Catching up - Sitges, Midreview, and Madrid

Ok, so I just got back to Barcelona from my mid-term trip...but let me explain what happened in my life in the weeks leading up to that trip.

The weekend before our midreview, the boys and I headed down to Sitges, a small beach town that is about 45 minute train ride south of Barcelona. It was a great time. The beaches were beautiful, beautiful sand, warm(er) water. We spent about 6 hours in the town. I started walking around because I could feel the tops of my feet getting sunburned. I got some beautiful pictures of the church and views from the top of the hills. The historic city was pretty incredible. small winding streets, overlooking the sea, waves crashing on the rocks below. I can now see why so many people from Barcelona head to these beaches as opposed to the busy, crowded ones of the city. I arrived back in Barcelona that evening knowing that the sunburn was going to be rough for the next few days...and boy was i right! The tops of my feet were nice and crisp. The back and shoulders were a little sore, but after a few days, it all faded again. Good thing that I had midreview to prepare for and keep me inside away from the beaches!

The next few days were pretty nice. We got to hear a lecture from a local architect here who took us to one of his buildings currently under construction. It was really cool and amazing. The way that he used light and different materials was good for me to see and actually helped inspire me in my studio project. As a result, I took a massive overhaul to the project and got cranking for the midreview!

Midreview came and went. It was alright, the guys who were our reviewers didn't really like anyone's project, but I got out of the review relatively unscathed. I think that people could tell that I have a project, and am just in the beginning proecess of working out the details of it. the next 3 weeks will be a lot of work, but for the first time, I feel that I've got a decent project!

So midreview was thursday, and then we found out that our midterm trip to Madrid was leavign at 9AM Friday morning (thanks for the ample time). We knew that we were taking a midterm trip to Madrid, we just didn't have any of the details about where we were staying, when we were leaving, what we were visiting until 8pm the night before...that really was frustrating!

Madrid Day 1:
Anyways, we met at 9am at the train station and boarded the 10 o'clock high speed train to Madrid. I slept on the train for the most part, so it was a pretty good little trip in for me. When we arrived, we saw the station, which is in it's own right a pretty cool little piece of architecture. The extension to the station was done by Enric Mirrallas. We then found out that it was the same train station that was bombed in the terrorist attacks. We got to walk into the memorial which was a really incredible space. A pair of double doors led your into a room which you could tell was airlocked. The room was painted blue with light pouring down from a light well, in the back corner of the room. The lightwell had a piece of plastic way being held up just by the airpressure in the room. On the plastic were messages in all various languages. Then, as I turned around, I could see back into the train station, but the glass was very distorted, almost like a prizm, almost like the glass had bubbles blown into it. It was a very quiet and solemn place, just incredible to reflect on things. Very Very moving!

From there, we walked what seemed like the entire way back to Barcelona to find our hostel. I was going to be sharing a room with Cerny and Sung Il for our 4 days in Madrid. We got all of our stuff settled in the room, opened a window cause it was freaking HOT and then grabbed some lunch. We found a nice little place right behind out hotel that had a 3 course meal for 10 euro. Can't pass that up, right? Well I just ordered something off the menu and it turned out to be spaghetti for the first course, ribs for the main course and then for dessert, some vanilla ice cream. All in all, a great meal for 10 euro!

We all met back at the hostel to take a walk around the city. We visited plaza Mayor, the main plaza. We walked to the Royal Plaza, and around to some other places in and about the city. After that, we had dinner back at the hostel and then I went upstairs and right to bed to get a goodnight's sleep to help fight the bad cold that I'd had.

Day 2:
We woke up nice and early (8AM, meeting dowstairs by 8:45). We walked over to the Prado Museum. There we got to see a bunch of great artwork including the famous painting "Las Meninas" It was pretty interesting to see both the museum and the art, but nothing too spectacular. We then took a bit of a break, which was good for me, cause I had taken some cold medicine in the morning and was doing everything that I could NOT to fall asleep. We grabbed some lunch and then met back up in the park where we walked through and then went to Herzog & de Meuron's new building, the Caixa Forum. It was pretty cool because it was on the cover of the Architectural record that I just received from my mom the day before I left! This was really cool. The building only hits the ground at a few certain points. From the distance, the building actually looks like it's floating above ther ground! Look at the pictures and see for yourself!

Day 3:
Again waking up early we met outside the hostel for our bus tour. We drove to the outskirts of the city and got to see a few cool, more recent projects, including MVRDV's housing project which was pretty cool because Winny Maas, the principal of MVRDV gave a lecture at Wash U last year, and we got to talk to him afterwards during the studio dinner which was great. We got to see an amazing church by Miguel Fisac. From the outside, it seemed like no big deal, but the way that he used the light on the inside was incredible. Unfortunately, I only brought my worse camera with me for the trip so the pictures I took we're super, but trust me...it was amazing! We were driving past the Telefonica complex and decided to stop. It was a really cool bunch of buildings that used a double skin glass system to create interesting shadows and different ways of reading the building depending on the sun and time of day.

From there we went to go see some affordable housing by FOA, which was decent. The building had a bamboo screen facade that was operable. This was interesting because depending on who was home and wanted to open their windows, the building would always look different. I personally thought it was a bit gimmicky because really all they did was take a building cover it completely with shudders except the shudders were bamboo. Sorry for the rant, but that's just my opinion. We then went to see the new project by Morphosis, which Thom Mayne talked about when he lectured last semester.

After our bus tour, we headed to the Thyssen Bornemisza Museum. It was a great exhibit of some of the newer work of the modernists and post modernists. They also had a pretty incredible exhibition of aerial photographs. It was a great trip, but we left in order to get ready for the final of the Eurocup in which Spain was playing Germany for the title! Bloom, Leslie, and I met up and walked down to Plaza Colon, where they had massive screens set up to show the game. With 3.5 hours before kick off, the place was already packed to the point that no one could move! We walked around, took in the chants, saw everyone and then decided to leave for a much cooler (it was 43 degrees Celcius or 110 Farenheit). We walked back towards the hostal and ended up at the place that Cerny and I ate lunch at the first day. We got front row seats infront of a big screen. The boys ended up meeting up with us and even the girls came out to watch the game. The final was 1-0 Spain on a Torres goal in the 33rd minute. We spent the rest of the evening partying in the streets of Madrid with the rest of the Spanish! It was a CRAZY night!

Day 4:
We woke up and headed to the Reina Sofia Musem which was really cool because of the canopy and exterior elevators that Jean Nouvel did as a part of the museum extension. We got to see Picaso's famous "Guemika" painting. It was HUGE!! Seriously could have been 10' tall by 25' wide! After that museum, I got to head back to the hostel to lay down and Leah called, so I was really happy to talk to her for a bit!

After our lunch break, we met back up to walk down the main stretch of street in Madrid, La Castellana. We talked all around the city, seeing new cool buildings which I couldn't take any pictures of because my camera battery was dead! The worst part was that we ended up at an incredible hotel that was VERY cool. Each floor was designed by a world famous deisgner! We grabbed a drink on the patio bar, and watched as the Spanish soccer team arrived from the airport and paraded down the street directly in front of the hotel. It was pretty cool to be a part of. Then, we went to the bar on the penthouse level, overlooking the entire city of madrid. As we did, the victory celebration reached Plaza Colon and 5 fighter jets flew overhead spraying the colors of the Spanish flag along the city's skyline! It was an amazing way to end the trip, unfortunately, I will have to steal someone's pictures to show you all!