We introduced the concept of the Optimism Quotient (OQ). Let’s make a crude / broad brush / thumbnail / back of a napkin attempt at applying the OQ to buildings and see what happens. Might it be true that the buildings that we like and enjoy the most have the highest OQ? Let’s see. Ronchamp. […]
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26Feb
2016
BELIEVE IN EVERYTHING
2016
“You…must believe in everything, mostly in the impossible. Don’t ever forget that by your intuitive foresight you will find solutions to problems that seems impossible today, but will be common place in the next generation.” This quote is from Paul Grillo’s book, Form Function and Design, on page 4. I can’t help but apply this […]
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24Feb
2016
OPTIMISM QUOTIENT
2016
“…there is a sort of innate optimism in all works of the imagination” This thought, by Bachelard on page 153, is great. The act of imagining is optimistic. The act of problem solving is optimistic. How can you do any of this if you are not optimistic? To design and problem solve we need hope. […]
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22Feb
2016
DRAWING IN AND OUT
2016
“…the mind that imagines follows the opposite path of the mind that observes.” Bachelard, (p151 The Poetics of Space), proposes that observation is opposite to imagining. He is saying that the working of our minds is opposite when we are observing and when we are imagining. 180 degrees of separation. Opposite is the key word […]
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19Feb
2016
ORDINARY ROOFSCAPE
2016
To round out the week, a last travel related page regarding ordinary roofscapes. Drawing above of an ordinary roofscape in Ortahisar, Turkey. I snapped this photo. Then I did my drawing at a later time. Although I drew just one segment of the roofscape, there are many other segments that I could draw from to […]
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17Feb
2016
AYRE HOTEL OVIEDO
2016
Another travel related page as we are in Toronto this week. During our recent trip to northern Spain, we spent a night in the Ayre Hotel Oviedo, which was designed by Calatrava. Now, I am the type of person who is absolutely content to let my wife make most if not all of the arrangements […]
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15Feb
2016
ROCKPORT GRANITE
2016
We are away this week. So I prepared this travel related page ahead of time. When you travel, you don’t have to limit yourselves to drawing buildings. I took me years to realize this. Once a year we spend a beach week in Rockport, MA. Rockport is known for its’ granite formations. Granite was quarried […]
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12Feb
2016
VALUE MINIATURIZATION
2016
“The cleverer I am at miniaturizing the world, the better I possess it. But in doing this it must be understood that values become condensed and enriched in miniature. One must go beyond logic to experience what is large in what is small.” This is from Bachelard, The Poetics of Space, page 150. For me, […]
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10Feb
2016
SCALE MINIATURIZATION
2016
Is the imagination of buildings an act of miniaturization? Are we in fact miniaturists? Think of the scale change that must happen between what we draw and what we build. It is in fact quite enormous. The design of buildings, from drawings to construction, might have the greatest physical change of scale of all the […]
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8Feb
2016
BUCKY FULLER INSPIRATION
2016
In my reading this weekend I came upon this inspirational quote from Buckminster Fuller. Reading Bucky is always a fuller inspiration. “Physics has found no solids! So to keep on teaching our children the word solid immediately is to drive home a way of thinking that is going to be neither reliable nor useful. There […]
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