My Last Weeks in Paris

After returning from the Italy trip and after finishing up with final reviews at school, I spent a few days relaxing -- pretty much just eating and sleeping -- before setting out to explore or revisit all of the things I wanted to see in Paris before leaving.

Our panel of reviewers on the last day of school

Au revoir to our awesome staff!

Some of the places I visited during those two weeks of freedom....

The catacombs -- creepy

Sainte Chapelle yet again 

A fun day in Montmartre.  We really need to get some of these good drinks in the USA:  I think this was a "Monaco," a Belgian beer with grenadine.

The Musée Rodin, home to the "Thinker" statue 

The Napoleon apartments at the Louvre again... pure luxury

Monet's water lily paintings at the Orangerie near the Louvre

The Eiffel Tower sparkling on the hour

A huge exhibition at the Grand Palais by Anish Kapoor, the guy who did the Bean in Chicago

Standard famous shot: the Eiffel Tower from Place Trocadero, or the Palais Chaillot

My new favorite park that I had never seen before: up on the northeast side of town, the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont

My final photograph taken in France... good old Notre Dame de Paris

I spent a lot of time visiting various boulangeries and cafés around the city, comparing baguettes and pastries of all sorts.  Sitting at a café for a few hours and sketching is one of my favorite Parisian past-times; once I even splurged at Ladurée (on Rue Royale) and Les Deux Magots (on St. Germain).  I revisited my favorite crêpe place, which, for anyone heading to Paris soon, is right off of St. Michel and St. Germain on Rue de la Harpe, a few meters from the Musée Cluny... A bunch of us brought wine and snacks to the Pont des Arts, where lots of young people like to spend their evenings drinking along the Seine... And I went museum-crazy.  I visted/revisited the Louvre, the Orangerie, the Musée d'Orsay, the Palais de Chaillot, the Palais de Toyko, the Musée Carnavalet, Victor Hugo's house, the Musée Jacquemart-André, the Institude du Monde Arabe, Sainte Chapelle, Notre Dame, and more that I probably can't remember right now.  I also made sure to stop by Fauchon for free food samples again and went to the Marais to compare falafels (Chez Hannah is the best).  But the best thing I did during my last week was hang out with the remaining Americans and my French friends.  Being able to hear and speak French with them for the last time was so nice -- who knows when I"ll get to do that again.  On my last night, I went out with my French friend in his neighborhood, and then before catching one of the last trains back to Versailles, I sprinted over to the plaza in front of Notre Dame to step on the famous gold marker set in the pavement there.  It's considered a good luck charm if you step on the marker, which denotes the geographical center of Paris -- it means that you'll be back there soon!  So hopefully, since I went so far out of my way to get there... fate will bring me back to Paris soon.

Finally.... My 3-Week April Sketch Trip in ITALY

After arriving back in Chicago, a month and a half after-the-fact, I finally remembered to put up some pictures from my Italy trip on here.  It was a three week break in between our final exams and our final design presentations, during which my friends and I traveled all throughout Italy.  Ten of those days were also spent on a mandatory sketching trip with a teacher, and I was lucky enough to go to the Amalfi Coast with Lenore Baigelman.  It was the most relaxing sketch trip of the entire year, what with the warm weather, the beaches, and the complete overdose of Italian cuisine... here are some of the beautiful sights I got to see on my Italian adventure!

The Leaning Tower of Pisa

The Duomo in Florence from Piazza Michelangelo

The Colosseum in Rome

The Spanish Steps in Rome

And now for our Amalfi Coast sketch trip... first stop: Sorrento! 

The Roman city of Pompeii, buried under the ashes of Mt. Vesuvius

Crazy huge lemons.  Lemons and limoncello were everywhere! 

The Atlantis-like island of Capri

The small but beautiful Amalfi

High up on a hill, the ultra-luxurious town of Ravello

A ritzy resort town called Positano

The ancient Greek city at Paestum

And after the sketch trip ended... the charming canals of Venice

Last day in Italy: Piazza San Marco in Venice

We also visited Naples, where we ate the world's BEST pizza at three different restaurants, one of which was the famous one from "Eat Pray Love."  (Unfortunately, Naples' big garbage disposal problem made it rather unworthy of photo ops).  From Florence, my friend and I also made a side trip to the Chianti region, where we compared vineyards, went in a castle with pet peacocks, and tried 3 different wines.  And of course, we spent a LOT of time sketching every single day -- even outside of the Amalfi sketch trip -- to document all of the beautiful Italian architecture and ruins surrounding us.  It was good to go back to France, where the food is more diverse and where I can understand the language... but it was an eventful and memorable trip to Italia.

William J. R. Curtis Week: The Sequel

The man, the myth, the legend: William J. R. Curtis

This was our last week with William J. R. Curtis, the architectural historian who has officially taught us more about architecture than any other class or lecture to date.  This was a sort of "coming of age" moment for all of us, and a "pilgrimage" of sorts: we visited no less than five examples of modern religious architecture, and we even spent a night sleeping in cells at a monastery.  To say the least, it was the most spiritual and relaxing week of the year.

The week began with a visit to the Chapel of the Deaconesses of Reuilly in Versailles, a lovely little church with sleek glass walls, a floating roof, and a basket-like wood chapel inside.  In the afternoon we visited the Grande Arche at La Défense, the modern business district of Paris, and gladly listened to William's positive and negative critiques of the building.  We briefly popped into the Church of La Défense to see yet another modern take on religious architecture.

A modern chapel in Versailles

La Défense

The next day featured a lecture on Spanish architecture, followed by a trip to St. François de Molitor in Paris.  It was a very pleasant church tucked into the urban Paris landscape that took old ideas (like the use of ovals in Baroque architecture) and modernized them.  We also got to hear a lot about some juicy architectural drama: apparently the architect Steven Holl is building something across the street from Macintosh's School of Art in Glascow (an old classic).  William, who happens to be an expert on Macintosh and who also happens to think Holl's work is overrated, has been causing a scene -- sending letters and publishing articles everywhere -- trying to stop Holl's design from being built.  He's actually making progress.  Stay tuned for an architectural showdown!

We spent Wednesday night packing and arrived at school very early Thursday morning, when the real adventure was about to begin.  After five hours on the bus, we got to stretch our legs at Bibracte.  This old town was the site of the oldest Celtic settlements in France; it was also the temporary home of Julius Caesar, who wrote about Bibracte in his book on the conquest of Gaul.  At the Museum of Celtic Civilization, Alejandro suggested that we explore the building and then eat lunch.  Naturally, we ignored this and sat right down on the hillside and ate while taking in the beautiful scenery.  It was actually a very nice first way to experience the building, which was very modern and fit in perfectly with the landscape.  The inside was really interesting -- it looked like a bunch of stone planes intersecting each other.  But after sketching and talking with William, we set off on the bus yet again.

How very Frank-Lloyd-Wright-esque...  A very horizontal building that
blends in nicely with the landscape

After driving through the beautiful French countryside, after nearly falling into a ditch, and after climbing up some scary steep hills, our bus finally arrived at La Tourette.  We were all incredibly excited: this was the monastery designed by Le Corbusier towards the end of his career, and we were going to sleep there that night.  It was a strange, spooky place: monks in white robes were drifting around, everything was cast in dark shadows, and according to Alex, the ghost of Corbu was still haunting visitors.  We enjoyed the sunset and a great view of the valley during dinner, and after exploring the nearly pitch-black chapel, some of us set out for a walk.  The surrounding farmlands were quiet and eerie, but it was warm and we had a perfect view of the stars.  We got to know two French and Japanese students, who were also visiting that weekend to absorb the awesomeness of Le Corbusier.

Sunset from the hill at La Tourette

Another strange Corbu masterpiece: the Monastery of La Tourette

The individual cells we slept in that night were amazing.  It was cozy and quiet, and I could sit on my balcony and see the stars.  After breakfast the next morning about half of the group went to church with the monks.  It was hard to understand their French chanting, but the music sounded really cool reverberating around Corbu's great concrete chapel.  We toured the building with William, sketched, ate lunch, and then spent the afternoon sunbathing and playing frisbee on the hillside.  It was another beautiful day, and I was sad to leave that strange concrete haven of peace and quiet.

Colorful "light cannons" inside the main chapel

View in the afternoon

On the road once more, we got to the small town of Besançon around dinner time.  Situated halfway between Dijon and Switzerland, it was a pretty town with a central river lined by lots of restaurants and pubs.  I had pizza and went to the Pub de l'Étoile afterwards -- and everyone that we met was super friendly.  (Especially the pub bartender, who was seriously identical to Mike Chang from Glee.)  It was cheap too!  What an escape from Paris!

In the morning we drove a short ways to our last destination: Le Corbusier's most famous church.  Called Notre Dame du Haut (Our Lady on High) at Ronchamp, I could not believe how much I loved this building.  Perched atop a big hill, it looked like a giant concrete boat that was just about to sail off into the sky.  The curved walls and the punched-in windows were very dramatic, and the dark interior was lit by amazing bursts of light.  It was also one of the most "sketch-able" buildings I've ever seen -- I just wanted to draw its fun curvy shapes all day long.

The twisting, intertwining, floating church at Ronchamp by Le Corbusier

The dynamic interior wall

William told us an interesting story while we were there: apparently, he once asked Frank Gehry what his favorite buildings were.  Gehry responded, "It all comes down to Chartres Cathedral and Ronchamp."  Japanese architect Tadao Ando has also drawn lots of inspiration from this church.  It's fascinating how two such completely different designers -- Gehry with his crazy curving structures and Ando with his minimalist buildings -- can both admire the same building like that.  For me, it was sad to leave that dayt.  The weather was perfect once more and we were all enjoying the scenery.  I've seen a lot of architecture this year, at times too much architecture... but I know that I will never forget the awesome feeling of standing in the presence of Le Corbusier at La Tourette and Ronchamp.

Another fun week.... sans sleep

This was yet another one of those weeks that just flew by, without a lot actually happening.  It felt like everything on my "to do" list couldn't put off any longer, so I didn't really sleep much.  On Monday we had design work due, which was hard to pull off since I had been in Helsinki over the weekend, so I did some experimental study models and hoped for the best.  Tricia (my awesome studio professor) was cool enough to let me skip the first half of class so that I could work a shift at the student café (called the K'fet).  So while everyone else was falling asleep listening to presentation after presentation, I was chilling out with my French friend Alex and drinking endless supplies of free coffee!

Our Spain travel sketchbooks were due the next day, so everyone stayed up all night filling in missing diagrams and coloring in things that we had intended (and forgotten) to color in.  I spent the evening working on job applications and researching Italy travel costs.  Wednesday was a structures class walking tour, and Jeff took us to a bridge called the Passerelle Simone-de-Beauvoir.  It was a pretty cool wavy-looking structure, so we sketched there for a while and took a look at President Mitterand's modern Bibliothèque Nationale too.  I allowed myself one hour of fun afterwards: I went to the Latin Quarter and had a crêpe for lunch (nutella + bananas = yum!) and then had coffee by the Fontaine Saint-Michel.  I hung out with my host sisters that night, who were playing with toy horses and jumping on my bed for about an hour.  Priceless.

On Thursday, my friends and I signed up for morning desk critiques, because in the afternoon we were going to Paris for the Taylor Swift concert!  We got to the Zénith de Paris, a medium-sized concert venue, which was out on the Northeast side of the city.  It was a weird situation, to say the least -- half of the people there were Americans abroad, and the other half were young French girls and their non-fan boyfriends.  The show wasn't even sold out!  I only saw one guy wearing a cowboy hat... I mean, TSwift is more pop than country, but these French people clearly don't know or care much about her.  Next time I see her in concert, I want to be in Nashville or somewhere crazy like that where they really know how to party to country music.

Nevertheless, I freaked out when Taylor came onstage, and I was only 10 feet away from her the whole time!  She was WAY better live than I expected -- pretty much flawless, not at all like some of her live performances I had seen on TV.  She sang mostly Speak Now songs with a few from Fearless, though sadly nothing from her original self-titled album.  We knew basically every word to every song, and Andrea and I were super excited when she sang "Dear John."  The gorgeous outfits, the pretty guitars, the talent... I just want to be her.  That's all.  (We tried meeting her afterwards at the stage door, but to no avail.  Next time!)  We got home very late the night and struggled through structures class and a structures exam the next day.  It was easy, at least.  Now it's time to catch up on homework and prepare myself for our intensive history seminar with William Curtis again next week!

My Ever-So-Slightly-Chilly Weekend in FINLAND

View from my room at the hostel

This past weekend was a cold one, but it turned out to be quite an adventure.  We left Paris on Thursday afternoon and took a 3 hour direct flight to Helsinki, Finland.  Called "Helsingfors" in Swedish, which is also spoken there a lot, our plane pulled up at the very modern airport and we grimaced at the sight of 2 feet of snow on the ground.  Once inside the airport, we could see that Finland really embraces its culture of modern furniture design and sleek architecture -- there was even a "Café Alvar Aalto" inside.  But more on him later.

The taxis were cheap so we got dropped off at our hostel within 20 minutes.  Located at Helsinki's Olympic Stadium, the Hostel Stadion was huge and seemed to be the most popular hostel in town.  It must have been converted from an old athletic building of some sort, because the rooms were really big and the showers were actually good.

We were starving, so we set off towards the center of town to find dinner.  Unfortunately it was late due to the time change, and since people actually eat at a normal time here (imagine how dark it would be if they ate late), it was hard to find any open restaurants.  Kara and Sam and I went to a bar near the Forum shopping area while the vegetarians got fast food, as usual.  The bar was crowded with young Finnish people, and it was cool to hear their language and see their culture for the first time.  We learned that all Finnish people speak perfect English, so we had no language barrier problems for the rest of the week.  I ate some delicious chicken wings and tried the local Koff beer while listening to a live Finnish guitar performance -- not bad.  The other girls joined us and we marveled at the locals for the rest of the night.  Several guys had long black hair or mohawks, and lots of girls had crazy hair styles, even though most of them had natural pretty white-blonde hair.

Walking home in the 20°F weather was pretty brutal, so the next morning I bundled up.  We rode the tram around town and saw its Art Deco central station, designed by Eliel Saarinen, which looked a lot like Park Ridge's Pickwick; we walked to the town square with the big white hilltop church; we saw all of the design shops along the lovely Esplanade street; and we stood on the harbor to see the Baltic Sea.  It was a really exotic landscape, the complete opposite of a tropical rainforest: the sea was covered in thick sheets of floating ice, with a giant cruise liner headed for Russia pushing its way through the nearly solid water.

Central Station

The Baltic Sea

Daily cruise liner to St. Petersburg, Russia

After a quick lunch at "Wrong Noodles" (lots of strange international cuisine in Helsinki) we went to the Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art.  The building, designed by American Steven Holl, was cooler than the exhibits inside.  Then we went to the National Museum of Finland, which had lots of interesting Viking furniture and clothing.  Across the street from that museum was Finlandia Hall, the concert hall designed by Alvar Aalto.  We tried to get in but missed the cutoff time by 5 minutes, sadly.  We got dinner at a place called Memphis (strange) and then went to a bar called Baarikärpänen (even stranger).  Those Finnish girls are somehow impervious to the cold, because they were wearing nothing but minidresses and heels outside, whereas I felt like my legs were going to fall off.

Inside the Kiasma Museum

The next day was designated Alvar Aalto Day for us.  For those who don't know, or for those of you who know his name from the crosswords but don't know his work, Alvar Aalto was one of the greatest modern architects ever.  He was a friend of Le Corbusier and made Finland famous with his modern designs.  We first got a private tour of his studio, which was a really nice working space with an awesome living room and an outdoor amphitheater.  Then we walked a few blocks to his home, a cute little house with more of his original lamps and furniture.

Aalto's many lamp designs 

The perfect studio space

The Aalto home 

After a nice warm lunch (salmon soup) at a local diner we walked down the street towards the ocean again.  Here, it was completely frozen over.  People were cross-country skiing on it, ice fishing, walking their dogs, and flying kites.  One lady even let us play with her puppy for 15 minutes (how un-French!) and told us good places to visit in Finland.  So we went back into town to see Aalto's Academia Bookstore.  It was very cool inside and had tons of interesting books on architecture.  We then walked to the big Lutheran church, the biggest one I've ever seen, which had big statues of Luther and Melancthon inside.  After a chocolate and coffee break we went to Uspenski Cathedral, the Russian Orthodox church.  The priests tried inviting us in to the mass, but we just wanted to admire the weird onion domes.  That was possibly the closest to Russia I'll ever get!

Helsinki Cathedral (Evangelical Lutheran)

Academia Bookstore

Uspenski Cathedral (Russian Orthodox)

In the evening we split up for dinner and Kara, Sam, and I finally went to Kappeli.  This restaurant was recommended by my friend Rick Steves (haha) and is apparently the best in all of Finland.  After eating there, I wouldn't doubt it -- I had whitefish and salmon in a dijon sauce with veggies, and I tried some of Kara's amazing reindeer.  (Sorry Rudolph... it was delicious.)  We went back to the hostel before going out to a club called Onnela.  It had amazing DJs and several dance rooms, but the €11 cover fee and the €8 drinks killed the fun a little bit.  These Scandinavian people must just accept that they have to pay a lot for food and drinks.  We felt a little out of place, since everyone else there was 8 feet tall and blond... but it was a fun time anyway.

Kappeli restaurant

Sunday was our last day, so we tried to go visit the home of Eero Saarinen (another great Finnish-American architect).  We took the wrong directions though, and suddenly we found ourselves stuck at a giant cross-country skiing resort called Paloheina.  Kara and Maria weren't interested, but the rest of us thought, "Well... we're here now!"  So I rented some cross-country skis for the first time and had so much fun.  It was trickier than I imagined, but at least I only fell once.  The other girls had never skied at all before, so they were pretty sore and bruised by the end of the day.  It was great to wind through the beautiful Finnish forest, and it was a good workout too.  We had cocoa in the lodge afterwards and watched some ski jump competitions on its TV.  I really didn't want to leave; I was in total winter sports mode and would have loved to do real-skiing, ice skating, or sledding.  Unfortunately we had to leave for the airport after that.  On the flight home, I couldn't help but think that Helsinki wouldn't be such a bad place to live in spring or summer...  If I ever have the time and money to come to Finland again, I would definitely do it, though I would make a trip up to the Arctic Circle for a Northern Lights snowmobiling tour, too.  Helsinki would be a must, again.  Only time will tell!

A great day for cross-country skiing