La La land? Dubai 2010

It is our last morning of our whistle stop visit to Dubai, and it is off to sample some more of the city’s delights with a friend who lives in the City, and hearing the stories of how crazy everything was getting before the bubble burst, it was like La-La-land she tells us, I have no idea where La-La-land is...Hollywood, dream state, out of touch with reality perhaps, either way I think the term sums it up beautifully.

It seems that everything to do in Dubai involves going to a mall, in this case the Dubai Mall, I would say slightly more upmarket than the Mall of the Emirates, in fact probably as upmarket as it gets, here the same designer shops are accommodated in a more sophisticated, designed environment, an environment of exquisite minimalism that complements the exhibits in the shops. In the middle of a huge drum-like space stands a model of one of Dubai’s next mega projects, ‘The Dubai Pearl’ a cluster of tacky ornamented towers centred around what resembles a huge glass cube, 70 storeys high with 6 towers combined together by  a 3 storey deck at the top that links all 6. All have planted roofs and are sitting in a lush landscape inside a circular 10 lane highway...

Heading away this vision of the future, it is time to sit outside a coffee shop and enjoy a late breakfast in an environment that is so new that it is still in a state of frantic activity. The centrepiece is the tower that I said resembled Frank Lloyd Wright’s Mile high tower proposal for Chicago when viewed from a distance, in fact it is only half the height, but at 830m, 163 floors is still the world’s tallest building, designed by Chicago Architects SOM, the tower that we all now know as the Burj Khalifa. A walk along the base reveals that work is still very much underway...stainless steel and planar glass viewed across a silver stone plaza with newly transplanted palm trees behind a flimsy barrier of traffic cones and red and white tape fluttering in the breeze.  I had heard that if you book far enough in advance that there are guided tours to the observation deck, think I’ll wait until it is open.

Looking up towards the spire with the sun glinting off the silver facade I cannot help but be awed by the sheer scale of what is being undertaken here.  Panning round the base two towers at Boulevard Plaza that are familiar from the Aedas portfolio are nearing completion. The Khalifa lake with the Dubai Fountain, resembling the Las Vegas Bellagio fountain from the ‘on a day like today’ video from the flight in now stands dormant.  The lake front is lined by arabesque low rise blocks whist the glass towers of downtown Dubai that could have been transplanted from New York, Chicago, Hong Kong... form the backdrop to make this a truly spectacular if not surreal setting.

Stepping back inside the mall to see a fish tank, not just any fish tank, the Dubai Aquarium is the largest acrylic fish tank in the world 20 metres high, 48 metres long, teeming with life, sharks and rays swim among shoals of a whole variety of species and two scuba divers!

The final stop is at Burj al Arab, well, not exactly at the Burj Al Arab, because nobody is allowed onto the island without a booking, so it is a case of standing by the barrier to the causeway having tourist photos taken with the tower in the background, a golf buggy appears from across the causeway to drop off guests at the gatehouse, Tom Wright’s elegant white tower said to based on the sail of a Dhow stands serenely against a what has become a deep blue sky, framed by date palms and a stop sign. Alas the experience of crossing the causeway is one that will have to wait until another day.

Having spent a day and a half in the city, I am impressed by what has been achieved, even though I cannot understand the craziness that has resulted in its current state, the race to be bigger and better than anywhere else has driven our techical abilities to extremes to essentially create something out of nothing.  I mean who had heard of Dubai twenty years ago? other than potentially a transfer point on long haul flights, now like it or not it is a global destination with it’s culture derived from glossy magazines, designer brands and a sense of keeping up with the Jones’s taken to extreme.

Skiing...In the Desert??? Dubai 2010

Friday, our only full day in Dubai on this trip, and the Metro is closed, well until 2.30 anyway...So it is a taxi ride to the Mall of the Emirates, setting out mid-morning onto the empty ten lane highway that was the continual mass of Range Rovers and all manner of other high end cars...Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche...the oil refinery in the distance that was sparsely illuminated last evening is now a series of grey towers in the haze, still an oil refinery from this distance, with the exception of one tower stretching high up above the others like a very fine spire resembling Frank Lloyd Wright's 'Mile high tower' proposed for Chicago in 1956.

Passing the shells of the dormant metro, a huge sloping 'shed' appears on the left side of the highway, from in between the nondescript towers. A loop off the highway and to the underground drop off that forms the front door to the what was briefly the worlds largest mall and a demonstration of the ability of developers to create an alternate reality inside a huge, huge air-conditioned container. On entering the mall it has very much the characteristics of any other mall that has been opened in the past decade, elements of Bluewater in Kent, or Birmingham's Bull Ring are installed here from the same global branding manuals that exist for all these retailers.

Along the mall past all the usual suspects that appear in these malls and a glass wall reveals the unique selling point...snow! complete with Alpine ski lodge, ski lifts, bobsleigh run and a whole rabble of people dressed for winter conditions skiing down the slopes between the pine trees, to complete the illusion of an Alpine ski resort. Outside the glass wall in a comfortable 22 degrees, groups of Arabs shoot video of the people playing on the inside.

Some facts from the Ski Dubai website: the indoor park covers some 3000 square metres, is the equivalent of twenty five stories high and is some 80 metres wide. This is the world's largest indoor ski park and boasts 5 runs including a 400m black run, and apparently is home to a number of penguins although I did not know you found penguins in the Alps. It is January but it is 28 degrees outside, -2 on the inside due to super insulation of the external envelope in walls that are 5 metres thick, the temperature drops to -6 at nights and new snow is generated every night, as the 'old' snow melts it is used to cool the rest of the mall, and eventually to irrigate the gardens. It may seem inappropriate, frivolous or just plain insane to build a ski dome in the desert, but as a technical achievement this has to be nothing short of amazing.

Moving on from the Alps in a giant cool box, the Virgin Megastore in all its glory, sadly now missing from the UK cities, a fine representation of what a music store should be, selling everything from CD's, DVD's, band merchandise, and guitars, basses, drums along with some of the kit you need to play in your own band. Into Milano, or at least a plastic reproduction of some of the galleria that define the medieval quarter of Milano, that accommodates the Italian designer names, a seeming contradiction between the high design of the products in the shops and the artificial design of the container. The Gold Souk, clusters all the jewelry shops together in a reproduction of Mid town Manhattan minus the yellow cabs and Empire State building, except the shops are owned by Arabs.

Having spent a day in an alternate reality, it is time to experience the reality of getting back to the apartment using the public transportation system that is so new to this city, the Metro. The route from the Mall to the Metro station is something of a back route out of the Mall, an air conditioned pedestrian bridge threads its way past blank facades to one of the iconic golden shells that define the project. The sun has set without much of a fanfare, no orange glow, just a gradual darkening of the sky, and the towers become sihouettes against the fading light.

The train arrives into the  shell, with its first car dedicated to ladies only, so alighting into the second car which allows mixed couples and families, it is a smooth and efficient journey back to Al Mankhool. As the towers pass by something does not seem to add up, I know it is the weekend but even so the expected cool glow of office blocks bathed in light that defines a buzzing metropolis are lacking, only the standard red lights that define the pinnacles and refuge floors of the blocks. Then it occurs to that these towers were built in the rush of a booming economy, the bubble has burst and the towers stand empty.

The incomplete stations that I had investigated the night before pass by with smooth regularity until the Metro goes to ground and our destination is reached, in the cool blue glow of the underground station, an escalator ride to the surface brings us out into a smaller golden shell, which is one of four at each corner of a large crossroads, with my sleeping ten-month-old daughter in my arms this is no time to walk back to the apartment especially when not exactly sure where it is. So hailing a Dubai taxi, all climbing in to find probably the only cab driver that does not know his way around, proceeding to tell us it is only his second day in the job, strangely we reach the apartments quickly after a pulled out the leaflet with the address on, having exited the cab, noticed lost wallet, reported it to taxi company colleagues, only to find said taxi cabbie was still lost, so flagged him down on his second pass of the block, wallet retrieved ...goodnight La-La-land!

Range Rover Grand Prix - Dubai 2010

I have been flying in and out of Dubai for a number of years but have never stopped to experience the city. I have watched the 'On a Day Like Today' video (using the Bryan Adams song as the soundtrack) shown on Emirates Flights as they approach the city on numerous occasions. The promotional video shows amazing dancing fountains, pristine glass towers immaculate beaches, clear deep blue seas, cloudless blue skies, dramatic dunescapes and sunsets and the high end 'designer' lifestyle that permits one to enjoy it. Flying in over the Persian Gulf, the fabled Palm Islands become visible along with Tom Wright's distinctive Burj Al Arab Hotel on its own little island, and into Perkins and Will's impressive new 'Emirates' terminal, where there must be people of every nationality on the Planet, this really feels like a global hub.

On exiting the terminal through a vast immigration hall and into a 'pleasant' 28 degrees, not bad for January, with hazy a afternoon sky. The drive in the taxi joins the highway to be cut up by a Range Rover, and the driver remarks that they all drive like this here, in fact there are Range Rovers everywhere most of them sporting all the 'bling', living in Solihull, I had often wondered where they all end up when leaving the plant on the back of car transporters...and here they are. The roads feel new, as though placed there only yesterday, the intersections, flyovers that usually are merely functional, have an elegant sculptural quality and the concrete looks pristine, not because it weathers well in  this environment, but because it is painted in a cream colour that reflects the light.

As the sun dips towards the horizon more sculptures form dramatic silhouettes in the haze, those being the shell roofs of the metro stations that I am already familiar with in a sense as my employer at the time, Aedas have been working on them for the past three years and I have watched with interest as the team have developed the kit of parts that is currently being employed, having only previously seen them in in models and renderings in the London Office.

By the time we reach our apartments, home for the next two days, it is dark so the next view of the city is by night. Setting out from Golden Sands in the Al Mankhool district, vaguely near to the Dubai Creek, with a good friend of mine it is a walk with no map generally in the direction of the towers, that from this distance resemble an oil refinery with coloured lights picking out key elements. Having crossed Sheikh Zayed Road, a highway that must be at least ten lanes wide, more Range Rovers in a kind of Range Rover Grand Prix make the crossing quite an experience, electing not to even attempt the crossing directly, it is quite a walk to the traffic lights alongside the starting grid, even though the lights are on red it is more than a leisurely run across the first five lanes because as soon as amber show, they are off, apparently there is a minimum speed limit of 60kph, which they all seem to observe religiously.

Having successfully negotiated the first stage of the Grand Prix the most direct route seems to be along some residential roads, lined with villas behind walls with lush green planting poking over the top, past a mosque with what must be the largest empty surface car park I have ever seen. The oil refinery starts to fragment as we move closer taking on the form of individual towers, the pavement that we are walking on abruptly ceases to exist and trying to walk without dodging the traffic involves walking through sand pits that are laid out with plastic irrigation pipes, clearly awaiting the arrival of planting for the pipes to feed. A small wedge of pavement appears and a group of Asian workers wait in an air conditioned bus shelter for an air conditioned bus which actually resembles a National Express coach more than a city bus. The next encounter with the Grand Prix is the Trade Centre Roundabout, where the window between red and amber is smaller and the run becomes a sprint across the road.

Heading along the Sheikh Zayed Road, a kind of Las Vegas Strip in reverse, where the buildings but up to the road and the parking lots are at the rear, it is as though Fifth Avenue has been transplanted from Manhattan Island, as many of the blocks resemble the 1920's skyscrapers that define New York, there are new additions of course, some are bland glass towers, others forms strange shapes for no other reason than because they can. The traffic along the strip is light for a Thurdsay Night (this is the same as a Friday night in the 'Western' World), passing a hotel lobby that is sitting in the middle of a construction site, another of the ubiquitous Range Rovers pulls up and out totter two women in sky-high heels trying to elegantly make an entrance into the hotel bar across the sand and broken paving.

The lights in the distance that once looked like a nearby oil refinery seem to be moving ever further away, as the distance opens up after passing three metro stations, which must be at 1000m intervals, it is time to take a break (a fruit juice at Costa, costing a princely sum of Eight Pounds), and head back. The metro has recently opened, but many of the stations seem to be in a state of work in progress, some accessible, others marooned on a sand island behind flimsy traffic barriers. A quick look at one that is open, reveals just how large the whole project is, inside a sloping golden shell and up the escalator to the footbridge that crosses the strip, an enclosed tube that is strangely familiar to me, the last time it was on my computer screen, in a SketchUp model that I was preparing for a concourse on another railway station entirely, the power of collaborative working. The project that I was working on was a demonstration project, so was never likely to be built, but here it is in the place I least expected it, great!

Having experienced a small part of Dubai on the ground at night I am intrigued to find out what it is like by day, which towers those distant lights belong to and is the Metro really open...

The Beaubourg Experiment? Paris 1995

Following on from my previous post on Archigram, this is an account of my first encounter with what could be argued as the legacy of Archigram, some architectural books make reference to being a manifestation of Peter Cook's Plug-in City, having read about the project extensively I would say that it represents far more than that. From the terrace of the Sacre Coeur (Basilica of the Sacred Heart), the Parisian roofscape stretches out for miles into a vast, diverse panorama, the bustle of the densely packed streets seems far removed from here. In amongst the slate rooftops a splash of blue interrupts the scene, it’s not new in fact it has been part of the scene for over twenty years. The splash of blue nestling between the rooftops belongs to the air conditioning and ventilation ducting of Centre Pompidou. The legendary product of the union of Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers.

On the approach from the sloping piazza with its huge white, steel air intakes that would not look out of place aboard an ocean liner. There was an artist offering to draw caricatures for 500 Francs or some price that I could not afford at the time, however there were some good sketches of Mick Jagger and David Bowie. The Piazza was otherwise populated by clusters of students much the same as our party, looking, examining, taking photographs. I don’t remember exactly which day of the week it was, but there is one day a week that all the Parisian Museums are closed for cleaning, all of them on the same day!

Unfortunately the day that we picked to go to Beaubourg, was ‘cleaning day’. The fabled escalator tubes that climb diagonally skywards across the East facade were stood dormant; the only people within the tubes were indeed the cleaners. So the arguably, best experience that Paris has to offer for free was unavailable to the public. The ‘building’, ‘Centre Nationale de Arts et de Culture de Georges Pompidou (CNAC)’ that I had understood as the Pompidou  Centre or simply Pompidou, was one that I knew was an‘inside out’ building to allow for the interior to be arranged freely and rearranged at will.

However, a close inspection from ground level. The huge white steel columns, the elaborate system of cross bracing and tension rods, the dramatic, skeletal, highly crafted cantilevers known as gerberettes, seemingly supporting the escalators, raised enough interest for me to be reading books and asking questions for a very long time. At the northern end of the piazza, adjacent the entrance to the escalator tube, the concept of supporting great indeterminate floor spaces becomes apparent with the full depth of the building visible, the sheer size of the trusses that span from front to back, 48 metres to be precise. The whole mechanism that holds these beams in place is illustrated immaculately at full scale. The East facade, on the Rue de Renard presents a completely different picture from the one of the West facade. The elaborate of cluster of ventilation ducts, supply pipes threaded in around the structure. The structural bays almost hidden beneath the services, being defined by the cross bracing, each bay slightly different, air conditioning in one, passenger lifts in another. The issue of addressing urban context with such a large building is well resolved, the components give a varied level of interest and incident to all of the 'facades' which address the cafes that sit opposite.

At the time of my visit the colours of the external ductwork were not so strident, faded and partially hidden beneath a thick layer of grime and pigeon droppings. But somehow the used look permits it to ‘fit in’ to the tight grain of Paris as though it had always been there. The dull April sky made for some moody images as the escalator tubes and the skeletal frame become silhouetted against the cloud filtered sunlight, has been an enduring image that completely changed the course of my studies in architecture.

Paris 1995

The Monty Python of Architecture? 1998

This post is about a major influence in my architectural education: Archigram. I made a brief reference to Archigram in New York in an earlier post ‘The Final Approach -...New York Part 5 ‘...where the work of the six was exhibited in different locations throughout the city...Columbia University, Cooper Union, and the part that I did experience in the metropolis Ron Herron’s work in the Storefront.  The intention was always to follow up with a post about the complete exhibition as viewed earlier in the year in Manchester.

In terms of Architectural education, 1998 was the ‘fifth year’ being the first one back in full time education after the degree and ‘year-out’ in practice, which for me is when architecture was its most fun, study was its most experimental and the mood in the studio was at its most diverse and collaborative. This post is based on a piece that was originally written for the school publication ‘BARC’ the student magazine produced by my colleages in ‘Archaos’ the Birmingham School of Architecture student society. The journey into the world of Archigram was made by myself and Darren Staples who has been a partner in crime over the years, and it is his entry in the visitor book at the exhibition that gave me the title for this post, and it was the discussions about our impressions of the exhibition and Manchester in general that was written on the train on the return journey.

Archigram: six guys, Warren Chalk, Dennis Crompton, Peter Cook, David Greene, Ron Herron, Michael Webb, actually they preceded Monty Python, but anarchic in their approach to architectural discourse in the way that Monty Python are seen as anarchic in their approach to comedy.  I had read about Archigram during the degree and this was the first time that the any of work was exhibited since 1970., and the first time that it was all exhibited together.

On arrival at Manchester Piccadilly on the train from Birmingham,  it is a ‘Groundhog Day’ Situation,  is almost as though we never left…’Millies Cookies’ is still the cookie shop at the end of the concourse. The concourse itself is out of the same design manual as the one at New Street. Most definitely part of the same modernisation plan of the rail network in the 1960’s. outside the station the walk down to Piccadilly has the same feel as walking down Smallbrook Queensway, long sinuous office block following the curve of the road, with the same kind of shops in the base, only with subtle differences, ‘Greggs’ instead of ‘Braggs’, the bakers, the graphics are the same just the spelling is different.

In search of the RIBA bookshop to purchase tickets and find out where the exhibition is located, is a second feeling of deja vu, strangely enough the RIBA bookshop is located on Portland Street, which bears a close resemblance to its London Address, being Portland Place. We did find the bookshop but found it hiding behind some mad façade, scaffolding tubes, toe boards, signage, plastic screens, and it had been deconstructed and reconstructed next door to where we expected to find it.

The visit revealed that the Cornerhouse Gallery was actually almost next to Piccadilly Station. Having retraced our steps the search of Archigram took us down a back street between Victorian warehouses, tall walls of repetitive openings cast iron beams, peeling paintwork, rust, broken window panes, with some areas filled with studio units and small light industrial units; to a triangular brick building on the corner, ‘The Cornerhouse’ with a huge banner hanging down the facade inviting us to ‘Zoom up into a New World’  So zooming up into the Cornerhouse Gallery, well more of a walk up the stairs really, and wow! Let’s just stand here a moment and take it all in

The exhibition titled ‘Archigram: Experimental Architecture 1961 – 71’, completely fills the gallery, there are banners hanging from the roof trusses with the slogans that originally appeared in the Archigram broadsheets, and magazines. The walls are completely lined are with drawings preserved behind a layer of Perspex.

Walking Cities covers an entire wall, drawn in immaculate detail on A0 sheets showing the workings of a  machine that is self sufficient and can plug into anywhere, New York, the Sahara desert, and then move on to its next location.

On the floor: models of Instant Cities made up of a combination of trucks, capsules and hot air balloons. Plug-in Paddington East, Living pod, Cushicle, Monte Carlo Entertainments complex are exhibited in Perspex cases like rare finds in a museum, well maybe they are, and they are certainly treasures. It is pure commitment to illustrate the group’s thinking of the contemporary condition, (circa 1968). Entire exhibitions: ‘This is Tomorrow’ and ‘Living City’ for example are arranged in all their glory, images montages critique of the modern age, and reluctance of people to embrace new ideas, ‘It is all the same’ seemingly relevant today considering the Groundhog Day reference earlier. Some of the presentation techniques looking like cartoons from the Beatles movies,  giving a sense of being there through pop culture even though I was not born at the time. The exhibition captures the mood of optimism in the future from a 1960’s perspective with the ideas still looking and sounding fresh and very much still relevant reinforced by Ron Herron’s Imagination headquarters built in 1990 proudly sitting alongside the unbuilt projects.

A blacked out space at the back corner, with images and slogans being projected onto and through muslin screens hanging from the ceiling bring the ideas to life, far too many ideas to be comprehended in a single visit. Happily there are books that were produced to coincide with the exhibition, and having made my purchase of ‘Concerning Archigram’ there will be time to explore the ideas more fully.On signing the visitors book all I could write was ‘truly amazing!’ and on leaving I don’t think I will ever see so many great ideas in the same place again.

On leaving the Cornerhouse and returning to the contemporary of 1998, I cannot help but feel depressed by the environment, and the view of the city is one framed by the feeling of missed opportunities as real life took a different direction. On exploring the city, the recent addition of trams and the tram lines in the public paved areas give the city centre a European feel, it seems strange how European cities did not remove all their old tram networks and we in England are now striving to discover what was lost during the 1960’s. The feeling is reinforced by the 1980’s architecture...neo-classical or neo-Victorian Gothic decorated facade on the front, and blank brick walls to the sides, facade and pump up the volume. In contrast, the Arndale Centre, bombed by the IRA in 1996 now hidden behind rusting corrugated sheet hoarding.

A road too far and a bridge to nowhere...Having flicked though some of the Architectural magazines at the time, I had seen images of the regeneration of Salford quays and a dramatic footbridge as a centrepiece, which for some reason I had associated with Chris Wilkinson, and also attending a lecture by 1996 Stirling Prize Winner, Stephen Hodder, for Centenary Building at Salford University, there was a sense of something happening. On making the long walk from the city centre the journey comes to the end of a back road, where there is indeed a white skeletal steel bridge spanning the river Irwell, linking Manchester to Salford, a plaque on the bridge reveals that it is the Trinity Bridge by Dr Santiago Calatrava opened in 1995. The bridge itself comprises a deck suspended on cables from a single spire, with cracked paving slabs and graffiti applied to the base of the main steel members. marking the regeneration of the much neglected waterfront  area, as it stands it is at majestically spans the river to land of timber hoardings with a narrow path leading between them apparently to nowhere, evidently the regeneration of Salford has not caught up with the bridge yet.

On making the journey back to Piccadilly, the impression of the city improves from one of stark contrast to the optimism of Archigram, there are many civic buildings like there are Birmingham, only bigger and more of them, giving a sense of pride in city, and the overall  impression of Manchester is one of city coming alive and well worth another visit.

No Photos...Parc de la Villette - 1995

In my view no photos can do justice to this masterpiece in design, Bernard Tschumi's Cinematic promenade that was completed in 1987. The point grid of folies that define the structure of the park cannot be captured in a single frame, except from a hot air balloon perhaps, along with the lines being the elevated walkways that bind the elements together and the surfaces, the individual parks that combine to make up the whole. The only way to appreciate the project is to walk along the lines, climb on the folies and experience it on the ground. As an architecture student as I was in 1995, the tendency was to concentrate on the folies, particularly with the emphasis on them in the architecture books that could be found in the university library.

Over the years I have been telling students and colleagues about what an amazing place I think it is, but up until now I have not attempted to articulate all of those thoughts in a single piece. Now with my attention on the transformation of Olympic Park at Stratford, soon to become the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, I cannot help casting my memory back to my experience of La Villette some 18 years ago. For me the similarities are obvious: both have transformed industrial wasteland areas of city that would not ordinarily be considered as prime areas for redevelopment; and now in post games mode Stratford will start its new life as a park with indeterminate future events that can continue to reinforce the park's identity, which is how La Villette was envisaged at the outset.

Along with about 25 of my fellow Architecture students I took photographs of everything, from folies, reflections, shadows trying to compose images, but on having those films processed it was clear to me that my 36 exposures did not in any way capture the experience. I am ashamed to say that in the subsequent 18 years the opportunity has not presented itself to return so this is a piece based wholly on memory of my journey through the park in as it existed in 1995.

The first view was from the coach travelling along the motorway into Paris on our journey from Perry Barr, la Geode, a giant silver sphere that was not in the Architecture books, dominates the scene along with the expected red folies, serving to whet the appetite for the visit in the coming days. The actual arrival at the Park is at the front of Rice Francis Ritchies' (RFR) La Cite des Sciences (Museum of Science and Industry). Huge blue steel trusses, frame less glass boxes sitting in reflective water pools, fountains, immaculate stainless steel railings, very clean concrete and an old school briefing about what time we need to be back on the coach. A red steel frame leaning at a strange angle to the side of the entry plaza represents the first glimpse of Tschumi's fabled follies.

On crossing the entry bridge into the La Cite des Sciences, into a phenomenal space, some four to five storeys high, more of the huge steel trusses, a tent roof covers the central atrium, click! click! click! frame less glass joints, with stainless steel fixings are everywhere click! click! click! escalators climb through the atrium, glass sides, nothing new, glass sides to the lower section, with black steel truss and all the mechanism visible, have not seen that before, click! click! click!On crossing the entry bridge into the La Cite des Sciences, into a phenomenal space, some four to five storeys high, more of the huge steel trusses, a tent roof covers the central atrium, click! click! click! frameless glass joints, with stainless steel fixings are everywhere click! click! click! escalators climb through the atrium, glass sides, nothing new, glass sides to the lower section, with black steel truss and all the mechanism visible, have not seen that before, click! click! click!

On exiting the atrium towards the park, La Goede, absolutely no photographs can capture this click! click! click! anyway. But aside from the distorted reflection of the La Cite des Sciences behind, it is not only the visual that makes this so impressive, it is the aural!  It is a serene environment, where it is tempting to sit on the wall of the square pool that contains the sphere and get lost in the sound. I was told that the sound is created from a single sound wave being directed at the sphere and bouncing off surrounding surfaces, I don't know it it is true but the atmosphere it creates is impressive, the watery echoes would not sound out of place at a Pink Floyd concert.

Moving on into the park, L'Argonaute, a submarine! I did not know Paris was on the sea! Here we have a submarine compeletely out of place yet is sitting in a dry dock with one of the red folies acting as it's entrance pavilion.

A bit about the folies: each one is based on an enamelled red steel 10,8m cube laid out on a grid at 120m centres, each one different, some forming a more complete cube than others, elements have been removed, others have been added in a process of 'deconstruction' borrowed from film editing techniques; each frame changing slightly from the previous so that the image moves when viewed in succession. I have read multiple interpretations ranging from each folie being a 'deconstruction' of Le Corbusier's Buildings, another being an interpretation of Russian Constructivism to another being a physical manifestation of Tschumi's 'Manhattan Transcripts' a theoretical project ranging from 1976 to 1981 where abstract drawings are used to represent events that have happened. My interpretation from reading them on the ground? all could be true, there is certainly a passing resemblence to Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye in one, others do resemble imagery that originated in the Russian Constructivist movement, and sure the Manhattan Transcripts could inform the whole or even individual folies. Others resemble machines from the industrial revolution or even before, one contains a water wheel. As with all art and scuplture, each is open to individual interpretation and can be read as being purely built for pleasure at the same time as a statement on twentieth century culture, showing traces of past events that have caused us to be where we are today.

What makes these special for me is that each one is big enough to be a building, some contain program such as coffee shops, others are great to climb on, a spiral stair leads to nowhere except give an elevated view of the park, and what a view! this park is enormous! A canal runs through the middle of it, which at this moment has a barge loaded with sand making its way across the panorama. Bridges cross the canal one in a formal manner, making one of the 'lines' an elevated walkway that runs the length of the park, crossing a second that runs the width of the park. The second bridge crosses the river in an entirely playful manner, black steel structure that twists and curves its way across like a roller coaster whilst effortlessly carrying an aluminium deck into one of the folies to make the descent back to the ground. Walking along the promenade that runs alongside the canal the elevated walkway seems to float as very slender leaning columns meet the ground and disappear into the background. Moving on towards that background a football match is in progress on the immaculate green, whilst to the side appears to be a model of the Sydney harbour bridge, but on closer inspection part of a huge bike wheel buried in the ground, and over there is half a saddle, and there is the handlebar with a bell, it is as though a giant kid has chucked their bike down an gone off to play, and whilst they were playing the ground rose.

Outside a folly a bunch of steel chairs a strange angles stick out of the ground as though forming a bizarre cafe. Heading back through the gardens, some sunken, one of which bamboo climbs from a bed of gravel though a network of steel cables stretching from side to side at odd angles to define the 'ground' plane. Another plane appears to be formed of springboards, it seems that everywhere there is something different to play on, each space has a different character, and if you get lost it is easy to use the folies as orientation devices to find the way back, and on doing just that it is clear that there is far too much to take in during a brief single visit. What I did manage to take in has stayed with me, two hours spent in a most amazing place where time simply disappeared.

On leaving the experience of La Villette of 1995 and returning to the present, just a word to the nay-sayers: Parc de la Villette attracts 8-10 million visitors each year depending on which source you read and that is without having a hugely successful Olympic Games to kick start it's existence.

1000 views

The blog has just passed 1000 views since August 2012, 1000 views I guess that does not necessarily mean that people are reading it but for those who are, thanks and hope you are enjoying it. There is much more to follow.

Manama April 2013