Is it July already? Sure wouldn’t know it given the weather. But while it may not be the most spectacular summer for us people, the plants are loving the extra rain. The image above was taken while walking through my new neighborhood in Seattle where people love wild and crazy plants in place of the boring lawn in the strip between the sidewalk and the street. I only had my phone on me at the time of walking around and admiring the various creative things people have chosen to plant but I’ll go out again with my real camera and capture a good smattering. There are some great little urban gardens as well.

Speaking of the “new neighborhood in Seattle”, that’s why the blog has been fairly dead lately. It was a crazy packing and moving up from the Portland area but then extra crazy when the first location (and landlord) in Seattle was rather less than awesome and I ended up moving again to my current location. Luckily the current house is fabulous and I think I’ll be here for awhile. I’ve only been in the new house for a week so things are still a gigantic sea of boxes but soon I won’t be spending my spare time unpacking and I can instead enjoy some quality time with my laptop and get back to finishing the long list of drafts I’ve got piling up.

Have a happy 4th everyone!

The picture above is of the sheet metal panel covered organic walls of the Experience Music Project building by Frank Gehry. I shot this will walking through the Seattle Center on my way from Queen Anne to downtown during some amazing sunny weather in my soon-to-be new home. That’s right, I’m in the process of moving up North to the Emerald City!

Posts lately have been spotty and few while things have been a bit busy over the last couple months but once the move is complete and I’m sitting happily in my new home in the Greenlake neighborhood, things will return to normal. Till then, posts will likely continue to be spotty but look forward to more posts coming out of Seattle on a regular basis very soon!

I love the rain for so many reasons…the fresh smell, its life-giving properties, the artistic potential and of course the musical quality. I can sit forever just listening to the rain hit various surfaces, from light tapping to the beating on the roof tiles like drums while the wind whistles the melody through the trees and the sound of thunder crashing like cymbals just as the song reaches the climax.

The last couple nights have been really stormy with lots of wind and I have enjoyed turning out the lights to sit and listen to all the different sounds swirling around my house and the occasional howling in through the air vents. It made me think of the amazing vocal group from Slovenia, Perpetuum Jazzile who performed an acapella version of Toto’s “Africa” with an astounding introduction using voice, hands and feet to simulate a rain storm with crashing thunder. I’m not easily impressed by vocal perfomances but when you mix an amazing song and a storm it’s gonna catch my attention. If you haven’t already seen it, check it out:

image via iamtekn

Last night I received news that a friend in Mexico died in a car crash over the weekend. I immediately checked his facebook page and saw the great outpouring of photos, love and wishes. Luis Alberto Matanzo touched the lives of so very many. He was a proud Poblano and a talented architect and landscape architect with great passion for his career and his culture. The world has indeed felt a great loss that reaches far and wide.

I had the great opportunity to meet Luis in 2007 when I was living in Mexico City and working at Grupo de Diseño Urbano. He even invited me on a personal tour of his hometown of Puebla which I will always remember. As a native of the only Spanish-designed city in Mexico, he taught me about the city’s history, design and the reason why Puebla was so famous for it’s tasty candy. I saw some of the most amazing churches, squares and hidden courtyards along with pedestrian streets and a converted art district followed by peculiar cocktail shots with bizarre (and tasty!) ingrediants and authentic molé under the arches of a sidewalk cafe just off the main plaza. We toured the ancient church built atop a pyramid of Cholula where we enjoyed the sun setting over the city followed by micheladas in the city square. Luis was so proud of his city and it’s culture and it showed. In a future post, I will share my trip and images from this beautiful city in honor of Luis.

But most importantly, Luis taught me the real story behind a famous Mexican holiday. As it turns out, back in the early 1900’s Hellmann’s mayonnaise was actually manufactured in England so when the Titanic set voyage it carried on board thousands of jars which were scheduled to be delivered in Vera Cruz on the Yucatan Peninsula after it left port in New York. The Mexican people, who were crazy about mayonnaise, were very excited and eagerly awaited the delivery which would have been the largest to the country. But as history had it, the ship sank upon hitting an ice berg and took the precious cargo down with it. The loss was so great for the Mexican people that they declared the day a national day of morning. To this day, the people continue to observe the day every year on May 5th and is known as the Sinko de Mayo.

Luis had a silly sense of humor. I remember walking along while he was telling this story in such a serious manner that I was actually totally surprised that it turned out to be a joke.

Luis had a kind personality and a warmth that was infectious. His charm and humor drew people to him like a magnet and kept people laughing and smiling. He was an inspiration and a friend. I feel lucky to have known him. Luis will be remembered and forever live on in the hearts of many.

Luis, te vamos a extañar. Te mando un abrazo super fuerte.

images via Lisa Town

image (c) Lisa Town

In doing some cleaning I came across a large, newsprint pad that I literally hadn’t touched in 10 years. It was full of figure studies I’d done with a big fat and soft graphite stick, mostly trying to capture mood or movement and not so much perfect realism. I’ve found myself over the last couple years drawn to the sketchbooks and studies of great artists (loved the old sketchbooks from Picasso that I saw in Barcelona last year!) so it was interesting to rediscover some old, forgotten drawings of my own.

This particular drawing was completed in the late 90’s and while not necessarily the best of the bunch, I found myself drawn to it’s character and the hurried fashion of the drawing style. I don’t know whether this is a man or a woman, or if I drew it from model or mind. I do remember thinking back then of what a drawing might look like in trying to portray a still, sitting body that had a restless mind. The pad had several studies but the eyes in this one capture a sadness the others didn’t, like a longing to move but a tension in the hands suggests the inability to do so. Lots of big quick strokes moved over and over the figure almost creating a blurred edge with the mind moving outside the lines of the otherwise still figure.

I am thankful that I live in an area where there are definite seasons and I enjoy them all. I associate each one with different sights, sounds and smells and definitely tastes (as I sit here sipping my hot apple cider). Last Saturday my husband and I drove out into the country and went on a long autumn walk. I was so excited about it that I got up early, for a Saturday, and put on my festive burnt orange down vest, packed up the dog and was ready to go. The morning light was amazing as it came streaming down through the trees and the colors of the leaves falling on the path as we walked were beautiful, like they were laying down a colorful carpeted path.

Aside from the landscape turning brilliant reds, oranges and yellows, a large part about the change into fall is the difference in the light. The days grow shorter, the nights longer and the mornings darker. Even a bright sunny day has a subtle difference from that of summer or spring. To some people it can feel depressing, this lack of light and onset of various hues of gray, gray and more gray but there’s something personal about it that I love. To me it’s cozy and it’s in this time that I feel more inclined to read, write and even just sit and think. I also enjoy waking in the darkness. I feel like in the early morning it’s just me and my thoughts…me and the city…me and the world. Everything takes on an intimate beauty with the city lights glowing and the sun just over the horizon. The moment is mine.

Over on Portlandize, I saw that I wasn’t the only one enjoying this change in light and finding beauty in the morning darkness. He even shot a video of his bike ride along the Portland waterfront on his way to work one morning. The videos on Portlandize are always great and this one fit right into my very autumny zen mood. Check it out.

I absolutely love graffiti but not only spray can kind, the momentary kind as well. More and more graffiti artists are using light to express themselves and creating amazing works of art in a matter of seconds. Artists Michael Bosanko has made some that I think are really fun and they use light to bring life to otherwise uninhabited spaces under the light of the moon.

images via michael bosanko

Lately I’ve felt rather exhausted by the idea of green building design. Put a building in a tree, bury it or cover it in some unidentified field of green fuzzy stuff and it’s suddenly sustainable, no matter how absurd the concept may be. When I saw this sketch from one of my favorite sites, Variations on Normal, I couldn’t help but laugh in how appropriate it was in it’s absurdity. But let’s be honest, who doesn’t want to sled down that hill? I’ll take the penthouse suite please.

Most of the time I love looking at things that go way outside the box because, why not? It’s good fun. But so many times in architectural designs plants have become an accessory like wall covering or paint and gets tacked on in the most ridiculous ways and expected to survive or even produce food. Reaching beyond working solutions has almost become the norm and the photoshop renderings littering the blogosphere are beginning to look eerily similar in both style, content and that infamous greening filter. I find myself looking at drawings and constantly asking, what IS that patch of green? Lately reading has been less inspiring and therefore blogging as well which has sadly taken a backseat to my busy schedule as of late. Time to get back to it, things are piling up.

And so there’s my rant for the month. Moving on.

image via People’s Parking Lot(s)

Things have been busy lately and between various trips and other things, I haven’t found much time to make good use of all the fabulous things that are accumulating on my computer. Things are definitely piling up on that front. Although, it’s nice to take some time off and sort of disconnect from the virtual world temporarily.

One thing I’m certainly looking forward to is the PARK(ing) Day event on Friday the 18th which seems to be getting more and more interesting as the day draws near. I’ll be participating with some friends in Seattle in their Central Park, a parking lot turned into a mass of mini parks along with entertainment, lectures, charettes, food and whatever else. There will even be a prize for the best park.

More upon my return regarding the event and the park I’ve been working on for the last few days and hopefully some fabulous pictures as well. And if you are in Seattle and want to come check out the event, check the People’s Parking Lot(s) blog for more info about the space and the event that will be taking place at 500 E. Pine in Capitol Hill. I hope to see you there!

Last week I spent time assisting my husbands parents in the big move of their life. They were moving from their house in a cozy, small town they bought when they were married and now have all paid off and have made a million additions and improvements since then, to a decent-sized, yet much smaller, 4th story condo in the nearby bigger city. Aside from the physical trouble of going through 30 years of accumulation, having garage sales and multiple trips to the Salvation Army and then picking out the small percentage that actually went to the condo, the mental trouble of it all was huge.

This was a house that I knew for 12 years of my own life and so I could understand how my husband and his siblings felt about no longer having a “home” to go back to. Since my parents moved a lot, it sort of acted like my home to go back to as well. Every year during Christmas, all the family would go there for a week of food, fun, games and snow…doing such movie-like things as roasting marshmallows, putting up the tree, building snowmen in the yard and sledding on the nearby hill. The living room floor in front of the fireplace was always covered with drying gloves, coats and boots. The house was big enough that everyone had their own room to stay in because of all the guest bedrooms. It was sort of like the family bed and breakfast. Now I’m not sure where everyone is going to stay for the holidays. It will all work out of course, but definitely won’t be the same.

My husband and I walked through the house on our last evening, as if we were saying goodbye to the walls. Most of the rooms were fairly empty, just a few loose items strewn about. The large family photographs still hung on the walls, awaiting their fate of perhaps being stored. There is something eerie about looking at a bare room with pictures on the wall….displaying the faces of those that made all the rich memories there as if saying that those memories would stay with the walls.

As much as I like change, it is times like these that I’m reminded of how a building or a space can be imprinted with so much sentimental value as to become an entirely different entity altogether. Walls are no long walls, a bench is no longer a bench….they are events, feelings, and lives. And then there is that fear that should the building or space no longer exist in the original form, that those memories fade with the passing of that entity that was once associated with them.

While the older memories obvioulsy don’t die altogether, they don’t transfer to another space either. You can’t just put them in a box and bring them along to inhabit the new building. New memories will be made in the new space and new traditions will develop over time. Those walls too will become more than just simply building materials.