Temppeliaukio Kirkko

I have quickly come to cherish my weekends here in Helsinki. A time to unwind from the week, sleep in, and explore new areas of the city. Trying to keep my last semester's resolution of Saturday = Funday (which is important as I am in Funland, or so my brother calls it), every Saturday I make an effort to see something new.

Yesterday's cold and rain kept me inside most of the day, but late in the afternoon, Kelley, Amanda and I went to Temppeliaukio Kirkko (The Rock Church), which is a short few blocks from our hostel. When we arrived we found out there was a wedding in progress, and the church would only be open for a few minutes in between events. A hoard of visitors pushed their way in as soon as was allowable, and I quickly followed suite - pushing my way in to glimpse the highly anticipated space. Although our time inside was brief, I was captivated by the various textures inside the church: rock, copper, wood, and glass, underlined by the various forms of light within the space, not wanting to leave as we were virtually kicked out no more than 10 minutes later for the day's next event.

Looking up toward the copper ceiling.

Candlelight flickering along the rock wall.

We Whatever (Smile?) in the Face of Adversity

The group of us left campus today around 6 to get our much anticipated bikes. The ride from Domus (our summer hostel) to school is about six miles, so we all decided to get bikes to take a scenic route along the water - most of us, I think, were envisioning a sort of Von Trapp family scenario, minus the matching drapery uniform (because we sure do sing). Used bikes had been reserved for us, so after much testing and debate, we left the shop in a herd, eager to map out our bike route home.

After triumphantly haggling down my bike's price, about ten minutes from the (now closed) shop, my back tire literally exploded. As bikes are not allowed on buses, Kristin offered to walk with me home. So, we naively trotted along, no biggie.

I should have guessed it was a long walk when we stopped at a dog park to ask a gentlemen directions, and he commented, "Why do you want to go to Helsinki?!" My response, "because we live there," followed by him bewildered and telling us it was 10 kilometers away. Well, turns out, we were more like 10 miles away, and spent the next 3+ hours walking home. Thank goodness the weather was really nice today, there were a lot of interesting buildings to look at, and Kristin decided to keep me company. All in the name of not abandoning my great deal.

Definitely looking forward to the weekend...

Blissfully ignorant about an hour into our walk.

The Poetry of Space

After traveling through "the woods" since May 26th, we finally returned to Helsinki last week and were gifted our first free weekend to settle in and do some much needed laundry. Saturday afternoon, several of the graduate students walked to the Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, designed by Steven Holl. After spending last semester reading a lot of Steven Holl's ideas on Phenomenology, I was anxious to experience a work of his. The experience greatly surpassed my expectations. While I have never thought myself to be a great writer, even the best, I think, would lack sufficient words to describe the poetry of space in Kiasma. Light, shadow, texture, color, materiality, undulating forms and movement - a place I will no doubt return to many times while in Helsinki.

Skateboarder paradise near the cafe entrance.

Entry Hall from second floor.

A stunning exhibit by Denise Grunstein.

Textured concrete made by wood forms - a nod to Finnish culture.

Rear auditorium wall wrapped in cerulean velvet panels, asking to be touched.

Arrival

Sean, Mike, Kay and I arrived in Helsinki Tuesday night to join a group of 12 students from UT. After feeling mildly lost, we finally found Scott Wall (the program's head), who promptly gave us a map of the city, and instructed us to find our way to the hostel. After a long day of traveling, it was nice to finally arrive and meet the group - after dinner we had a "scavenger hunt" to orient ourselves in Helsinki. Our group of course got lost, but it was fun - you'd never know it was so late as at midnight it still looked like a typical night at 8pm. The Finns were out in abundance as well, enjoying the light they missed through the dark winter.

Wednesday morning we had a short orientation to the Otaniemi Campus (where we'll have class for the summer), which is a beautiful campus with amazing facilities. The wood shop alone would make the best carpenter salivate, and the shop itself has a sauna on the ground floor (sauna is that important to the Finnish culture). Then we left for Kiljava, an hour's bus ride away, to become better acquainted with each other and start learning the traditional Finnish measurement skills to document our summer project. The past few days have consisted of good food, company, a lot of dimensioning and drawing, and Jari Jetsonen teaching us important Finnish phrases - from the words "thank you" and "sweat" to "greetings from my ass" (apparently what you'd say if someone's work was not good). It's been a lot of fun - probably not entirely reflective of the work load to come, but fun nonetheless.

We left Kiljava this morning, and are now several hours and bus rides away in Kauttua, where we will be for 4 - 5 days, documenting a terraced house Alvar Aalto designed. We just arrived a few hours ago, and everyone rushed straight away to their rooms, as we finally have internet access again. We are just getting started making dinner together, then will relax before starting the big group project tomorrow morning.

The group - outside the SAFA (Society of Finnish Architects) - our first stop in Kiljava.

Our house in Kiljava - photo taken around 10 pm.

Early drawings at the old sauna to practice measuring/group documentation.

Sauna time before dinner - cooling off in the lake.

My favorite house in Kiljava - of course it's the one with the yellow door.

Experiences of Water

With the first year of school under my belt, I wanted to post my final project for the 502 studio. The first half the semester we did an urban design project (mixed use commercial/residential building on 14th and W Streets NW), and while I liked the project, our second project for the semester really resonated with me. We were given two potential sites on the Potomac River in DC, and were to design a boathouse. One of the sites was just west of the Key Bridge, an urban, compact area with a fast change of grade. I, however, landed the other site, west of Georgetown, with a gradual sloping terrain and more remote location.

This semester for my theory class, I did a ton of research on phenomenology and architecture, which snowballed into a great interest in perception. In fact, over Easter, I went to the Hirshhorn, and saw an exhibit of Josef Albers and Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, and was really inspired by their pure geometric forms and how they manipulated perception of said forms, which eventually would influence my decision to use multiple buildings of simple forms.

My concept began with the movement of water, fast versus slow, which translated itself into active versus restful programmatic areas. Using water to indicate path, my project explored circulation, and crossing thresholds into various levels of rest. The visitor to the boathouse would "enter" through the information center, and have different options along the path: either head straight down to the boathouse along the main path (the "fast" movement), or cross a water channel at various points along the way to experience the dwelling units, spa, community room or cafe (the "slow" experiences).

I spent much of my time working on the dwelling units. From crossing the threshold on the path, one would take a bridge along a pool that all of the units floated on. This larger body of water mimicked the canal and Potomac, indicating a slower, more restful zone of the project. Upon entry into a dwelling unit, the viewer would experience a linear continuation of water which raked down the sloping terrain. This experience of water was underlined by the rain shower created on axis with this flow of water - reiterating the idea of water and path.

My first experience with water color paper and water colors - a lot of fun, but a lot of work. Here is my site plan and a section of the site.

Plan of project. Entry is on the right, and as the visitor walks down the path, experiences the dwelling units, spa, and finally the community room and cafe walking towards the dock.

Various programmatic areas blown up drawn in plan, section, and perspective.

32nd scale massing model of the buildings and how they related to the site.

Quarter scale dwelling unit from river side. Channel of water was to flow from pool down terrain.

Dwelling unit from entry side along bridge.

Interior of dwelling unit. Rain shower was between skylights, along the path of the water channel down the site.

Girls with Glasses

So my posts have been dwindling as the semester winds down - three more weeks to go! As much as I'm ready for it to be over, I have a mountain of work to get done in that time, so it's a little stressful as well. But the exciting part getting me through is I'll be done with my first year of grad school AND then be off to Finland for the summer - that's some pretty serious motivation.

I ran across this last night while perusing my usual blogs, and I had to post about it, as a fellow girl with glasses. Not exactly sure what the show is going to consist of, but I loved the theme song and accompanying animation. Reason still to be taking more photos...

I Am A Girl - The Girls With Glasses Theme Song from The Girls With Glasses on Vimeo.

Film Inspiration

Eric (my brother) posted some film he shot lately, and it's definitely inspiring me to keep using my Holga (and finally get my finished rolls developed)...