Vitra Museum

while we were driving back to Koln D and J mentioned that there was this great little stop that we could make and see a lot of neat architecture all in one place: the Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein.  the Vitra company is the main producer of all the famous architecture chairs (and some other things but, really).  the campus was an incredible mix of many different kinds of architecture.  Zaha, Grimshaw, Gehry, Tadao Ando, Siza and a new Herzog de Meuron coming soon.  it was unbelievable.

we only had a short amount of time to stop and it was raining just a little bit but D took me on a quick tour around all the buildings.  he told me about each of the buildings’ design logic and we had a lot of fun talking.

I am so lucky to have D and J in my life.  I thank my lucky stars every night.

croissants

I almost completely forgot about the delicious jam I had at MF’s house.  it was quitten jam or maybe marmalade.  but it was incredible.

not all play!

we stayed overnight in Langenthal, which is a small town in Switzerland near Basel.  the neighborhood that MF lives in is very cool.  almost all the buildings are older farm type structures that have been converted into apartments, houses and even some businesses.  it was gorgeous.  D and J and I walked around a bit on Friday morning to scope out the area.  we saw this incredible Oriental barn (?) just covered in amazing details.

we consulted with MF for a while during the morning on our competition entry and then went out to see the progress on a villa that has already begun construction.  I got to wear a hard hat and some big boots.  going to see the site was especially cool for me because this is the same villa that E and I were designing a wine cellar and wardrobe for so I was fairly familiar with the plans.  it was so neat to see it really come to life!  I can’t wait to begin construction on my very own designs.

basically, everything I saw was delightful.  I love Switzerland.  if only it weren’t so darn expensive.