was still quite large and they had better choices of what to put in it than America. I had barramundi. It’s a kind of fish. I recommend it.

                  Next, I don’t even remember, I may have taken a nap or just sat and stared at a wall for a few. Either way it was good. I think there was ice cream involved. Then most everyone went to see Harry Potter and the Newfangled Magic thing I can’t Remember. I on the other hand bought myself a bottle of Jack Daniels and a liter-o-cola to celebrate the end of Sydney with Jenna and Carmen.

 

18_Saturday

                  Good night, I’m a little dizzy this morning, but it was worth it.  So anyway, Gina and I got up pretty early, like 7ish on a Saturday morning, gross, but we walked to a really cool café that Nick had told us about called Deus Ex Machina.  It is a local sort of café with pretty fancy breakfasts (Field greens, wild mushrooms and crusty bread) and it’s attached to a motorcycle and apparel store. Interesting combination and interesting crowd, but really cool. From there we went to the Library to do more research for our research papers. (Up early, library? What kind of Saturday is this??) I don’t think we were at the library too long before I got hungry again and Gina and I left to have a picnic. There’s a really cool market sort of thing that sells everything you can imagine foodwise in the basement of a department store. Strange, but I’ll take it. So we bought bread, peppers, octopus, figs, and dessert and went to eat in the park.  If you like really good food, I suggest asking me about this picnic, it was fantastic.

                  But then we had to go back to the library to actually get some real work done, boo.  We closed the library down, much to the dismay of the employees who practically pushed us out the door at closing time, and then headed back to the hostel to make guacamole and hang out. Only one more day in Sydney, where has this trip gone?

 

19_Sunday

                  Again on Sunday, we had to be up fairly early (Twice in the same weekend, is nothing sacred??)  We had to get up this time to pack up all of our things and move out of our room.  No, we’re not leaving until tomorrow, but apparently two girls need our room and we have to move to a different room with people we don’t know for one night. Dumb.  We packed up and moved (down the hall) and then decided what to do with our last day in Sydney, Australia. It’s a little sad but let’s make the most of it.

                  We took a bus downtown, but only made it halfway because it was nine thousand degrees on the bus and I couldn’t take it. We got off a good deal early and ended up walking to King Street Wharf so it worked out well.  We continued from there to Observatory hill to hang out for a few, climbed some trees, scraped up my hands (I bet you’re all glad that I’m 8). We then moseyed over to the Rocks to check out the Rocks Market and the Aroma festival, which is a giant festival dedicated to coffee. Not my thing, but it was still cool to walk through. And they had camel rides, at a coffee festival, why not? 

                  After returning to the hostel, Gina and I had pasta together (meaning Gina made pasta and I stared at her long enough for her to give me some) and then walked down to Sydney Uni to look out at the city one last time from the place where I first saw the city the night I arrived.

                  So long Sydney, I imagine I’ll be back some day. 

Photos for the Previous Post

First off, I'd like to submit a formal apology via this blog to Ms. Janet Laurence, whom I've been referring to as Jennie Lawrence. Apparently, I've been hearing her name incorrectly this entire trip and I never thought twice about it. My sincerest apologies Jannie.

Next, here are some photos that belong with the last few posts about the previous weekend.

Did I ever tell you about the time I slayed the Minotaur?

Abandoned Tower_Cockatoo

Sunset Crane_Cockatoo

Sunset Reflection_Cockatoo

Grenadine the Bird_Manly

Harbor_Manly

Sailboat_Manly Ferry

Sydney Skyline_Manly Ferry

Sydney Harbor Bridge in Rare Form_Couldn't Resist taking a Photo

12.July_What a Manly Ferry Ride

Saturday amounted to a pretty relaxing day. We all slept in a pretty good deal and then Gina, Mr Gauggel and I headed over to the rocks to eat at Pancakes on the Rocks.  I had pancakes. They were excellent, grilled banana, walnuts, cream, chocolate ice cream, and drizzled with chocolate sauce. That’s my kind of breakfast.

                  We then took a ferry (I get a bit excited about riding on the boats) over to Manly.  Manly is a sort of small almost touristy town, but at the same time has a pretty strong local feel to it with a good number of surfers and many little restaurants/stores that make and sell their own food like breads, meats, produce etc. It seems like it could be a cool place to live. Anyway, the reason we were there was for a nice naturey walk through some trees and eventually to a beach. We weren’t sure where to go and I think we ended up taking a wrong turn because we walked through some muddy nature and a park and ended up at a really smelly beach that was covered in trash. Nice. I don’t think our trip to Manly was as successful as some others on the trip, but we’ll just look at their photos.

                  After the Manly ferry ride, we came back to the hostel and then went out to meet Bill for drinks down on Circular Quay.  Bill was our GA for computer skills first year and he graciously let me live with him in Florida when I worked in Naples for co-op, so it was nice for the three of us to see him again. Just shootin the shit, chillin, you know. So that was fun, but I’d just like to mention that being on Circular Quay, this bar was rather pricey, amounting to a Mint Mojito for $15. Yes that’s right one drink for 15 bucks. Whoa.

 

12.July_Sunday

                  Let’s just toss Sunday in here real quick, we got up and worked on studio for most of the day, then had an informal meeting with Michael at his flat in Erskineville to talk about our projects. From there we went back home, didn’t really work too hard between our meeting and dinner. Which brings me to my next point, dinner was great. Andrew and I walked back to Erskineville (where people think we belong and asked us for directions on multiple occasions) to go to the Pizza Piatsa Café. We did not get pizza, but one of the best burgers of my life.  Bacon, egg, beetroot, Spanish red onion, lettuce, tomato, and cheese all on a burger. It was great. Australians are onto something with putting bacon, egg, and beet on everything. Then we worked some more and went to bed. Project due in four days…

10.July_Paddington and Cockatoo, No Bears and No Birds

On this fine morning, we’re heading back to the Museum of Sydney, hey we’re actually gonna go inside this time. So we meet there at nine because we have a guided tour and we’re actually all on time this morning, but they don’t open until 9:30 so we just stand outside for half an hour. Even the gift shop was closed today. So the reason we’re there is for an exhibit of Glenn Murcutt’s work. He’s probably Australia’s most well-known architect, focusing on very sustainable, very place specific architecture, mainly residential.  His houses all harness the inherent qualities of the surrounding area, wind, sun, water, even smells etc. to reduce the need for any mechanical equipment while maintaining thermal comfort regardless of season. Not interested in iconic forms, Glenn’s work exemplifies the idea of doing ordinary things extraordinarily well.

                  From the museum, we rushed out and over to Paddington to meet Adrian and her Aunt, Julie Rrap. Julie is a very well known contemporary artist and she happens to have an exhibit in a gallery in Paddington that she personally is going to walk us through. Just imagine Michelangelo showing you around the statue of David. Our situation was similar to that.

                  After the gallery, we walked back up to the main street to walk around a bit, looking for a store that another architect of interest did the interior of. The store, Aesop, the architect, Sean Godsell. Not overly impressive, but sorta interesting to look at, we didn’t spend too much time in the store. I believe we’ll be seeing some of his buildings later in the trip, perhaps Melbourne.

                  Next, we break away from Michael and Adrian to do whatever we like with the remainder of Friday afternoon and evening. We chose Cockatoo Island. Home to all of zero Cockatoos, it was once used as a ship building center for the city and is currently left in it’s ship building state for tourists to wander around and look at. It’s a bit creepy to walk around all the old abandoned buildings and not really see any people there. I personally thought it was pretty cool at the same time, but I certainly don’t need to go back. Among other things, Cockatoo was also a prison/work facility, a girl’s reformatory type school, and home to the ship industry. There are still a large number of cranes left on the island as well as a large number of industrial warehouse looking buildings that you cant get into. After wandering around, the group of us all happened to meet at the same point on top of a hill and we watched the sunset together, then climbed a tree and took some pictures and whatnot, just enjoying the evening free.

09.July_Late for an important date..

Wowza, another excellent day, who would have thought, eh? Anyhow, we went to a barbecue at the home of Brian Zulaihka and his wife Jennie Lawrence.  He designed the house within his firm and it has seen the pages of such high profile magazines as Dwell and the like. So we got to go to his house, have a tour of it given by him, then eat lunch with Brian, Tim Greer of TZG, and both their wives. It was spectacular. The food was not what I had expected when I heard barbecue, but I imagine they are a bit above hamburgers and hot dogs. Instead we had, smoked salmon, seared tuna, a whole baked fish, selection of fancy cheeses, olive bread, pita, hummus, the whole shebang. They also had dessert, a cinnamon strawberry custard pie type deal and an almond currant crumb cake. Other than the desserts, not typically food I would want to eat, but it was all really quite delicious, even the pheasant pate. Pinky’s out kids, I’m comin home classy!

                  Anyway, to get to this house, we had to take a ferry, which is cool because I had yet to take a ferry, but as it turns out, standing on the front open deck of the ferry does some crazy things to my hair. Picture my drivers license…  So the house is located right on the harbor with a view of the city, kinda tucked down the bottom of a hill at the end of a really small alleyway type street. Similar to Nick Seeman’s house in the mountains, most of the windows slide completely pen to bring nature in and allow an amazing openness we can’t seem to get in Ohio.

                  After lunch, and I mean just about as soon as we’d finished eating, we had to go. They’re busy people, got things to do ya know? It’s ok though, the day was awesome. So from there we caught the ferry back to Circular Quay ad downtown where we tried to figure out what to do.  Ms. Lorubbio and myself decided to go on a “date”, a.k.a. I wanted to find some hot chocolate so we wandered aimlessly through the Rocks (everyone remember what the Rocks is?) not finding anything to drink with a suitable price tag and a view. It’s a tough life. So we walked around for close to two hours I’d wager and ended up just looking for a bus to get to Leichhardt, which is a Little Italy of sorts. Know whose idea it was to go there? 

                  Well once we got to Leichhardt, we walked around, not sure what we’d find, but we stumbled upon a little family café that had a decent looking menu, but we just got hot chocolate for now. We continued this “date” from there by walking all the way back down the street we had just walked down, then turning around and coming almost all the way back so someone could see every restaurant on the street. Know whose idea all that was? In her defense, we ended up at an amazing restaurant and had a fantastic meal, so we’ll give her that one. Zucchini flowers with goat cheese, Ravioli with mushrooms and veal, a banana toffee pie, and a bottle of wine later, I’m ready for bed. Let’s go home.

06-08.July_Naechste Woche gehen wir segeln

Monday

No worries folks, we started our presentations around 9 or so, had a dance party about 11, in bed by 1 and final touches this morning before giving the presentations, oh the life of a design student.  But seriously, the presentations went well, good feed back from Ms. Conroy. Oh, also we didn’t finish our presentations with Rebecca, she had places to be so we went to a café to finish, but they had places to be so we moved a third time to studio and ended up talking about our projects from 1 or so to almost 7. We like talking about ourselves.

Tuesday

Tuesday I didn’t get out of bed until probably 11, which is nice.  The professors were changing residence and didn’t want to deal with students and their children and all that jazz, can’t blame them. We did meet Adrian around 1:30 to visit ArtSpace, the original ARI in Sydney and Adrian’s home where she squatted as a young artist when she lived here, pretty cool history. From the gallery, we went to the Library of New South Wales, where it’s a huge hassle to get a library card and look at books, very bureaucratic. Look up a book in the catalog, fill out a slip, title, author, location number, your name, your card number, your dogs initials, your cousin’s birthday, the whole nine yards, take the slip to the desk, oh you’re in the wrong library there are two in this building, they sign the slip, stamp it, file it away, bury it for three days, come back later, pick up your book from the shelf, then you can look through it. And you can’t check it out, but you can fill out another slip and they hold said book for you for one week. And that’s just one book.

So we spent about three hours at the library doing research and trying to come up with an abstract for the research paper we have to write after this trip. Meh. On the upside, it’s $5 large pizza night at Eagle Boys Pizza on King Street. Yea, I ate the whole thing. I don’t believe in leftovers.

 

Wednesday

This morning we got up earlier than normal (still not til 830 or so) to go visit Tranby Aboriginal College with our very own Andrew Gauggel as a tour guide who provided us with a riveting tour chock full of interesting facts (and engraved rocks at the college that gave us all the information).  It’s a pretty interesting little space meant to embrace all Aboriginal cultures with a focus on the pathway through the college and reaching one’s goals while bridging European and Aboriginal culture. Nick of Constructive Dialogue met us again to see the college himself and to impart his knowledge of the site to all of us.

Tranby

From there we went out to lunch with Michael, enlightening him with the $6 lunch special at Newtown Thai and proving how cheap we really are. It’s really good food though so why not, and it kicks peanut butter’s ass any ole day. Nach dem Mittagessen sind wir an dem Uni wiedergekommen, um unsere Hefte zu sehen und diskutieren.  We talked about our sketches, worked on some studio stuff and headed home for the evening.

Tranby

03.July-05.July_I suggest grabbing a chair

03_Friday

Our weekend getaway in the Blue Mountains amounted to one of the best weekends I’ve had. (How do they keep getting better? Not sure but I’ll take it.) We started bright and early Friday morning, having to be at the train station by 7:30 AM, mind you we normally get up around 9 and we had to take a train to get to the right station, so we were up about 5 AM. You may not be aware of my sociability at 5Am but imagine poking an old bear. So we made it to the station and took a two hour train ride or so to Faulconbridge. Perfect time for a nap.

                

Once there, we met an aboriginal man by the name of Evan Yana Muru who was taking us on a walkabout through the bush and aboriginal country.  Now when I say walkabout , I mean we started on a gravel path, then took a turn into the forest and almost immediately had to climb straight down a hill, then continued along winding paths, through a river at one point, over rocks, under rocks, up, down, side to side, man this path is steep, oh my, my knees are killing me. A few people fell into small rivers or streams, somebody got their foot stuck in mud and almost lost a shoe. We were really in the middle of the bush.

Natural Caves_Walkabout

I must admit, I was quite skeptical when we first met him, and even more so when we hiked to our first destination and put Eucalyptus leaves in our noses, but as the day went on, I understood more and more.  The point of the walk was to learn about Aboriginal Heritage while rediscovering our own personal connections to nature.  When we first met Evan, he told us to “Walk gently”, meaning be aware of where you’re walking, how you step, and taking measures to avoid hurting the earth.  This idea can also be translated to design in terms of designing buildings that “walk gently” on the earth, leaving a small footprint, sustainable materials, etc.

The other focus of the walk was to strengthen our own connections to the dreamtime, meaning “the spirit of all things”, a force that connects all living things, people to nature, people to people, etc.  I don’t imagine anyone reading this who wasn’t there with us can truly comprehend how powerful the day was for me, but if you really focus on the moment at hand and living in the present, the idea of the dreamtime can become a moving experience.  The aboriginal people lived every day focused on the dreamtime, always maintaining a spiritual connection to country, something that most people today probably can’t fully grasp.

Serene waterfall_Walkabout

Walking through the forest, Evan showed us Aboriginal rock carvings, caves the people had used as temporary shelter and even homes, a few rituals they had, and explained a lot about nature and the history of the aboriginal culture.  We saw streams, rock walls, Aboriginal meeting grounds and campsites, and even learned a basic dance, one for men and one for women.  Overall the day amounted to about 8 hours of hiking through dense forest, a lot of new information and a rediscovery of the world we live in each and every day. It was a very intense spiritual day, connecting with nature and trying to really align my thoughts with those of the Aboriginal people.

     

Needless to say, that was a pretty strenuous, exhausting day.  We went to a pub with Evan for a drink and some dinner, then took a train out to Katoomba, where our hostel was for the weekend.  We weren’t sure where the hostel was or where we were once we actually got there (I seem to have trouble finding hostels) but we just kept walking down the main street and found it. This hostel was really awesome, very clean, large kitchen and common areas, friendly staff. I think it was better than most hotels (except for the whole bunk bed thing).  So Gina and I split a cheesecake and a bottle of wine (we need our energy for tomorrow…) and the others played Monopoly and we went to bed.

Dr. Seuss Trees

04_Saturday

Saturday, we got up whenever and hung out for a few at  the hostel, then broke into groups of whoever wanting to do whatever. My group went on a slightly less strenuous than yesterday nature hike again, this time on a public path with railings and a much lower chance of death around every bend.  This hike took us sorta through the woods, but mostly along the top ledge of a cliff with spectacular views of the Blue Mountains, ending at our destination of the Three Sisters, three separate rock formations all in a row. They were nice to look at, but very commercialized and touristy with a large paved lookout area, heaps of people, even a gift shop.

Blue Mountains

From there we headed back towards town, stopping for hot chocolate and cookies and such in a small cabin looking house that’s only identifier was a large sign that said “chocolate”. Can’t go wrong there.  We walked back to the main road in Katoomba where half the group went to take naps. (for once, I’m not the one going to take a nap, gotta have priorities) Being the Blue Mountains and a little mountain town, the main street was full of mountain outfitters and outdoor type stores. Clearly, I need to go in every single one of them. And I did. I didn’t actually buy anything, but I definitely needed to go in each one just to make sure.  We also went into a hattery, famous for their Indiana Jones style hats. Rather amusing, nice hats but very pricey.

                

The stairs we didn't climb down, treacherous  

That afternoon, we went to another book launch for Adrian, this one more a discussion format between her and a professor at Western Sydney University.  It was nice to hear his thoughts on the book and her responses to them. Then some questions from the audience, small quarrel with her own father who was in the audience, then we left to get food. Gina, Jenna, and Emily made dinner while Andrew and I had some wine. (How life always ought to be) Then we ate dinner, drank some more wine, and had a friendly “discussion” about sustainability and what actions we may take in the future.

Three Sisters

05_Sunday

Sunday, we got up fairly early and packed our things to check out of the hostel. We took a train to Wentworth Falls where we again met with Nick from Constructive Dialogue. He has a house in the Mountains that he designed for his parents and happened to be staying at for the weekend, so he kindly agreed to show us around a bit. We met him in town outside the station and he led us on a path through the woods to get to his house. It’s difficult to explain the house and we didn’t take pictures, but every wall in the house has at least one opening, window or door, that slides open, completely disappearing from view from within the house. The focus of the house is on bringing nature in and maintaining the relationship to the site upon which it is situated.  Ask me to draw you a plan of it or sketch it sometime, it was fantastic.  After showing us around, we sat on his deck drinking tea and eating scones that he purchased while we were in town by the station. It was another spectacular morning.

Then we walked back through the woods to catch a train home to Newtown and work on our studio projects. Oh did I mention we have a presentation tomorrow that none of us have started? Yep, we’re presenting our ideas to some local artists, and don’t have anything done yet.

02.July_Beach'n

Thursday was another one of those pretty surreal days where you think to yourself, “Man, school is awesome.” For class today, we took a train/bus to Bondi Junction, where you get off the bus, look to your right and see a wide expanse of beach, cliffs, cliff houses and surfers. Pretty unbelievable.  So the reason we’ve come to the beach is to go for a walk. What did you do at school today? Yea I thought so.  Anyway, we walked from Bondi to Bronti as a group. The walk consisted of walking along a path in the side of the cliffs I mentioned before right next to the ocean. 

Every corner you turn, there is another gorgeous beach and some spectacular view of a cliff, the ocean, cliff houses, or all three. We stopped after an hour or so when we got to Bronti to have lunch on our own. Some people swam, others sat on a rock and tried to comprehend how surreal their lives are at present. It’s pretty hard to believe all this is really happening. A few others just had fish and chips.

_Not a bad place to stop for lunch

We then came back together for class in the middle of a park with Adrian while Michael and his kids had a nap on the beach. Definitely one of my favorite classes. We then continued the walk past Clovelli and to Coogee, both of which Nick Seeman had shown us photos of to sketch from. Along the way, they have pools that are naturally filled by the ocean overflow back into the ocean.  

_Rock Pool at Bronti

_Baths/Pool at Clovelli

Concrete on three sides and one end open to the ocean

At Coogee, our final destination was Wiley’s Baths.  It’s another rock pool filled by the ocean, but it has a really cool sort of rickety old deck built up out of the rocks surrounding the baths.  From there we took a really really really long bus ride back to Newtown and went to bed to get ready for a weekend in the Blue Mountains.

_Wiley's Baths

30.June-01.July_Museum Day

We started this morning with a train ride downtown to visit the Sydney Museum of Contemporary Art.  We had a private tour with a museum curator who explained some of the work and the needs of the artists. We then moved to a different floor in the museum to look at a collection of photographs by an Aboriginal photographer, Ricky Maynard.  His work was really powerful and extremely moving.  Combined with select quotes by the photographer, the images spoke volumes about the tragedies within Aboriginal history and their struggles for survival.  I’m sure my description could never do it justice, but these photographs said more than most books could. Really powerful.

 From there, we took a stroll around the harbor and past the Opera House again to visit the art gallery of New South Wales.  The gallery houses every sort of art you can think of, classical to contemporary, but our focus was on a collection of Aboriginal works on exhibition.  Generally, looking at Aboriginal art comes with predetermined opinions of what art is and what it should look like that cloud one’s judgment while viewing these works. Going into the exhibition with a completely blank mind and no preconceived notions of art, you realize how complex and meaningful the artwork is.  For me, the patterns, symbols and imagery in this work carry a good deal more meaning than any classical landscape painting or portrait of a queen ever could.

From there, I personally went home and took a quick nap. Art makes me tired..

 Then we went to a book launch for Adrian and her book, Hijacking Sustainability. It was really cool to hear her synopsis of the book and listen to the discussion about sustainability that followed. It’s nice to know that even though America isn’t doing the best job with sustainability, most people in the world do really care about the future of the planet. I’m not trying to be an eco-hippie or anything but the Earth is kinda important to me.

01.July_Wednesday

We’ll just stick Wednesday in here real quick.  We just had a class discussion and met with two artists from another ARI, “Quarterbred”.  They gave us more information about ARI’s and their perspective on our project and the art scene in Sydney.

P.S. The fact that it is Wednesday means it is “Wine Wednesday” and we will probably need to add to our ever-expanding collection of wine bottles. Good day.

29.June_Some things you just wouldn't trade for anything

 Constructive Dialogue

This morning, we walked over to a small firm that focuses on social projects in Australia, Constructive Dialogue.  We met with one of the firm’s principals, Nick Seeman, who gave us a short presentation about the firm and the work they’ve done.  The firm seeks to generate built form by determining how a building can work as a social entity, claiming that there is no point to design something without a positive social impact. Without this impact, architecture simply becomes a large piece of sculpture. The firm is fairly young, having opened 10 years ago and starting their first major project, which is still in progress, in 2005.

                  Before telling us about the firm, Nick’s first action was to have us all look at a photo and sketch a quick diagram speaking about social interaction within the photo.  It was sort of a surprise that he asked us to do this, but a cool activity to get us all thinking a bit differently about what we were looking at.

Meeting with Nick again hit home the idea that architecture should be much more than aesthetics and iconic form. They now have 5 main clients, mostly not for profit organizations, for whom they have done small projects and renovations. Speaking with him, you realize that he’s part of a group that looks at architecture differently than a lot of people.  Looking for the positives in even the worst spaces before tearing anything down, Constructive Dialogue seeks to retain as much of the building as they can, focusing on adaptive reuse, sustainability and social aspects of design. A really well-rounded firm with the best intentions for humans and nature, Constructive Dialogue should be an influence to any design students.

At this point, meeting with people like Nick and Paul and the architects of Tonkin Zulaihka Greer, I realize how lucky I am to have these experiences and realize what I could do as an architect, work that can actually make a difference in the world, architecture with a small “a” as they call it here. It’s really awesome to see people whose entire design philosophy revolves around helping others and preserving the environment.

After Constructive Dialogue, we walked over to the university to meet with Michael and have lunch, then we met with an artist from a local ARI, Bill and George (named for the streets surrounding it).  The artist was Rebecca Conroy, a writer and divisor of contemporary artwork for the ARI.  She gave us a good deal of information about what an ARI can be and the things they need in terms of spaces, people, etc.  After this meeting, Adrian met us at the Uni and gave a short presentation about contemporary art as a follow up to the first presentation that had no images.  Her and Michael then left for a UNSW College of Fine Arts radio broadcast and left us to work out some ideas of what our projects could be and what directions we may choose.  Michael came back later to speak to us about our ideas.  We finally left studio around 7 or so after a pretty long day, but we finally have some sense of a project starting. Don’t forget, this project is due in 2 and a half weeks now.

28.June_Free time, let's fill it with stuff

28.June_Darling Harbor

Sunday, a day off, what to do what to do? Well Emily, Andrew, Gina and Myself decided to go explore some things we had not yet seen, yes, there are still things we have not seen. My choice was Darling Harbor. Designed to be a great place where all the locals would flock to hang out and have a good time, the result was actually much closer to an amusement park. Filled with Asian tourists with cameras stuck to their faces, Americans in sandals and high white socks feeding their large children, and plenty of street performers, it’s really the epitome of the American theme park, right down to the ferris wheel and the cheesy train tram thing that drives around a group of tired, angry looking parents and their wide eyed children. Don’t get me wrong there’s plenty to see and do, and the view across the harbor is nice, but I certainly don’t need to go back.  We walked around for a few, just to see everything, expensive harbor bars, a Chinese garden, a couple museums, and heaps of people before heading back across the bridge (a bridge, not the bridge) to the real world.

After that, we set out to find Hyde Park and hopefully a bit more low key place to chill for a smidge. On our way however, we got sidetracked, due in large part to Gina, by a market that Adrian had told us about a few days ago.  The marlet is situated in the basement of the David Jones building. Now I know what you're thinking, “A market in the basement?!” “Obsurd” But it was really awesome. They had a bunch of individual counters for different types of food, meets, seafood, vegetables, anti-pasto, pastas, need I go on?  Cakes, pies, cookies, olive oil, smoothies, a noodle bar, and my favorite, one entire counter dedicated to sausages. I’d tell you about the different kinds of sausages but you wouldn’t even believe it.  So the market was pretty spectacular, though we didn’t purchase anything, we’re planning to go back and buy some things then have a picnic in the park, cute.

Hyde Park_Chess Chaps

Next we made it to Hyde Park, not that it was hard, walk straight from Darling Harbor and you hit the park, but we made it. So this park is supposedly home to a life-size chess set. To me, life size means the size they would be in real life, you know, people the size of people, horses the size of horses, some Harry Potter stuff you know, what a let down. That knight couldn’t even bite my kneecap. On the bright side, the gentleman playing the game of chess were fantastic. I could sit for days photographing them and not capture how intense this game was. It was actually really cool to watch, even if they were a bit smaller than advertised. The rest of the park is nice too, they’ve kindly erected a statue of me naked slaying a Minotaur, a few of the details are off, but the likeness is pretty good.

                

Across the street from the park is a church, interesting looking but probably built about 300 years after what it was modeled after and plenty of clues to suggest that this is true. Yes mom, I went to church in Australia. I thought you’d be proud.  Next we walked down the street to the botanical gardens, meandering through the trees and flowers, careful not to touch any of the native species. Later in the garden we found some bats in a tree, also called flying foxes, which turned out to be terrifying. They were just sleeping in some trees, but I felt as if the end was quite near. Terrifying, I’m telling you.

TERRIFYING!!

So we continue through the park and the sky turns blackish. Oops, didn’t look at the weather, but it turned out that the other side of the sky looked amazing, and then there was a serious rainbow. Words can’t do it justice, but see the photos for a special experience.  After that, we tried to see the sun setting by the harbor, sprinting through the park with our bags in tow in the pouring rain, ending up on top of a hill adjacent to the opera house and completely missing the sunset anyhow. Running through the rain however is invigorating. I suggest you try it right now, I’ll wait. So we ended up stuck under a giant tree trying not to get drenched by the pouring rain. It wasn’t so bad.

Downtown in a rainstorm

Two rainbows folks, count 'em, two.

27.June_Paddington

Saturday morning we got up fairly early to head over to Paddington Reservoir. It’s another adaptive reuse project by Tonkin Zulaihka Greer. This time, Tim Greer, one of the firm’s principals met us at the reservoir to give us a tour and explain the project.  The project, as you may have guessed, was a reservoir that TZG redesigned as a public park, leaving the remains of the reservoir as a ruin and adding new materials that play off the existing to create a really interesting space. You get the ideas implied by the ruins of the reservoir creating an interesting dialogue with the new materials and generating a very relaxing environment to spend time in, interesting that it gave me this feeling with materials being brick, concrete, steel, aluminum and heavy timber.

We then walked down the street to the Australian Photo Gallery, then Paddington Market, full of odd trinkets, jewels, artwork, wooden bowls, and some pretty delicious looking food (mmm cheese steak). The market was pretty overwhelming and quite odd, but an interesting experience.

Reservoir_Illustrates Existing vs New Materials

Lower Level

Upper Level

Lower Level from Upper Level

26.June_Pretty Standard

                  Friday wasn’t overly exciting, we had class, discussed the project we need to do but still aren’t sure what it’s going to be. Mind you, we’re a week into the 4 weeks that we have here in Sydney, final project now due in three weeks, and we aren’t sure what our project is going to be. It’s alright, we’re flexible.

                  Friday afternoon we met with two artists from Matchbox Projects (we think this project is going to have something to do with artists and artist run initiatives). So the two girls, Naomi and Leanne, identical twins mind you, are artists in Sydney that talked to us about their work and what they may need for an exhibition space. We then spur of the moment left the university to go on a walking tour around the area to some local ARI’s (artist run initiative, a work/gallery space for artists run by the artists).

                  Friday evening we celebrated the end of our first week with a few Aussie beers, Little Creatures, Toohey’s New, and Pure Blonde. They were all pretty good, but Little Creatures (my choice) was the best.  The worst part is that a sixer of beer here costs generally close to 20 bucks. Not cool.

25.June_These Classes are Fantastic

25.June_Thursday

                  

Opera House_Reflection of Myself, Gina and Andrew

Thursday began very similar to Tuesday, meeting Eoghan downtown again for another architecture walk.  This time we started outside the Museum of Sydney, still didn’t go inside, but we chatted about the actual building for a few, walked a few bocks to Aurora Place and Government square (the most expensive piece of real estate in the city), then proceeded through a portion of the botanical gardens up to the opera house.  

Aurora Place_Renzo Piano

The main focus of this walk was the Opera House so we sat on top of a hill with a clear view of the opera house for the initial history of the building, the design competition, the ideas behind it, some sketching and some lunch. We continued from there around the Opera House, learning more and more about it as we went. It has a very extensive history, from competition to budget to exterior vs interior, etc and Eoghan just kept pulling all of this information out of his head. I realize it’s part of his job to give these tours, but it’s simply amazing how much this man knows. We continued around the Opera house, in, out, underneath, everywhere, for near 4 hours or so.  

Opera House_Interior and Exterior