Tampa Bay

Who knew that Tampa is a bunch of islands? I guess I never did. You can kind of see them from the above picture taken from an office building downtown. As a result of this spread, you drive over water half the time you are there. Just watch out not to take 275 the wrong way....

Then you have to drive for about 20 minutes over water and no exits... about 7 miles away. However, the drive is beautiful. I really enjoyed Tampa as it seems to me to be the Hawaii of continental America. For two reasons: 1) the tropical weather and plants like the one below...

... and 2) because of Clearwater beach that reminded me of Kailua beach so much. The sand is just as white, sugary, and soft (just the water is not as clean).

I like the last picture a lot because it shows how white the sand is with my white towel and also what I was doing there. At sunset, a lot of people came to fish and enjoy the view...

...and these big birds came in to eat the fish remnants that people would give them. It was all beautiful.

I didn't see anything architecturally interesting but what I noticed is that people love to write on their cars. Here are some examples that I captured :-)

Talking of cars... the radio stations were really really bad and they played the same music over and over. I need the car rental companies to have a radio station guide. Another very annoying thing that kept on happening is that the car thought that there was someone sitting in my passenger seat and it was constantly beeping for them to put the seat belt on but it was only my (very heavy) purse :-(

How can you fix that cars?

PS: no BP oil spill had reached Tampa when I was there and I don't think it ever did because of  a current that pushes waters away from the bay. That is cool!

Detroit and almost Canada...

...put your hands up for Detroit!

It's kind of like Chicago but smaller and more french (that's why this bridge to Belle Island looks like it could be in Lyon). Here we go:

USA is clearly taller. I don't know why but I was expecting Canada to look different... however it is pretty similar to the US.
Anyways, back to Detroit. Very many abandoned houses like expected but not so bad after all. I guess the fact that I had a friend show me around could have made the difference. Some random images from driving around:

This last one is taken on the back of a really cute and delicious little restaurant. I forget the name...maybe Millers?
My friend bought the house below on the left for really cheap and will fix it himself.

Across the street a professor from the Art Institute in Chicago is already doing that. Is this the new thing to do? Everyone lets just get houses in Detroit! Some of them though look like this:

Enough with the conventional stuff. Here comes Mies and Lafayette park, aka IIT in Detroit. If I crop this picture the right way no one will be able to tell the difference.

I think, more than anything else about the park, the landscaping was amazing. It put you in a totally different mood than the rest of the city and it was just gorgeous. Way to go Caldwell! 
One of the saddest things to see in Detroit is the abandoned central train station, the Depot. It is so big and so destroyed that looks kind of fake. I guess people are trying to save it and a lot more people are trying to take pictures of it, just like me. I think Hollywood should take advantage of such opportunities for horror movies or concentration camp movies or whatever and help the city's economy. Just throwing some ideas out there.

Houston

...aka "no-signal town"

This image probably best describes my impression of Houston: Highways, highways, highways - with so many of them you would think people would know how to signal - but no. And if I don't think of Houston as a bunch of roads put up on columns then this is the next best image:

I visited a bunch of these as they employ most of the town's population. This one specifically made plastic. Yay!

One good thing about all the highways is that there is no traffic really. But while you drive you might see these amazing things:

The 80 or so foot cross is quite impressive but I don't think it served any other purpose than the symbol that it is. And then everything is stamped with the Texas-shape. Even our waffle-maker at the hotel - unfortunately I don't have a picture of that.

Probably the single most interesting thing to do in Houston is visit the space museum and the NASA headquarters there. Jump on a tour tram, get your tickets, and explore the tools of space.

We did have quite first class tickets!

This last one is "Saturn 5" or "Apollo 18", not sure anymore - but it is one of the ones that never went to space obviously. I have no idea how to describe the size of it but the tour guide definitely did not warn us before entering just another warehouse at the space center. This thing is gigantic.

 "-Houston we have a problem! Can you hear me Houston?" Yes, this is historic mission control. I got goose bumps seating there. Apparently the red phone on the right is where all the important decisions used to go through.

Finally, the tour stopped by this tree site - every tree is planted for a lost life in the different space missions. I think it is a great idea - we should just plant a tree for our loved ones instead of a stone...

After the space center, we headed to the art district of Houston - very cute little area. Here you discover Renzo Piano's Menil Collection museum. It was a nice fresh break from the heat and it has some interesting ground digging artwork upfront.

Another typical Renzo Piano detail but what can I say - it works!
Unfortunately, no good cowboy or cow pictures - but went to a very fun movie theater/restaurant with great and affordable food.

And my last image from Houston will be that of the multiple electrical wires running through the sky. They have multiple electricity companies which makes for great competition if you ask me, no monopolies, and cool looking skies.

DC

Yes DC, not Greece - although maybe not from the above view point. The sky is the same everywhere :-p

 ~.~

DC was so pretty from the beginning, from the airplane view. I was just too lazy to take my camera out but the streets looked painted and the houses like little doll ones. There is a lot of vegetation everywhere and it doesn't feel like continental America.

Although the traffic does feel like continental America and I thought the drivers were pretty aggressive, too.

Nonetheless, I managed to get to the Mall and experience the monuments. Here are some representative ones (My favorite is Lincoln looking down at everyone)

And the white house! There was a tour going on inside, tons of people taking pictures on the outside (from where this picture is), and someone told me you have to stand in line from 6am to actually get in. So I never went closer than this.

At the mall, there was also the National Portrait Gallery with the Foster roof - nothing too impressive on the inside and I thought there was no good air circulation, but here it is.

DC had really cool train stations - that I have to admit. The concrete was just gorgeous and it was well lit. Way to go!

Was Foster trying to copy these ceiling forms in his museum roof?

And finally the real reason why I flew into Dulles. I love this airport. And Saarinen.

 Why don't they make them like this anymore?
By the way, last note, the metro map for DC was amazing - very clear and understandable which is hard for something with that many lines (and a fact that I can not say was true for Miami - blog entry to follow). This one is a little dirty cause it was one from the street - but I think you can still see the great design.

LA baby!

I have taken forever to update this blog but tonight is the night! ***Note my Macgyver skills with the GPS hanging.***

Probably one of the most exiting things about the LA trip is that I got a free upgrade to a convertible!!! It was really cool and it had a sweet sound system in the back. I feel that I truly experienced LA just because of that.
And of course Hollywood - which by the way I did not get to see the whole thing and I am going back - but so far it was kind of disappointing. I did not really find any stars with famous names on them and kind of had to run away as we were chased by this weird guy that wanted to make a portrait of me?!?!?!

In any case, it was generally dirty - even the star names! and so much pollution you could see it in the air. Sad :-(  On the bright side, my job took me to Corona Del Mar which is probably one of the nicest places I have been to: Cool houses, sunshine, marinas - the life!

That's right - solar panel facade. LA is one of the places where this can work...Chicago not so much... I really liked this building though.
So in search of architecture I went and even thought I didn't have much luck with the case study houses, I did find Eames, Frank Lloyd Wright and Schindler.

The Eames house was really tiny on a huge property and closed to the public except for one day a year which of course wasn't when I was there. It had a nice overview of a big beach.

This FLW home was for sale for $5 million! It was huge and definitely very cheap for one of his designs. I think I heard that it went even lower. Oh economy!! The cubical concrete block with perforated and not decorations was amazing and allowed for flexibility in design. I really liked the concept. Same with the one below that was actually inhabited.

And yes - this one above here is the Schindler house or whatever you can see of it. Apparently whatever society is preserving it decided to grow prairie grass around it - which I am convinced served the purpose of not letting me take pictures of the outside. Below is as close as I could get.

Above is the dining room with Schindler's furniture, the best idea for sink/shower design I have ever seen, and this stupid sign they had put outside the house. It looks like it should be able to rotate and spin - but no - it does not move at all. I tried.

On the modern side, I visited the Getty center up on a hill. The views were beautiful and the center was interesting. As always, I took the tour of the outside building and did not even get to the inside exhibit. I am an architecture student after all.

I am now realizing that I don't have a picture of the entire place but it was huge and probably impossible for my little canon. Last comment for this entry - the bottom picture is of what is called fossil limestone that covers pretty much the entire enormous Getty Center. According to the tour-guide, the stone came directly from Rome from the same quarry as the stones that built the Colosseum. I don't remember the exact amount of stone brought to the top of the hill for the center but it took them about 6 years to bring all of it. However, according to the guide and the big round sign on the entrance doors, the building has a silver LEED rating. Anyone see any conflicts here? Just wondering...