Showing posts with label Zurich. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Zurich. Show all posts

Friday, July 11, 2014

Quick Impressions of Zurich

While in Zurich to see Shigeru Ban's work (see previous post), I had some time to walk around. After years in the south of Europe, those sharp church spires were kind of worrisome.


I started to get into the Protestant mood inside one of the churches near my hotel (the white one in the foreground of the photo above). In the photo below, the red in the back is not a Rothko, but a weave. To my weak eyes it's just as effective. And those shadows! A good argument for white walls and no stained glass. The Artist may not be Present, but Something definitively Is:


This same church had a very interesting sun-clock.



Keeping up with the north-south schtick, I was surprised by quite a few middle-European beauties. The flaxen hair, the careless posture and awkward limbs, the fair skin, the baby fat that seems ready to ripen right through to a prompt plumptitude.




And a bit of romantic Sturm und Dram, up on the heights of the Zurich ETH, near the hospital. As he looked for solace down by the wheels, she was admiring the view of those needle-like spires over the balustrade. What on earth happened to her foot? And she's pregnant!



Whoever dumped red paint on this fellow, it's a great improvement. Another interesting couple there, off to the right. He's dressed for banking, but she's wearing cutoffs.


Many women of all ages are very sharp dressers. It seems that the sense of style of the old European bourgeoisie lives on in places like this, God bless it. I am especially rueful over quite a few bohemian-looking women in their 70s, still with their long hair, hats, jewelry and tight jeans. Is that how Joni looks now? In a different league, but remarkable nonetheless, I managed to grab a shot of this elegant lady:


And this elegant gentleman:


As well as a group of pensioners outside a café:


Finally, I am a sucker for great light effects, here on the main boutiqued shopping street, the Bahnhofstrasse. LuxuryStoreWindowGlass, as the Germans might put it, is great for these:



Wednesday, July 9, 2014

Shigeru Ban in Zurich


From AR. © Shigeru Ban Architects
For their July issue, Architectural Record sent me to Zurich to report on Shigeru Ban's Tamedia office building. You can see the full article here.

The interest of the project is its exposed timber structure of laminated Austrian spruce, which supports all seven floors:
"Workers fitted the structure together without any metal connectors whatsoever, hammering the rounded ends of the beams into place on the columns with large, soft-headed mallets."
Frm AR. © Nelly Rodriguez
I especially enjoyed getting into the details of this conceit:
"Ban treats the wood like a high-tech material... Fabricated in a shop using computer-controlled laser cutters, the structural elements include doubled cross beams with their rounded ends, oval spacer beams that run perpendicular to them, and columns, each a single piece 17 inches square that rises the full height of the building (more than 65 feet)."
"The key to the structural design ... is the joint where these three elements come together. The oval spacer beams fit through oval holes in the ends of the cross beams, fixing them to either side of each column. The oval shape is crucial, because it produces a rigid "grip" joint rather than a weaker "pin" joint that a circular connector would create...."
Frm AR. © Shigeru Ban Architects
Inside Job
A finely crafted timber office building for a Swiss media company makes a strong statement from within
Tamedia Offices, Zurich by Shigeru Ban
Architectural Record
July 2014
Frm AR. © Nelly Rodriguez

From AR © Didier Boy De La Tour

Lobby, cardboard tube furniture by Shigeru Ban. Photo DC
See my next blog entry for photos from around Zurich.