Uruguay

Laid back Uruguay. Seemed as if sand was everywhere. We had gotten there via a ferry from BA to Montevideo. We were curious to go to a church designed by architect/ engineer Eladio Dieste. The church was in a small town called Atlantida. The bus driver's eyebrows raised when we stepped off the bus.

We ate lunch and asked where the church was, figuring that the architectural masterpiece would be the towns main church. The waiter quickly responded that it was not far and we started walking. Of course the church is not the one we want. Now the problem is- is that all we know is that the church is in this city and every architecture book calls it just the Iglesia Atlantida.

We have no idea where it is and no clue what to call it. So we draw pictures. Crazy curvy pictures of plans and a blurry axon. Its not so good, but after talking to a few people and waving our arms around a bit, someone figured out that we were architects and that we wanted to go to the church outside of town. They told us to walk 3 kilometers straight ahead. Past goats and cows for 45 minutes we walked, very unsure if we would ever see it. Quietly musing that it is incredible that we would just head out on this dusty road with really no clue were we were going.

It was nice though- it reminded me of when i was a kid as i walked aimlessly along a country road staring down horses and jumping every time a dog raced the fence.

Obviously by the pictures we make it. You tell me it was worth it. What an amazing structure. All masonry, very simple, but super articulate structure. As we were there they prepared for a baptism.

Part 2. FoA

(Part of a series constantly evolving, but you can read and happy to hear comments)

There is a lot of room to expand when thinking about the future of architecture through the future of the house. A few days after the last post, Hisako and I sat in a cafe and discussed if we had to re-write 5-10 rules for architecture what they would be. We were careful to not think of concepts, since if done right any concept should be able to incorporate these rules. During his time Corbusier's rules embraced new technologies (steel structure, free plan) and related the results to new ways of living born from these changes in technologies (automobile, the private garden). He represented his interpretations architecturally in his rules. Think of the technological movements today that architecture should be addressing. Below we seek to incorporate what we see into rules. All a bit hazy- but a start of something...

1. 24/7 - A house that operates 24 hours a day
2. East, West, North, South - Conscious of cardinal directions, even Vitruvious paid note
3. Roof Garden - As the residential house gets more urban it must maintain the garden quality found in the suburb
4. Stair/Ramp= Armature - movement through the house should be captured
5. Carbon Zero - is the future
6. Flex/ Multi-use Space - house must adapt to alternative uses as new uses for the house are demanded
7. Un-Private House (1st, 2nd, THIRD PLACE)-Porous - house should function as home/work/play/meet space/place, something that in modern times has been segregated
8. Vertical Ownership - it is not enough just to stack uses, mixed use should promote all of its uses down to the street
9. Invert or Exteriority (Indoor/Outdoor space) - house incorporates natural space either to the side as in the traditional yard or inverted to the courtyard- either way natural space is inclusive to the program and not tangential, even if these space are not physically doable natural space must be brought in
10. Short Street Access - entrance to the house is no further than 5 feet from the street
11. Space in Density - trends toward urban density grow in popularity. How then to make space in density becomes a prime concern for the architect. Without the lawn or the tower view to provide a visual sense of the infinite, the architect must make the most of what they have to create spaces that unfold, exponent, and general make themselves seem bigger than they are
12. Deus Ex Machina - like the literary device which uses dramatic authorial intervention to save a character, in architecture it is a fine opportunity to draw the unexpected, the distant, the phenomenal into the project

Casa de Chorizo

For the past week i have been loving the houses in Palermo. The reason is that nearly every house has this amazing plan. You are always stepping in off the street, up a few steps, and into an entry vestibule elaborately detailed with a set of iron and wood doors, tile floors, and marble wainscoting before then walking into a front room that generally both connects to other rooms and a great sun lighted courtyard. The greatest thing about these houses is the courtyard. Every house allows for some type of natural light. Very often this is a full courtyard with huge steel windows. Frit, prism, and colored glass filters and gently alters the light as it comes into the rooms surrounding the courtyard. Because all of the rooms face the courtyard and because the courtyard is surrounded by high walls this outdoor space feels very much part of the interior.


After excitedly talking about this with Diego, an architect here in Buenos Aires, he told me with a smile that these houses had a name- Casa de Chorizo. Wow- this country likes beef- they even name their house types after sausages! After pressing him why, Diego explained that when the first families moved in they would get these skinny deep lots from the city and build a room in the front. Then as the family grew, they would build another room, then another, then another. Often they built around a courtyard and kept the kitchen in the back nearest to the alley. Seen over time these domestic houses developed like links of a chorizo. Fantastic!

The truth about dreams

The truth about dreams is that when you speak of them, people smile skeptically and you wonder if you are not just kidding yourself. Then you fly away. Once you are there- and there may be a completely crazy place- on the tallest peak or the furthest place away from home. You may fly literally or figuratively, but once you are there- you meet people...Lots of people actually. And they are all doing the same thing as you are. Then you realize that what you are doing is actually not unique. It is new for you, but not new to the world. There are tons of people doing the same thing. It is both inspiring or sad depending on your ego.

Palermo Soho

The buildings are cracked with vines of trees growing atop window cornices hold bits of facade together. Skinny/Tall metal and wooden doors punctuate the low one-story buildings with a showy presence indicative of a prosperous neighborhood, but now betrayed through neglect- rusted and chipped. The streets are still broad though and the trees have grown full. Light filters through the large tree canopies bringing the summer temperature down several degrees. Far from the main boulevards and lush with vegetation the air is free from much of the diesel smog one finds throughout the city.

It is a neighborhood that has gone full circle and now stands poised to take advantage of its obsolescence. Encouraged by low rents and the area's character designers and inventors have been moving into Palermo Soho for the last decade or so. They work in the backrooms and courtyards of these old houses and use their front rooms as showrooms.

One benefit of the 2002 economic meltdown was that for the smaller designers the marketplace was awash in cheap talented labor. With the multinational companies gone, the little guy found his day and Palermo sprang to life with tiny shops each of great creative vision and uniqueness. Today it is a mixture of crumbling buildings and sleek storefronts, each an adventure to look through their wares and to meander through the backrooms and courtyards.

Part 1. FoA

(Part of a series constantly evolving, but you can read and happy to hear comments)

Throughout the trip we had been discussing our future, the future of architecture, the course of building in Los Angeles as we saw it. I never really think of myself as a modernist, but whenever the thinking gets complex I think about Corbusier. He touched on all aspects of architecture from urban planning and manifestos to some clearly amazing projects that can be very different from one to another. I mean he mixed it up. And he was rigorous- tons and tons of houses pursuing a central idea- his sketchbooks are voluminous, but his drawing skills were really not that good- which is comforting- but he kept tons of them. No idea wasted. The artist Doug Aitken is that way as well, and i really admire both of them for it.

But back to Corb. It is just that he is very clear and diagrammatic. And he is not bothered by being a bit polemic, which makes for some good entertainment. So hell, why not he's a good role model. And when thinking about something like lets say the future of architecture- he's a good brain to have on your side. So what is it? The future, I mean? I mean everything is changing around us. Especially in how people are living. Huge demographics are moving far out into the suburbs, while another huge swath is returning to the city. The city dwellers are yearning for a quality of living that we stopped building 100 years ago. Everyone thinks of San Fransisco and New York or Europe for walkable cities, but thats just a few cities. What do you do in LA or Charlotte? It has got to be invented. And what's getting made? Lets be honest, the good ideas get hogtied by zoning or the results are often plastic looking and contrived (Which is happening for a whole slew of reason's-some controllable and other's not). There are reason's that SF, NYC, and medieval towns had integrity and it goes much further than just stacking uses on transit nodes. They grew organically and even more importantly they were market driven. Its perverse that people clamor for walkable cities and detest traffic, and yet cannot abide to allow commercial zoning within their midst. They want it! Otherwise they would not be driving daily to get it. Small markets would do well in communities and folks often point to it when they have it AS community, but do not be fooled. It is grandfathered. They would never get a variance now. Oddly homeownership leads individuals away from market economics and more down the road of petty dictatorship attempting to maintain property values by freezing the neighborhood from change through NIMBYism (Not In My BackYard). The result is a mall in a greenfield.

Ok- a bit of a rant. But I want to describe the battleground because the future of the cities we love (read: SF, NYC, San Gimignano...) is looking good. Its the future of cities where the city IS what i described above- coincidentally where most of us live- that is in trouble. Cities built by the car, cities built in the boom for the baby-boomers, cities created for property value and not as living communities- This is where the discussion is most important. Once again the future of architecture lies in residential housing. And interestingly as the demographics shift and cities start to reassess if current zoning is helping- the house is being asked to change from the inside out as new technologies are allowing more and more people to create flexible hours and to work from their home. Like in times when those walkable cities were built, the house is being asked to do more than be an investment, a shelter for the family, and an escape from the 9 to 5. The house is being asked to become the center character in peoples lives: A place for family, business, public meeting, playground, and convenience (as it replaces escape). And when the house becomes this, people have more free time- they then escape not in an entropic, hidden way, but rather seek new stimuli in the culture of the city and the city finds new meaning.

The issue is that there is not a vibrant discussion of the future of the house within architecture. There is little reassessment of it in relation to these new demands on its internal programming. I see investigation of form and of technology. Houses are of course being tailor-made by architects for families with these needs mentioned above. Do not get me wrong it is happening- but it is happening in a boutique way and not acknowledged as an opportunity to re-shape architecture.

And now back to Corbusier. When he first mentioned the house as a Machine for Living and he set up his five points for architecture, he said it because he meant it and he was rallying architecture to move forward. You do not have to read "Toward a New Architecture" to get it. While architects at that time are doing or being trained to make lacy Beaux-Arts buildings or tricked out Art Nouveau, Corbusier makes a book full of pictures of steamships, cars, airplanes, and grain silos. All images of engineering. He is like folks-, "Wake up! Stop making boutique. Make a Machine for Living like that dude Henry Ford and give it to the masses!" Ok- That was conjecture...but this is not an academic discussion and neither was Corbusier's. It is a simple point. Technology had allowed for a paradigm shift, the market had followed within other fields, and people were living differently. So if he did not want the engineers to start doing the architects job (or more true to what happened the developers doing our job after post war economics hit the residential mentality); if we want more than boutique we better engage and play with the new landscape and invent a new language.

The same can be said today. It is time to play with a new language. To take a new look at residential architecture that trumps antiquated zoning restrictions and prioritizes the convenience and art of the home over static notions of property value. (Property values will rise because this new architecture will better match demand).

This is all a bit daunting. But let us say "Toward a New Architecture" was a response to a new world. A world of engineering and efficiency. Is not this a good model for addressing our new world? A world that has passed the infatuation of globalization and email and now demands convenience and global service. I mean, I am writing all of this from a wi-fi cafe in Buenos Aires- where my billing for a project under construction in Utah is subsidizing a lifestyle I could never afford in Los Angeles. If trouble comes i can be in Utah within 12 hours and for under a few thousand dollars. Hell- the Japanese just launched a satellite that will provide 1 gig per minute of basically global wi-fi. The kids growing up are not going to be amazed by google earth like we are as we point out delightedly to our collegues, "Look i can see my house!" They are going to say, "Look at that place, it looks cool. Lets go there." Oh, did i mention they will get internet from there- phone free through skype- faxes emailed- pictures sent- video posted- Do i need to go on? If global living is (already has) changed that much, are not they going to expect something more from their home?

So let's start with a name- Machine for Living is out of date. No one even talks of machines-they just want the results. Whatever it is-it is invisible.
Nomad Living
Homeless (joke)
Synesthetic Living
Link Living
Live-Breathe Home

I dont know its all too much. More to come. If you are interested. Comment...

Upsala Glacier

Who loves glaciers! So we went back. Early in the morning we boarded a boat. We were the last on the boat and the only seats they had available was in the Captains Quarters. No more hiking- we were traveling in style. The largest and most impressive was Upsala which looses something like 200 meters a year. The lake was full of icebergs.




We stopped in a nearby inlet to have lunch. While staring at the fjord, we experimented with many different types of music from my ipod to match the view. This was our result. Strangely guitars sound good in mountain wilderness better than other single instruments, but there is something bigger about Jazz. The music is Krupa and Rich.

The W Trail

We hiked a trail called the "W". We left from Pudeto (bottom left) and ended in Hostel de Torres (top right). We were 8 days hiking. 85 kilometers.

TO GLACIER GREY
Along a long glacial lake for 11km; It was to our left. Ice drifted along the shore. Everyone carried big packs. And when we arrived at our camp we were tired. We stayed in a lodge that night. It was surrounded by delicate trees and small transparent icebergs.

We had smuggled cheese, salami, sardines, and wine into Chile. You would think that this is a lite comment, but they actually had checked our tire compartment and everything when we crossed, they were serious! Fortunately for us, we were not serious and they never checked our purses. We snacked well. It was the last good eating for a while.


TO CAMPO ITALIANO
The thunder we heard in our campsite was actually avalanches from the peaks surrounding. We camped under a short tree canopy that barely protected us from the howling winds that swept through the Valle Frances.

At night we read from torches strapped to our heads. I was reading this ridiculously thick somewhat bad fiction and had the pleasure of tearing out the pages as i went. Books are typically sacrosanct with me, but on a 8 day hike- everything must remain useful. I thought of burning socks, but Hisako would not let me.


TO CAMPO BRITANICO
The hike up the Valle Frances must be one of the most magnificent day hikes in the world. Up and up, you climb pass a rushing river, over boulders; to your left a massive peak constantly sheds snow in impressive waterfalls of snow. Through brilliant green Patagonian forest you climb until reaching a crest you step onto a very slight dome of granite. The trees, unable to take hold in this stone surface give you a 360 panorama of a new vista. One that surpasses all yet on the climb, for you now stand in a huge bowl of green rimmed with tall rounded peaks all the way around.

The climb up the bowl past Camp Britanico is straight up. Its not quite rock climbing, but its best to have all four limbs touching the ground. After the trees thin out, big clumps of tundra moss- a panoply of greens coat the slope. Tundra eventually gives way to loose mounds of sharp rocks.

The view is large and strange. The mountains are not like mountains. They have this concrete plasticity- parabolic slopes, rounded peaks. Truly strange outcropping teeming with character and personality- it must be amazing to stand on top of these things...

But the best i can do is climb what i can climb. There is only one other couple i see. As they go down they say i am the last one up here and to be careful going up or down. I am way past the last lookout. I take in a long moment.


TO REFUGIO CUERNOS
Everyday held new surprises. After the monumentality of the ring of peaks above Britanico, this cloudy misty day and low green hills beyond was subdued. A light rain turned up the contrast on all the black and white pebbles disappearing into the silty white/blue glacial lake. The subdued turned sublime when we stopped to soak all of this in. The place had this Zen like-no-mindedness about it- a mandala consciousness, the widest range of consciousnesses. In the distance low clouds were moving quickly out of the Valle Frances and dissipating in animate forms over the lake. A saucer, a dragon clawing...

There is a bit by Herman Hesse that takes hold, "The surrender to nature's irrational, strangely confused formations produces in us a feeling of inner harmony with the forces responsible for these phenomena...the boundaries separating us from nature begin to quiver and dissolve...we are unable to decide whether the images on our retina are the result of impressions coming from without or from within...we discover to what extent we are creative, to what extent our soul partakes of the constant creation of the world."

We stayed there for an hour. I skipped rocks, Hisako was picking little rocks and matching them with larger rocks of the same pattern- an experiment in camouflage. The lake was entrancing not only to us. A group of Australians threw down their packs stripped down and jumped in. You should have heard them howl!

There were many river crossings, but the hike was mellow. We talked about what our business should be when we return back to Los Angeles. We joked that we were on a business retreat. The refugio at Cuernos was very nice and many people were there. We sat in the cabin drinking wine and reading, watching the chef make homemade bread. The dinner was delicious and we went to bed very satisfied. The night was strange and ominous, however, with massive wind gusts rushing through the valley. We could hear the wind as it came rolling through the valley like a runaway bus sweeping through clumbs of trees with great ripping sounds getting louder and louder until it hit the tent. Everything shook violently. We slept in fits.


TO LAS TORRES
The last leg of our hike ended with the park's big attraction- the spiring granite Torres (Towers). Our campsite was in a pasture, but the setting was beautiful and the sun shined on us. A day hike up to the torres was mostly a scramble over boulders and talis piles. The vertical hike was pretty substantial, but the reward was magnificent. I hung out on a rock projecting into the small lake at the base of the tower, laid down and just looked at those massive rocks. Wondering who in their right minds would climb that thing. Of course it was an Italian who summited first in 1963.

We have a lot of time on our hands since the hiking is over. We lay on the grass and hang out in our tent thankful for such an amazing journey.


DRIVE BACK TO EL CALAFATE
Since Miho drove the rental car back, we have to take a bus back into Argentina. We did not really tell them where to pick us up, so we were very curious to know if we would have a ride. It worked out. One bus took us to the border and another picked us up. Its a weird crossroads.

Torres Del Paine

They say you can book the bus ahead, but you have to pay at the store, and they don't reserve your space on the bus until you pay...Something about this doesn't add up. But after a few months in South America, we get used to this circular logic. You try to plan ahead, but down here, you have got to let go if it becomes too much. Just run with it. It generally works out. Its good practice actually for life in the USA. So much of it should just be let go. The bus of course was full by the time we got to the store. We rented from Hertz from Victoria a friend of a friend who had migrated to El Calafate because unlike the rest of Argentina this place is booming and jobs are plentiful.

There is nothing, absolutely nothing. No lone telephone pole; no shard from a broken glass bottle reflecting in the distance. To say Patagonia is a vast desolate landscape is accurate, but too lonely. It is so vast and desolate, so immense and clean it conjures up an expanse of emotions. It is total. I remember once when i was a boy, i went camping in a cave. I closed my eyes to go to sleep and they turned the lights off. I opened my eyes. Sure, it was the darkest thing i had ever seen, but it was different than that; it was pure. There was no red spot remnant of the sun moving around, no twitching of eyelids to distract. The absoluteness of that space enveloped me with both fright and excitement. Patagonia feels similar.

We drive from El Calafate to Torres del Paine. We cross 400 kilometers of dirt road into Chile. Miho learns how to drive stick shift on the way. We see an armadillo.

The peaks of Torres Del Paine are some of the most spectacular on the planet and perhaps the most technical climbing mountains in the world. We drink wine under their shadow, looking for the Southern Cross in the night sky. It sits low on the horizon and points to a pole not so far from here. Somehow you can feel this. This connection to a larger order- the stars- makes us even more aware of our location on the globe. Its far, we are remote, like really out there. When i lived in Florida there were all these dudes who had gotten on the road and just headed south, ending up in Miami. That was one thing, but this! This is something else.

Epiphany Egg

Is there such a thing as one half of an epiphany?

The author Murakami describes two anteaters he saw at the zoo. It was cold and they were tight together completely intertwined so that they were one ball of fuzz. It was a striking image, but useless.

These marooned images sometimes come back when least expected, summoned by some cosmic attraction. Don't let it go! A new whole is formed. A pure, raw, new thought- it is the best type of thought.

Fingers and Fractals

I like how the angles of the mountains look like the jagged edges of the ice, look like the edges of a snow flake. Fractals in a scaled line, orders of magnitude connected in sight and process.

Patagonia2

Here is a bit of an experiment: I want to match music to how we feel at these places we go. There is a such a huge impression when a landscape and a sound match.

I heard once on NPR that Neanderthal language consisted of gutteral grunts, banging with hands, dancing and clicks of the throat. This anthropologist talked about how our instinctive draw to certain pitches, beats, and melodies goes back to our Neanderthals roots (Apparently they did not die in a big cataclysm, our Homo-Sapien ancestors more likely killed the Neanderthal men and ran off with the women- so we share their genes. And perhaps an ear for music). If this is true it means certain melodies contain meaning. Music to soothe a child, to warn of approaching danger, to indicate happiness and sadness; a meaning buried to us now, but the sounds today would evoke a certain distant emotion. If he's correct or not i have no idea, but its interesting that certain melodies do evoke so much emotion and at times it is easy to feel that it is something hardwired in us.

Standing in the desolate and magnificent, jagged and harsh landscape of Patagonia i liked this: (click arrow)
Hot Chocolate by Shonen Knife(Stereolab Remix)