I have a new apartment.

I'm moving tomorrow into a new apartment. This one is in Neukolln and is also pretty nice. The neighborhood is a lot different so it should be interesting. It is a lot more Turkish in make-up, has many more bars and cafes and seems a little bit younger too, which is nice. Prenzlauer Berg has a lot of young couples and babies for example. Here in Neukolln there are some Turkish families and many younger people my age. 


Another bonus: there is also a huge park 2 blocks away where I can go running.


Anyway, here's a google map of it.

Bike Commute Stats

Put my computer back on my bike. Here's some stats:


Time: 26'16
Dist: 10.6 km (about 6.5 mi)
Av: 24.2 km
Max: 42.0 km

Pretty good commute on the bike. The trip takes about 40 min on the train, though I do get to sit, listen to music and read.


Again, this is the approx. route, though Google maps is a little off....


Of course, this will all change when I move this weekend. New sites to see!

Good News for Us Runners

From the NYT:


Well: Phys Ed: Does Exercise Reduce Your Cancer Risk?

By By Gretchen Reynolds

Published: August 18, 2009

Researchers recently concluded that, if you wish to ward off lung or gastrointestinal cancer, you might want to spend your leisure time jogging instead of picking berries, mushroom gathering or fishing.

Schloss Charlottenburg

The Charlottenburg Palace is across the Archives where I will be working Wednesday and Thursday mornings. 

Berlin's largest palace, it was named after Sophie Charlotte, the wife of Friedrich III and inaugurated 1699. Badly damaged in WWII it was saved from demolition and renovated in the 1950s

Tiergarten

I went to meet my friend Pete and his girlfriend Mary on their last day in Berlin last Friday. We met for a beer in the Tiergarten and he gave me his German phone.

The Tiergarten really is an enormous park and pretty quickly the city fades away. There are lots of people (at least in the summer time) and plenty of paths, bridges, lakes and streams. Also, the occasional beer gardens provide plenty of opportunities to rest.

Web Migration?

I'm going to try and split up this web log into two pieces. This one will stay my own writings, pictures and work. 

Sing the Funk Electric will mainly be highights of cool architecture, photography and design I find on the web.

PDF Version of Rakvere Competition

For those of you interested this is a slightly higher-res version of the Rakvere Competition (though not the Print Resolution Version).

Be warned: Bigger File.

KINDRED

Arvo Part Concert Hall Competition

This summer I worked with one of my professors on a competition to renovate an old church in Rakvere, Estonia into the Arvo Part Concert Hall. The church was designed by an Estonian architect Kolti and was consecrated in 1941. However, it was never really used as a church and shortly after it was finished WWII reached Rakvere and shut down the church. When it "re-opened" in the 50s Estonia was under the grip of the Soviets and it was turned into a gymnasium.

Anyway, the competition brief asked us to design an annex for the church to house a secondary performance hall and re-design the urban plaza in front of the building. If you are unfamiliar, Arvo Part is an amazing minimalist composer committed to primarily slow, sacred works. We just found out we didn't win (we SHOULD have) so now I'm going to post the work that we did. All these drawings were done with Fransisco Gomes, AIA.

Site Plan

Floor Plans


Floor Plan & Diagrams



Sections & Perspectives


Sections, Elevations & Perspective




All these drawings are scaled down quite a bit but I thought someone might be interested in seeing them.

HOIDN WANG PARTNER Offces

If you didn't know yet, I am working at HOIDN WANG PARTNER in Berlin through January. The office is in Charlottenbourg, which is a very nice part of old West Berlin. I think it was always a nice place but now, especially after reunification, it is very established. The street shopping is very high end. Lots of BMWs and Mercedes on the streets for example.

Here's a picture from the front hallway into the main office space. Barbara and Wilfried can be seen hard at work. I work at the spot, lower left next to Wilfried (you can barely see my laptop). There will be someone working across from me (at the iMac) at some point.

The office is in a renovated flat of a typical Berlin apartment building, a square "doughnut" shaped building, courtyard in the middle about 5 storys tall. The office is owned by Wilfried, with the offices being in the front half, the back half being Wilfried's living room, dinning room and bedroom. Anyway, its very nice. Plaster, 14ft ceilings, wood floors, old. You get the idea.

Tortoise Show, ColumbiaClub, Berlin

Tortoise played the ColumbiaClub last night here in Berlin. Jeff put me on the list, which was great because tickets were 25 Euro! They played great and the crowd loved it. 3 Encores: Germans apparently love Tortoise. Requisite blurry show photo:


Requisite nighttime photo of ColumbiaClub:


The club was down the street from the LuftBrucke Plaza, which commemorates the Berlin Air Lift (Luftbrucke roughly translating to Air Bridge). Just to the south is the awesomely huge and classical Templehof Airport.

Berlin Philharmonie, Hans Scharoun

This is also along my bike route home. I took this picture last evening on the way home from work. You can tell how northern Berlin is by how light it stays into the evening: this was taken about 7pm.



The Berlin Philharmonie by Hans Scharoun is also the subject of the O'Neil Ford Monograph 4 (ONFM 3 is on the Greek architect Kyriakos Krokos). I will be doing initial research this fall at the Archiv der Akademie der Künste.

Apartment - Lychener Str. 80 Prenzlauer, Berlin

Here's the view down the street (south) from the front deck of the apartment.

Here's a view of my rather large bedroom. Yea for my bike!

And here's a view from the back deck. There's a train line back there behind those trees somewhere, but it's pretty quiet. The church bells sure go crazy morning, noon and night though.

Here's what I ride by everyday.

Altes Museum by Karl Friedrich Schinkel, 1825-1828

Berlin: First day of Work

Rode my bike today for my first day of work at HOIDN WANG PARTNER. Great ride, took a little longer than expected, about 30 min. Rode past Altes Museum by Schinkel just as it was being illuminated by morning light. Beautiful. I'll have to bring my camera next time.

First Route