It's a rather stress-free summer this year after obtaining my Master degree besides the endless wait on the EAD card. I got to attend my first American wedding in French Lick, Indiana. Austin and Lindsey's wedding was absolutely phenomenal with lots of emotional moments. It was also a great time to catch up with friends from grad school since I didn't get to graduate with them last year. The second wedding I got to attend this summer was Steve and Victoria's, and thus, I got to visit San Francisco for the third time. Steve and Victoria's wedding was extremely creative, families and guests got to tour around the city with many surprises along the way. I am truly truly happy for both couples and wish them the best!! I was originally planning to visit Brazil this summer for research if I were granted the Ryerson Traveling Scholarship, but that plan ultimately fell through and I wasn't going to put myself at risk for the U.S re-entry so this trip to California sort of fulfilled my need to explore. Shoutout to all the people who host me during the San Franisco trip! Shoutout to my cousin, Jeff, Malenie, bro Chao, Steve, Victoria, and Vivian. This blog post is structured into two parts, first part talks about some of the buildings I visited during the trip. These buildings are all somewhat related to each other because they all inherited certain context from the previous buildings on the site so it's interesting to put them together to compare and contrast. The second part focuses on the city, San Francisco, itself. There are some social and urban issues I'd like to discuss, which I wasn't able to identify during my last visit. San Francisco Museum of Modern Art / Mario Botta 1935 & Snøhetta 2016 SFMoMA is always a controversial piece. Back in 1935, when Mario Botta anchored his first U.S building on the site, it received certain backlash from the community and some architectural critics due to the post-modern design approach. Fast forward to 2010, the museum assigned Snøhetta for the expansion, they took down many parts of the original building and attached a new volume behind the existing front facade.
I think the building has lots of pros and cons. Cons are primarily coming from the fusion of the two distinctive design languages. Stitching a Mario Botta design with Snøhetta's was already an irrational move, but judging from the competition roster: Adjaye Associates, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Foster + Partners, and Snøhetta, the aesthetic and spatial coherence were never the priorities to the offical. The fact that they did not even try to bring the Architect Mario Botta back for the expansion project already indicated a strong political intent. Here is my chart of pros & cons:
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AboutThis blog was launched in August, 2015 during my 8th year of studying abroad in Barcelona, Spain. I decided to start this blog and record some of my thoughts and moments. This blog is also dedicate to Richard Fu, a good friend of mine who is now guarding me from above. He inspired me to get out of the comfort zone and be curious about the world. Amig@'s blogs
Check out my brother Will's blog (in Mandarin) to see what he's up to these days (Design, fashion, food, technology, music, film...etc) Check out Kris' website for some high quality photos around the world Archives
September 2023
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