so, i'm sitting in the spui - cause i got bumped from my flight - but i got some euro for it and i get to see a'dam one more time before heading home....

yeah, i'm happy

Notes from the underground

The clown is calling
No time for a full write-up
Two photos tell all.

Ma & Papa Roussel Eiffel hop

Let's understand this photo. We are on the bottom half of the globe and it's almost winter here. This pool has not been used/ cleaned in at least three months. D-wreck, Ivan and Andrew bet that the Red Wings would win the Stanley Cup. For non-hockey fans like myself.. they lost in game 7 2-1 to the Pittsburgh Penguins. The loss meant they had to jump in the freezing gross pool. And so I present one more jumping photo from our hostel in Argentina. -McBean

Juanism

Since the cool thing now seems to be posting quotes from your professors...we think our prof down here in Argentina says some pretty insane things...

"...and so shitty architects copy these shitty buildings, and soon there are waves of shit all across the landscape."

--Juan (fecking cdazy, maan)

fuck barcelona

yea, i said it. while your doing all your fancy book learning and building looking, we are climbing mountains and fighting trolls.

i hope at least one person gets the reference.



-Adam

So this just happened

we were at a coffee shop minding our own business when this dodad broke out. it went for almost two hours. this particular tune was achy breaky heart



-Adam

"Baby went to Amsterdam..."

some parting shots of the city, a few of the StudioNL human knot in the Nieuwemarkt, and a song you can whistle to

-jams

Craiggerism #5 (live blogging from review!)

Craiggerism #5

On drawing Siza: "It's like trying to make 2-D from the interior of your Rhino model for the first time, and all the lines

are like BLEAAHH" (makes squiggly tentacle-like hand gestures exploding outwards)

Day Trip to Hilversum&Almere&Lelystad

our last friday in Holland had the group split up, half went biking, half went on a whirlwind dutch architecture tour. 

First stop - Hilversum Media park.

several pieces of eccentric architecture here, including Villa VPRO by MVRDV (which was kind of a disappointment). The clear winner for our group was this building by Neutelings Reidijk:

Next stop - Almere.

Almere is a city that is only about 25 years old. Full of buildings fighting for your attention all crammed in a sterile retail district planned by OMA. 

Housing project on the Almere waterfront by Rene Van Zuuk:

La defense office building by UNStudio in Almere. One of the most photogenic buildings ive ever seen (and one of the few that actually lives up to the photos in real life).

Upon leaving Almere, Damon, Amanda and I decided to jump a train to Lelystad which was only about 15 - 20 minutes away. The only building on our agenda: the Agora Theater by UNStudio.  On the way we passed by large fields with hundreds of horses (wild? probably not, but they appeared that way) running around.

Unfortunately, our stay in Amsterdam is over in only a few hours. Jamie, Ashley, Damon and I are headed to Berlin (by bus) tonight and should be there by morning, meaning we should have our first update from 3G travelers in Berlin within a few days. 

-ryan

Malcolmism #1

because studioNL has its own quotable professor...

Malcolm, while speaking to a very small dog:

"You look like a dog unit. What happened to your genetic code?"

BCN Studio in the Wild West of the Iberian Peninsula (Madrid issue)

Madrid = loud, auto-centric, aggressive, polluted. Getcher museums and randomly placed awesome bits of architecture done and get out.

(Whistle-stop touring begets superficial & pat recapitulations of whistle-stops. Deal with it.)

TRUSS. Maravillas College Gynamsium, Alejandro de la Sota

Vertebrae chic in awesome freaking concrete church, Santa Ana Church, Miguel Fisac

Craiggerism #3.5 "That's not private, right? Just shimmy right up there!"

Housing project at the end of the world/Madrid, Morphosis

Caixa Forum, Herzog & de Meuron

I guess I should actually start posting pictures... (Craiggerism #4)

Craiggerism #4

"It's like he took a big block of cream cheese and carved it out."

Casa Batllo, Gaudi

some more from a'dam

inside the Oude Kerk, a 1,000 year-old polder, Berlage social housing...

-jams

So we have 2 more days in Amsterdam and it's looking pretty much like we're not gonna want to leave.  The last few days we've been trying to put together our pattern book while at the same time scrambling to see as much of the city and surrounding areas as we can.  Yesterday involved an amazing but exhausting 30 mile bike ride out to Almere.  Today we're gonna try to finish all of our drawings and have an all-night rager/bar crawl.  Ryan will be pissed if this does not somehow come to pass.  Malcolm put it best - after being here for 3 weeks, Amsterdam might not seem like such a big deal, but as soon as we leave and find ourselves in a place that is not Amsterdam, it will be all too apparent and we'll find ourselves longing to be back in A'dam.

Hope all is well with the other studios - can't wait to hear the many tales of adventure.

-Jams

Major Slackage...

Hence the lack of blogging, here is just a little update from Espana..

This past week we traveled to Toledo, Madrid and Porto, Portugal.  Upon which we encountered some great architecture and of course the per usual quality individuals; men guarding entrances (as if these building contained nuclear warheads), aggressive hookers, among others.  Other than that some were able to sneak into Siza's Leca Swimming Pools (although not all of us made it) we also saw some great Museums in Madrid and the most awesome escalators in Toledo.  Porto was all about Siza and Port...what better combo could exist?...yea nothing.

-erica-

I also hope everyone elses travels are going well and that you are having a great time! Cant wait to rendezvous in Ann Arbor! ha.

Jumping for MVRDV

showing some skin:

stijling it out:

touching the bottom of the cantilever:

-ryan

Paradiso op Maandag Nacht!

Monday at the Paradiso, Pains of Being Pure at Heart:

Dan Deacon tore it up. Funnest/craziest/weirdest show ever:

Sweating&jumping:

Look at that setup! (notice the ipod shuffle thrown into the mix):

Jamie and i sweating:
Best. Time. Ever. (better than a MSTRKRFT show in Barcelona for sure)

"I know it's a Monday, but a Monday in Amsterdam is like two Fridays in Las Vegas!"

-ryan