stephanieNY

This is an amazing thought for about 4 1/2 seconds.  Mmmmmm:

Dreamy thoughts of soft sand on your feet quickly squashed by uncomfortable thoughts of sand in your couch.  

In my internet searches on the BC/BS building in Boston (from my previous post), I came across these drawings of Rudolf's... 

mmmm....

I'm completely envious and enamored.  As I started paying off my mega-loans this week and have exercised very very minimal amounts of actual design and creativity at work, I've been a bit (and temporarily) irritated by the course of the architecture profession (and education).  I want to make drawings like this, real DRAWings...and make buildings like 133 Federal.  But I can't, because it's not 1960.  Ho-hum.

...so how did I miss this building all these years?  

I took a wrong turn today and walked right into this beaut, 133 Federal Street.  Some google research revealed that it's the original Blue Cross/Blue Shield building by Paul Rudolph in 1957.  Even though it's a bit tucked away among the newer, taller buildings of the Financial District, I can't believe I've never seen it before.  

1957-ish:

For reference, Paul designed the more salient Government Service Center in Boston years later:

Boston's modernist and brutalist buildings always seem to be in danger of destruction, I'm sure due to their sticky public reception.  According to this NYT article, the BC/BS building was slated for demolition in 2007.  Since I saw it standing there today, three years later, I'm hoping they've since decided get off its back.

I've been working on my portfolio for the past few days, which requires sifting through my hard drive of semesters of work. Some of it makes me cringe and some of it makes me laugh, and that which doesn't do either has a chance of making it in. This one made me laugh.  I made it at the beginning of my housing studio.  I like it.

Apparently, there was a chance that Roger Waters was going to be a critic on my final review tomorrow but cancelled. Apparently, he's trained as an architect and apparently my profs know him somehow. Apparently, he met some of his band mates in architecture school way back when. Now, all I can think about is how cool it would have been to say that Roger Waters came to my final review in architecture school, and I'm mad that I can't. So as consolation, I'm writing this post to say that Roger Waters was almost a critic on my final review. Hmph.

Today, I signed up for an interview with an architectural firm that's coming to our school on Saturday. I'll get dressed up, bring my portfolio, and pretend I'm on a real interview, but I won't be. They're not hiring. They're only doing informational interviews with the full disclosure that they are actually not hiring at this time. Six firms are coming to this event, informational-interviewing students all day, and then not hiring any of them. Thanks. Thanks for this....opportunity?

Why am I going? Because I'm terrified of interviews and I figure if this one's a flop it doesn't matter. And I'll probably learn something and feel more confident going to the next one....one that has the promise of an actual paycheck at the end of it. Or maybe I'll nail it, maybe they'll be so blown away by my work and my poise that they'll call up headquarters and tell them to put aside 100k and a desk with a view. Maybe.

Ok, this is the last one. My other two classes won't be "down" til May. But today, I finished my final renderings for my third 1/2-semester class, so that means it's pretty much over. The assignment was to create a set of three renderings of an architectural project, whether it be your own or something designed/built by someone else. I modeled and rendered Alvar Aalto's Experimental House in Finland.

So in my renderings, there's a creepy lady that lives there by herself.  I got a little carried away with the whole fire-pit-at-the-house-in-the-woods-at-night scene and ended up adding a creepy lady to each image.  She changes race and dress in each image, and she's either waiting for guests to arrive or she just killed her guests. I'm thinking it might be the latter.  She's crazy.  Take a look...you'll see what I mean.

NYU's Bobst Library today:

Philip Johnson

Last week I had my first assignment due for Architectural Photography that we presented to the class. I had heard scary things about the professor, so I was kind of nervous. But I think I like her a lot. As I silently flipped through my images one by one on the projector, she said..."yes, no, no, yes, no, yes, no, no, no" and she was totally right. She liked my interior shots and thought I was uncomfortable outside. Yup.

Here are some of the "yes"es.

Look how huuuuuge Sao Paulo is. It's the seventh largest city in the world. This is where my studio is going in March.

And we're going to Curitiba too. It's the city that my professor was the mayor of. So it'll be like touring New York City with Rudy Giuliani...sort of.