two years ago, the personnel recruitment consisted of finding free colleagues with the right attitude, a will to learn and similar values
the economic crisis changed everything
a bit over a month ago we decided that we needed another architectural brain in the office
we published an ad in jobs.bg; we set the conditions and declared that we are going to choose according to the portfolio
for 3 weeks the office e-mail was filling with applications; we were reviewing the presented portfolios periodically and everybody rated the works
at the end of the period we unpublished the ad, reviewed the grades and invited the people who had impressed us and met our requirements to an interview; a total of 23 colleagues
here’s the catch – we gave them a task, a tiny architectural task that they had to solve and present themselves in an architectural context with all other conditions being equal
in other words – we organized an unexpected competition
we tried to be fair – we sent the terms of reference by stages, giving each and every candidate the same time to prepare for the task; in fact there were two different tasks (at their choosing) – one residential and one public – with the sole condition to be solved by hand on a single A3 sheet of paper
as a result, we chose a new colleague and we’ll welcome him to the office soon enough
but
we believe that it will be interesting for all of you to see what we have seen; perhaps even the candidates will be interested… we’ll blot out all signs of which work is which, so that there are no angry or offended people and we’ll be happy to hear what you have to say.
If there is someone who has something against that – please speak now or forever hold your peace!
our first September morning is dedicated to a cultural event with the Moor name of Alhambra
we had gotten up inhumanly early and sneaked out of the hotel at 8:00, walking up the narrow, steep streets
the tickets for the complex are sold out in advance for weeks ahead of time at times; they have a fixed capacity and let small groups of visitors inside the complex, with an hourly schedule and two days ago we managed to reserve our tickets for this morning at 8:30 – the only ones left…
as we were climbing up, there were views of the city here and there between the houses
the morning is fantastic; a pleasant coolness from the mountain has come down during the night and the air is fresh and crystal clear; while we are wandering the zigzags of the steep streets, we manage to lose ourselves, find ourselves, be late, and in the end, almost tripping and without an audio guide we managed to enter the Nasrid Palaces minutes before the time limit for out tickets; the group for 9 o’clock is already waiting at the front…
the place is an endless sequence of open and closed spaces, shady and sunny spots, murmur of springs and water mirrors
each view, each ray of morning light, each perspective is skillfully directed and arranged so that it emits perfection and harmony
the attention to detail and decorations are typically Arabic and only the places, affected by the intervention or the negligence of the rulers of these lands in later years, do not carry the diligence of the Moor stonemasons, sculptors, carpenters and ceramists
you do not have to be a pro with the camera – everything around is a deftly arranges scene
something mystical is in the air
(I think that even the small window overlooking these domes was also placed there on purpose…)
at certain spots, the panoramic view from the terraces and the covered passages connecting the different sections of the complex was breath-taking
I am not really keen on photographing flowers, but here I could not handle it
does it look enormous to you? it is! and the places, where you are left breathless by the next directed view and you just want to stay there for a while, are innumerable…
before we left the lands of the ugly, small, frowning people, we still managed to get to the water for a cup of coffee
Portuguese is spoken in Brazil in case you were wondering… in fact, the memorial was built and given to the church as a gift, a thanks for helping Portugal remain untouched by World War II
we go east; we ride over the hilly landscape, covered with man-made forest lands for as far as one can see
at first, I thought they were olives but the green was not exactly right; here you can see them are from up close
the tree is Cork and Portugal is the only global exporter of this precious material
cork is actually the bark of the tree and, in some unconceivable way, it manages to survive after they take it away; repeatedly that is
the date of the last peeling is registered diligently
the fact that at some point we crossed the border can only be recognized by the fuel prices
we pass by Seville riding (apologies to all the aficionados of historic spots); after a full day of riding in the semi-desert lands of Andalucía, at dusk before us are the heights of Sierra Nevada; the town tucked away at the foot of the mountain is Granada
the city of Lisbon, the capital of the former patron of the seas, the departure port of Vasco da Gama and Magellan… lives in the past; the atmosphere of the place is one of nostalgia for a glory past.; the people who inhabit it have gripped at their depressive state and time seems to pass by somewhere to the side of them.
Lisbon (Lisboa in Portuguese) is a massive marine port on the Atlantic Ocean and it is situated on steep hills, descending towards the water in an almost ceremonial manner; the city, however, has no attitude towards it; it cannot be seen except from one single spot; the water, where one would expect to find the most lively part of the city, cannot be reached because it is bordered at its full length by a railway which, for some reason, nobody even tried to move; there is also no place where you can see the majestic hills.
I never expected to see lack of urban design of such a criminal proportion; without thought or a glimpse into the future in a European capital… but it is a fact; in Lisbon!
the only spot with a view and purposeful urban design (from 200 years ago)
it is Sunday; we are aimlessly cruising up and down but the suppressed and dispirited sensation which hangs over this sunny city just won’t leave; cities are made by people and people here, besides being fairly unattractive, low-stemmed and baker-legged, have no fewer chances than those in any European nation; yet, for the duration of our stay not a single person served us coffee with a smile, not a single one engaged in a conversation out of curiosity…
they have to build a monument of Remarque for still having their city crowded with tourists
even the new part of the city, where the World Expo was is 1998, does not have a different atmosphere although it seems much more European, it has a clear waterfront and attractions which are crowded with people on a Sunday
well, Siza and the great Cecile Belmont have done their best
but even in the shade of this astonishing concrete canvas there is some sort of emptiness…
the most pleasant to the eye locals usually belong to this race
30/08/2010
Monday is the cherished day on which we hope to find an open Suzuki repair shop; we find ourselves on a small, narrow, paved street and the Strom goes into the pit stop
equipped with a new electronic heart for the White Beauty we are impatient to leave the city at least for a while
a few pleasant turns to the west; then a bit more to the wast; then a road with Holes more to the west; a hill or two to the east and:
from here on, the only thing more to the west is the Atlantic Ocean
the most western point of the European continent – Cabo da Roca
before we left Porto, there was one more important task; I suppose it was no coincidence that the street of our tiny hotel is called that way
what we are about to visit, however, is the father of contemporary architecture, while the one on the sign is more of a grand-grand-grandfather…
there are not many pictures on the outside but in order not to keep the suspense going
the magnificent Casa de Musica
all the time it looked as if it was alien to its surrounding but maybe this was the point precisely…; the empty space, together with the rising corner elements had quickly found their inhabitants and purpose:
we wait for our guide and we get in
and straight to the main hall
5 years have passed since it was built due to the choosing of Porto (together with Amsterdam) for European Capitals of Culture (remind you of something…?); a competition, although a limited one, the result of which was the choice of the most characteristic building (the description of the guide was that the other options were “more ordinary”)
there is hardly any need for me to explain that the hall is naturally lit from both sides and the stage is positioned at about 1/3 from the back in such a way that viewers can observe the face of the conductor
the screen behind the stage is designed to reflect the sound back at the musicians so that they hear each other better
all the tickets for the hall are priced equally, no matter of the row and the seat number
in my opinion, the placing of the glass should have been a colossal challenge for the acoustics; the fact that glass reflects sound directly, is the primary reason why we have not seen glassed concert halls; they did their homework, tested a few things and here is the result – let’s call it “acoustic glass”
the truth is that the majority of the materials and the interior of the hall are completely tributary to the concept of acoustics; the seats are wrapped in a special fabric which imitates the sound absorption of the human body and the final result is that the sound is equally distributed in both a full hall and an empty one
mhmmm, the floor is made of aluminum…
there are several windows similar to this one around the central hall; they are on smaller premises (I would not call these halls), our guide called them “rooms”, which have parallel functions – be it chamber concerts or simply music experiments; during a concert, however, the watching and listening from these premises is free; following is a tour around them
this room has different acoustics depending on the direction from which the sound is made
to the right, the sound is reflected from the concrete and glass while the strange green things to the left are soft and absorb it
the next spot is the “experimentation room”
the weird things at the back are motion sensors which produce a certain type of sound depending on what they’ve captured in their field
next, is the “children’s room”, a place where kids can listen and observe what is meant for the conscious grown-ups; simply a staircase-shaped hall which points at the bigger one
do not be deceived, up there, to the right, is the door behind which they hide all the toys…
the glass buffer at the end of the hall is a bar; of course, right now and during a concert it is not working
we go to the other side and we arrive at the second largest hall which is quite ordinary
except for the fact that there is natural lighting
somewhere up these stairs is the restaurant but it opens at dusk, around 8…
this last spot is called the VIP room and overall it is used for press conferences and interviews
a tiny detail
a few shots of the main entrance/exit foyer
soon we are back on the bikes and we fly off to Lisbon
somewhere along the road, we take a detour to look at the creations of the Atlantic ocean along these shores
at some point we reach Lisbon and we quickly find ourselves in the midst of the small streets of the old town where we are served this:
a few pictures from the place we slept last night – the town of Vianna on the Atlantic Ocean which turned out to be a seaside resort…
morning mist
a hotel
an entrance
a lobby
a terrace
due to the strange renditions of a battery we have to change our plan for the next few days; we head for Porto which is about 16 kilometers from where we are; our idea is that in the larger city there should be a repair shop or a working Suzuki retailer where we could find somebody to “talk” to the battery and convince it to stop malfunctioning…
we reach Porto in no time and throw our luggage at the hotel as we start looking for the battery “fixers”; alas! in August people are either on vacation or they close up early on Friday… so let’s look around Porto then!
one of our points of interest is nearby the hotel and, without turning off the engines, we find ourselves in front of it; Vodaphone Headquarters
the main entrance of the commercial section for customers on the ground floor
when I look at this white, obvious concrete, I cannot help but think of its analog in Sofia, arch. Zheko Tilev; ……m?!?!!! this building has been made this way only for achieving a certain image; a great deal of the functionality has been sacrificed for the appearance, however… these curved windows remind me the muttering of another traveller who was working in a new, super flashy bank building where no windows could be opened and he could not show his nose outside and feel the wind; while I was walking aimlessly in front of the façade, a large group of people came out of the super modern staff only entrance
of the administrative section and lit up a cigarette in the street…
a few stolen shots of the interior
our next point of interest is down at the port; we make a few turns, passing by streets which are really difficult to maneuver by motorcycle (not to mention by car) and, all of a sudden, we arrive at the waterfront
technically speaking, Porto is what you see on the left hand side while the thing on the right hand city is the town of Gaia; the two are connected through the bridge on the picture (World Heritage List) and one more bridge high above us; the river in the middle is Rio Douro and, more precisely, its estuary at the Atlantic Ocean, the port
the name of the city is the basis for the name of the country, the name PORTUgal actually comes from Porto
the name of the world famous port vine, actually, simply means wine from Porto (Porto Wine)
we stop at a small café at the sea front alley of Gaia
right opposite us is the old part of town, also on the Unesco World Heritage List
the café is a modular one and there are a few more similar cafes down the alley
which does not make it any less elegant, of course
in fact, my interest towards it was really short-lived because I could not take my eyes off what was on the other side
these things are alive, don’t you think?; you can almost hear them calling each other across the street
perhaps there are many other places with similar preserved ensembles; however, the place from which you can admire this one was unique; it seems as if it is built so that you can observe it from the river… it almost sticks out its chest in front of you 🙂
we decide to go back to the hotel, leave the bikes there and “pretend to be human” as we continue on foot; we get on the last sightseeing bus; the route passes through an up-scale neighborhood called Boavista which is filled with houses like this one
this continues for a few kilometers; there are houses fit for all different tastes…
I never thought there could be so many houses like these in the center of a big city and this continue in the inner, small streets (earlier that day we passed by some of them on our bikes)…
the city of A Coruna – the name signifies “a window” – is a huge seaport city, filled with foreigners coming down from cruise ships; it earned its name thanks to these
which have not only occupied the main facades of all the buildings on the side of the ocean but, apparently, were worth copying through the years because the newer facades have the same over-coastal window screen…
unfortunately, the first thing to be noticed are not the ten-storey facades that are a hundred years old and over but how dirty it is… it is not that the streets are dirty but all the windows of this endless glass display are covered with dust as if they have never ever been cleaned since they were built 🙁
greyish…
still, in the center and parallel to the coastline and almost next to it is this mini-park
in which there was a stage and last night some 12-13 year old kids had their first steps behind a microphone being watched by a group of grown-ups; there is an underground parking on two levels which is at least a few kilometers long below the park, under the boulevard and the buildings on it for the length of five-six blocks…
next step – Santiago de Compostela
we get there dressed for a flood due to the lead-colored sky and the occasional drizzles; our first destinations is a huge disappointment – it turns out we could look at the construction with a guide (!!!) but we arrive at 2:05 and they let people in until 2:00! Pffffffffff! You know – that library, the really big one, which is like a cut-through hill… Pf! Pf! Pf! (you can imagine me stamping angrily while sitting on my motorcycle…)
this is our next destination
a thing of extraordinary beauty, needless to say
the straight wall to the right is, actually, made of this:
(empty CD cases) and behind it there is a narrow, utilizable strip facing the street (they did not let me take pictures there, I tried), the stone heaps belong to a small park
soul food…
on the road south
the town of Vigo (it may have something to do with Stoichkov but I will let those more knowledgeable speak…)
we do a few circles but it seems that many streets are either being renovated or one way streets; in the end, we head to the place on foot; on the road… especially for Rosi
here it is – the sacred College of Architecture
naturally, the square in front of it is a construction site…
and we thought we were inventing the wheel… (somewhere among the streets of Vigo on the way out)
more to the south
all the way to the wide estuary of the river which is a border between Spain and Portugal
we leave our bags at the hotel and as light as feathers head up the mountain towards Fuenta De where there should be a cabin lift…
there are Spanish people everywhere, going out for a walk; they are peacefully waiting for tickets at a huge queue
we join the queue as well, although we would usually give up at the sight of it; after half an hour at the queue the person in the ticket booth tells us that we are going to have to wait for another two hours in order to get in… we exchanged horrified glances; we were not going to wait although we regretted our decision right away…; the cabin (a single line without supporting pillars on the way) goes somewhere up there
the rock massif is almost entirely vertical and it winds around the place the road took us at in a crescent shape; from here on, the only way is up;
on the way back, we load out bags and take the road leading west, away from the mountain
we stop for coffee at the port of Aviles
the port area is under reconstruction but the most interesting part of it was still under construction. The honorable Niemeyer:
we get back on the highway; we have decided to get to A Coruna
with this light, it does not make sense to look at Guggenheim again; we put on our raincoats and swiftly sneak out of Bilbao; there are other mountains ahead of us 🙂
the road winds along the Atlantic Ocean for a while
but soon it swirls to the left
and the weather still has this heavy feel to it but, at least, it is not raining
a black “ninja” is picking up blackberries…
up and down…
the entire day
the sky begins to clear after we have already registered at a hotel in the heart of Picos; the well-known in the motorcycle circles Potes
all that was left to do was hope for better weather tomorrow 🙂
