Links

Check out my updated links. These people remind me that some one out there cares somewhat.
xxW

Creepy Alien Sounds...

I was doing my usual rounds of
Bldgblog and Archinect today and looked up some of the articles that I had missed.

So this appeared to be quite boring to begin with as I'm not very intersted in weather monitoring at this moment in time. Basically the guy goes around recording stuff that you wouldn't normally hear this is what the article says:

Audible space weather appears, McGreevy explains, when energy from the sun "impacts Earth's Magnetosphere and generates lovely Aurora and Natural-Radio Signals." This topologically endless pressure-front between terrestrial energy and the radioactivity of the sun whistles, hisses and growls throughout McGreevy's MP3s.

Ok, enough with the yawning.

Listen to this

So you're thinking- ah so what? But imagine this guy is in dead silence in the middle of the desert. Seen that Bruce Willis film, Signs?

Creeppppy. Oh and if you have a minute check out the latest article in Bldgblog the images are beautiful.

Over and out. xxW

Olivo Barbieri

Olivo Barbieri's tilt-shift camera (don't ask me I don't know either) makes these beautiful shots.

Kaffeehaus

A new cafe has opened up round the corner from my office which I walk past everyday. The sign says that its a Vienese Coffeshop and Roastery in pretty curly letters a la Klimt. Its a lovely change to the nasty 'men's clubs' and 'pubs' (which are really dirty bars) that saturate the area.

Its on the traffic light between Neil Road and Cantonment Road so outside is quite busy. Although once you step inside, the atmosphere is completely different with its marble topped tables and dark wood furniture. Its quite narrow being in a shophouse though they've used the high ceilings to their advantage and placed strategically angled mirrors that give the space some definition without closing it in.

The staff are helpful and the manager takes the time to go round the tables and talks to everyone. The last time I was there I had a honey affogatto which was a shot of espresso poured into a honey lined espresso cup ontop of a scoop of honey ice cream, and the manager took the time to chat to me that he had stolen the recipe from Paul Basset (that barister on telly) to make the Honey ice cream.

So today I went in already looking forward to my honey affogatto and the place was rammed! As soon as I came through the door I was met with the manager (must get his name!lets call him George?) who looked so dissapointed to see me! So George turned around looked through the cafe and asked his staff whether there were any seats available for me (just me!) and said after he was so very sorry and that he'd never had to turn anyone away for being too full before but he'd have to. awww..

'Okay then' I said, so turned around to make my way to another place to eat and he said in his very european accent that he was once again very dissapointed and hoped that I was not too upset. I joked and said 'no its quite alright I'll come back another time..although I'm a little upset that I've missed my coffee' ,grinned and proceeded to the door.

A few doors down I hear a voice 'excuse me! miss!'
I turn around and its George! Bless him cos he ran out to give me a piece of chocolate and said that he hoped I'd be back.

Tomorrow then. xxW

OH Lordy.

There's a Neo-Noah in the Netherlands.

Here's the article. But for those who haven't got the time/inclination here's the run-down of the project:

• Guy in Netherlands want to build 'replica' of Noah's Ark according to its description in the Bible.
• Wants to 'renew interest in Christianity in the Netherlands'
• Is aimed at children to show that the Ark is actually tangible and can exist.
• Is going to be a floating zoo/tour/religeous pamphlet in your face, oh and a drink too, kinda thing.

Okay. I personally have nothing against proving that Noah's Ark did indeed exist, and that the sentiment behind it is.. well.. noble. But come on.

I must say though, that the estimated project cost at just under 1m Euros is quite impressive. That will get you glazed gallery walkway here, but lets not talk about that.

But the zoo bit is something I have a little bit of a problem with. They're planning to keep baby horses, lambs, chickens etc etc to save space. Now we know that we can keep all these animals in relatively small spaces and cause them no harm. But babies grow up do they not? Chicks become chickens and ponies become horses - where are they going to go then? Isn't it just a little mean to go, oh okay, I'm going to put these little animals in this boat (which, according to my memory have tiny little windows-no LIGHT!! YOU MONSTERS!)ahem, and then ship (pun intended) them off, to oh I dunno where?

That means that they can only keep a certain amount of animals in the boat (obviously) but correct me if I'm wrong but as nature and life have it, things multiply. Where do they go? It all seems like a lot of air and a big farce to me.

In the article the man who is building this ark, Johan Huibers is quoted as saying 'This will speak very much to children, they'll hear the creak of the wood smell the smell of the dung.' Great marketing strategy matey. Whether you're 13 or 31 you are going to hear and smell the same shit. And something tells me from your photo there that the openings aren't going to be quite big enough are they?

You've got to give the man credit for having ambition, because he so clearly does. Lets just hope that in a few years time his 'zoo' won't be reduced to a couple of stuffed animals with sound effects, eh?

moo. xxW

Groove Studio Opening

Had the most perfect weekend for a long time.. Spent some long overdue quality time with my Abang and his lovely SPG (hahaha..), went wakeboarding for the first time in MONTHS (thanks Mum!) and to top it all off performed at the opening of our new studio which went rather well I think.


Final pose with me in the middle. And yes, I have been walking around like an old biddy since.


Candid shot of me! Maybe I should just pretend not to be looking when I get my photos taken - that looks like the me I see in the mirrr as opposed to the toothy grined idiot I assault most cameras with. xxW

For you Dilberts out there...

The guy who invented that little box that you're sat in? He's sorry.

Kiddo, this one is for you. haHAhHAhA...

xxW

Soul lost for a four minute run.

I was thinking about this the other day... what with the Commonwealth Games on and all. How big events like this can change our cities, propose huge costs as well as profits yada yada yada. We always think about whats going to happen to these mega structures after the events as its quite unlikely that another big sporting event is going to be held in the same country in the very near future.. But whats lost? What used to be a quiet green area on the outskirts of the city becomes a graveyard town of, well, olympic proportions-no? (oh bad joke, I know)

So I came across this article today, and it made a lot of sense. Ultimately, it made me sad really thinking about all those miles of graffiti lost. You can argue until you were blue in the face and tell me that graffiti is vandalism. Granted there is some shoddy graffiti art out there, in my opinion that is, but thats the beauty of it-no? Can we not wabi-sabi our ways into beautiful, flawed, human cities? (thanks Kyle!) I mean, there are some God AWFUL buildings being built - that are a much worse eye-sore than some kids' scribblings on the wall..surely?! Do we go up to the construction workers and architects while they are being built and go -erm- that stinks, get lost. Ok ok ok so there are planning authorities to do all that, but the system is flawed - just look at the evidence! Ok so you can't REALLY stop a building from going up cos some dude in his seat at the planning office reckons its ugly. But what happened to transparency? What happened to oh I dunno, asking your neighbour whether he minds that you build some Romanesque monstrosity to shelter your punto from the sun. Its hard because everyone's tastes really are different, and if you did try and get everyones opinion on a building nothing would get built, and what did - would probably be so boring, that no one would notice it was up anyway. Oh the neverending debate in my head..

But I digress..

Graffiti. If you put up a brand new building that was pristine white and flawless then I can totally understand that if someone came and chucked a load of paint over it - you'd be pretty peeved. No no, scratch the flawless bit out- just a 'new' building - you'd be pissed. Which is fair enough really. BUt the back alleys and those hard to reach walls could do with an aerosol filled breath of fresh paint! What harm is it doing-really?

There's a fuzzy line between vandalism and graffiti but to attack it with your pots of beige and gray paint and zero tolerance is not the way to go. Take Singapore for example- perfectly pruned tree lined streets and lush greenery, beautifully maintained buildings, roads and pathways - someone obviously wants to keep it that way. So there's a giant park in Somerset being built where Graffiti art can be produced 'safely'. Ok, so its totally taking the sprit out of the quick-grab-yer-can-and-stencil-the-bugger approach, but its something. The article talks about low tolerance areas which I think are brilliant - basically the parts of the city which might want/need/can't help but have a little street art are left to do their own thing.

The stadium back home was built for the SEA Games - which caters nicely for big events and the like. Though the area is a tarmac induced coma laying there inanimate and lifeless the rest of the time. You ask- what should have been done then smart arse? Me? I probably would have done the same thing, yank some trees out of the ground and plonk in some massive concrete jalopy with some hint of 'ethnic' architecture. Oh spiel spiel spiel. Having said that though, that area was always that way so its fate was sealed from the word go.

Perhaps a more sensetive approach (and I'm thinking this with home in mind) would have been to incorporate a smaller, less ambitious area of a human scale which would house the shops and cafes etc during the big event which would ultimately serve the surrounding community post event. I understand that the area is relatively lively actually before sunset but as soon as walks have been walked and laps have been swum everyone jumps in their cars and heads on home. Leaving the place once again an intimidating void.

Ripping out the old to slot in the new is part of the business of being an architect - or so I'm told. What seems evident is that town planning and architecture is approached in two ways especially in the Far East and Australia or at least in what I've seen of it. The first being a slash and burn one where everything is straightened out and built skywards a la Americano where you have very distinctive quarters and what doesn't quite fit gets a face-off with the demolition man. A little Disney, a little ladies who lunch. Then there's the polar opposite where you can go to your fancy glass fronted shopping complex and order a latte then go next door to see what is the catch of the day, where as soon as you walk outside you are hit by lack of cover from the sun and the smoke from the streetside barbeque chokes you. A little rojak, a little Chainsaw Massacre. Each with its own pros and cons although I have to say that the chaos of the rojak towns and cities seem somewhat more appealing than Truman Show suburbia. In that way Singapore has a steady balance of the two if a little disproportionately Truman in some cases, where there are pockets of grit and actual humans which bring the city back to life under the cover of skyscrapers.

Heres a website with some of the newly released Darling Harbour entries for your viewing pleasure. Love the 70184 drawings - just a little more real than the 'photo realism' that I despise but thats a whole new entry on its own xxW

East Meets West

Slate Magazine as usual has some very convincing essay/slideshows. This one I found particularly interesting and I wish I was in New York to go see it.

Its about an exhibition currently being held at MoMA showcasing 'Muslim artists who come from the Islamic world but do not live there'. It has the intention of challenging the perception of Islam/Islamic art by breaking away geographical boundaries it seems.

The points made in the slide seem just and I would agree only to a certain extent simply because it is the only material I have about the show having never seen it myself. Let me know what you think while I sit here on the fence. xxw

Pre-fab for Crabs

Hermit crabs have a gross shortage of homes. Check out this link for more info but for those who can't be arsed to read it this is the gist:

• There aren't enough homes for hermit crabs perhaps due to seashell collectors and pollution.
  
• Someone's come up with the idea to make some plastic homes for them which are meant to satisfy all the criteria that a hermit crab may want. i.e lightweight and durable etc etc
  
• The building cost of these homes will be met by corporate sponsoring

Folkes, think of all the poor crabs who are wondering the beaches of the world looking for a home. Stop collecting seashells. The mental image of this poor little crab clutching onto its precious home is too much! I hope to dedicate.. well.. at leat 10% of my time when I'm qualified to the rehousing of crabs.

The plastic shelters might be lightweight and whatnot-but how about the bouyancy of the shells themselves? We wouldn't want schools of little plastic shells bobbing around the ocean now do we? Oh the images in my head are too much! haahHAha..

The article says that the crabs often exchange their shells depending on their size. So does that mean that the houses have to come in S,M,L,XL? Are hermit crabs in America bigger than hermit crabs from China? This I'd like to know.

And the corporate logos thing - can you just imagine this tiny little crab with his little man made house with oh I dunno, a Shell logo? Oh the irony. Then you'd have groups of these these crabs lumbering around our shores with logos or slogans with the more obvious health warning - 'Got Crabs?' call 0800-c-r-a-b-s

Don't get me wrong, I fully support the building of homes for the homeless hermits and hope to someday help house our little homeless friends. xxw

Midnight picnic

Yesterday we celebrated our three year anniversary since being together. Been pretty skint lately and trying to save to do some volunteer work so we decided to have a picnic on our enclosed balcony... Brought back to memories of our first balcony picnic on a tiny balcony in the hostel we stayed at in Milan once we'd figured that it was way too expensive to eat out in the city!


Spent the night chatting away eating all the yummy things we wouldn't normally be eating out here. I took this photo of Kyle while he wasn't quite sure when I was going to take the photo and caught the man smiling! hahaha.. xxw

Isn't GM food grand? 

Current distaste for architecture.

I'm purturbed. At the risk of sounding like a wine spitting ponse. I'm purturbed.

It says here: Please indicate what architectural issues interest you and why you wish to pursue them at the **.

Gnash teeth. Blank stare, slumped shoulders and you have me pinned.

How am I supposed to write that? Architecture interests me alright - although I would never have used that word- but I mean, ALL of it does. I'm supposed to pick out a couple issues and write about them in the space of 12 inches on this A4 sheet - that interest me. I'm devoting my life to architecture - you'd think that it would do more than interest me.

Okay so I did the whole beginning, middle and end bit that they teach you at school and it didn't work. I did the whole okay - I'm going to be precise and wrote it out in points - thing and that didn't work either.

Can I not say :
Oh GOD please let me in. I'm a starving architect pleading you mr.admissions officer to let me in and please please get me out of my 9-6 as its sucking my brain so dry I could not write a proper personal statement. I'm no longer the carniverous architecture student waiting to sink my teeth into some old Corbu or snort some 100 units of Archigram. Instead I come to you a jaded smalley tired of being told to be lousy on purpose. Instead I come with this transcript gripped in my cold fingers to thrust it in your direction so that you might consider my plea for asylum.

The tangled mess that occupied the space in between my ears has now been undone and folded neatly. The space is vacant and disconnected to the rest of my body which still courses with the hope of real stimuli. I lied to them. I don't care much for overplanning and the social engineering that happens in this place. The tree-lined streets just out of reach of the masses cause them to claw and swipe their way through to the shiny lights of the designer bungalow. They relish the thought of freedom into the prison of the material world. A prison where the inmates vex each other on by the size of their balls. The ones that are on their chains that is.

My preoccupation with my position in the architectural discourse that I so love has been diluted down to the break between C.S.I and a re-run of friends. I suddenly care about things I have no interest in and can live happily without- it disgusts me. So therefore please kind mr.admissions officer let me in so that I no longer have to live my days pursuing a life I don't want. one. 150dots.per.inch. at a time.

Or go the other route?

I like:

• Architecture
• Architecture with a conscience
• Architecture for those with pensions
• Architecture that is mine
• ...wine
• The arhitecture of huts
• (hate) being an architecture slut. (to family: do not be alarmed, that only means doing this solely for personal gain/money - although the personal gain thing is kind of true)
• in fact the thing i really like
• is to be admitted into your university so please please cut the crap and recognise the talent-yo!

word.

House

Living in South East Asia's arguably most expensive city is madness. Trying to find somewhere cheap and fairly nice was pretty hard to begin with too. After battling with the most unhelpful, unreliable, money-grabbing estate agent we managed to find a place with a nice landlord, close to work and within our budget- which he was reluctant to show us in the first place!
The reason why I'm posting this is, I suppose, because we're due to leave in about 6 weeks time and I'm going to miss our wee flat. The first time my mum came over to stay the night at our place was the second night we'd moved in. After camping out for a week in a hotel room in Chinatown that was the size of the bed, the abundance of space was met with an explosion of the bags in the spare room. So you can guess what might have happened with my dear mum.

tut tut dust dust so untidy.. You have to laugh really..

I suppose the idea of work and living in a chic little city like Singapore is paired with the ideal of living in a shiny new condo in Orchard with a pool and barbeque pit. The closest we have to that is the mushy grass between our building and the next and the paper-money burning pit I can see from my window. Still, how many people in Singapore can say they can get up just over an hour before work starts, take a leisurely walk over and stop for breakfast on the way? The beautifully restored shophouses are fantastic and I hope to own one some day, so I'm definately going to miss walking past them every day. Anyway, here's a peep into my flat.

Lifes questions answered.

At Subway yesterday it occured to me. Its struck me like a bolt of lightning straight out of the Sandwhich Sky. Its all about the sauce baby! See the sauce drips from the top of the sandwhich down to the bottom as you hold it upwards and stays there so the last bit is always the juiciest! Another bite from a new sandwhich will be as dry as the inside of a cotton ball factory in comparison.

Whew. Thats a load off my mind! fascinating stuff this..

Oh and I always wondered why doctors always used pagers instead of mobiles. Well until Kyle enlightened me yesterday. I'm looking at the world now with new eyes. xxw