mini break!

my internship/full-time contract job is up for now (finishing up the work during the fall), so now i can blog again! since it's so hot here right now, i'm going to blog about my trip to toronto on the coldest weekend in january in hopes of cooling down our no a/c, no insulation, sauna of a house. never mind that this trip was 7 months ago.

oh, and remember this was a school field trip, so i don't have many photos of people, but i do have lots of photos of buildings and things. yay non-humans!


the seats on my shuttle bus from the airport had outlets for your charging use.
nice.
but weird.


a spot of tea to start our first morning.
i love drinking tea out of clear glasses.


we ate a lot of crepes.
there was a good crepe shop near our hotel.
it was open late.
and it served alcohol.
because the trip was so last-minute and jam-packed, i didn't get to plan my eating as i usually do.
so i ate a lot of crepes.


the approach.


"look! it's an insect f*cking a building!"
-jeff kipnis
actually, it's will alsop's addition to the ontario college of art & design.


a view across a park from OCAD to gehry's AGO (art gallery of ontario).


gridded.


entrance to gehry-designed AGO.


squiggly ramps.


we got there just as the museum was closing.
no art or king tut for us. boo.


i need another wedding (to the bear again, of course)
so i can register for nicer tableware.


libeskind's michael lee-chin crystal
(addition to the ROM/royal ontario museum).


the house of spirits or some other silly nonesuch.
the floor is made up of grates.
greenish light shines up through the grates.
and some weird noises also come up through the grates.
oh, and those metal shards are libeskind-designed chairs.


dirty sanchez and me fooling around in the chamber.


where new addition meets old, existing building.


stairs.


dizzy.


i found a bear since mine couldn't join me for this trip.
excuse my pancake face's mac tonight profile.


an older part of the museum,
in contrast.


looking at where old meets new, again.
through a piece of art.


slanty columns.
one reason why engineers hate architects.


almost looks like an occlusion render.
but it's a photo of dirty sanchez, JC, and sparkles.


"this is where cats go to die."
-andrew zago.
but that's not a cat. that's JC.
one of the problems that occurs when you design non-orthogonal spaces.


bugs!!!


michelin man!
j/k. it's some sort of rock.


hi! i'm cute!


hi. i'm not as cute.


barf.


this guy looks quite sad.


a morphosis dorm building. and yes, it says "toronto" all big.
you might know morphosis from diamond ranch high school and the caltrans building downtown.


i believe this blue blob is sir norman foster's.
but i might be wrong.


more crepe. this one's a late night one.
nutella and banana!


steamed milk.
tomato soup.
yet another crepe.

kydrich, TT, and i did venture to chinatown for a (cheap!) dinner.
food was good, but nothing we can't get here.
like our parents, we suddenly craved asian food after
eating only "western" food for days.


calatrava.


more calatrava.


a fabulous market adjoining the site for our project that semester.


some sort of canadian bacon rolled in peameal.
i had a breakfast sandwich with some.
delicious.


like the US.
only with lots of maple leaves to remind you it's not.

don't even get me started on toronto's hockey team's name.
the maple leafs [sic].
yeah.


sriracha! just like home!
and another maple leaf. maybe not just like home.


if for any reason you need a faberge egg
of an event space
in toronto,
check out st. lawrence hall (north of the market buildings).


random sculpture.
i prefer my bears non-radioactive, tyvm.
we took a class photo with the bears
as it was one part of the trip where we were all in one spot
at the same time.
i don't have a copy, unfortunately.


pork. yum.


the market hall.


more market.


above the main floor, there is a mezzanine--
a miele demo kitchen.
(perhaps one day i'll have a miele dishwasher
and
built-in espresso pod machine
and
double convection ovens
and
vacuum cleaner).
for now, i settled for free coffee samples.

there is a beverly hills miele store on robertson
that offers cooking demos using their kitchen appliances
and demos of their other stuff.
i no longer receive invites.
maybe because i haven't specified their stuff in awhile.
sigh.
maybe you can act like you're rich and going to buy their stuff,
get an invite,
and bring me along.


what to do when you don't have a tripod.
use a friend's head.
that's hansley rutherford (formerly fuzzface) as the photographer.
and kydrich as the tripod.


miele stuff.


so hansley rutherford and i may have
picked up some spiriteux here.
then some coffee at the starbucks a few doors down.
and mixed them.
and sipped as we froze our hands off
while measuring and photographing like 5 blocks of buildings.


schoolyard beaver.
seriously, this is in an urban schoolyard. ha.


another shot of the outside of st. lawrence market south hall.


notice the sign behind the fence.
just like home.


kydrich and i introduced TT to one of our favorite meals
that we assembled from various vendors at the market.
TT is straight from china and not very familiar with cheese.
peppercorn encrusted duck pate.
a freshly baked baguette, which we had sliced for us.
and cheese.
oh, this was a glorious cheese.
and yes, it was too much for the 3 of us and our wimpy
plastic knives.
we left it with a friend who lives in toronto.
so.
sad.
oh, it was a fontina washed/soaked in raspberry.
the sweet-tart aroma and subtle flavor of raspbery in the rind
balanced the richness of the fontina.
so.
good.
like seriously.


it's a lake, not an ocean.


west 8's simcoe wave deck.
part of the waterfront revitalization stuff.










taking a warming break inside a mies building.
on mies chairs.
that's TT all bundled up.

toronto has this network of underground tunnels that connect buildings.
it's lined with shops. so it feels like a mall.
again, weird. but good when it's below 0 FAHRENHEIT outside.
we walked that to get here.


mies from the outside.


more mies.


behnisch architekten.
really nice atrium inside.
some science building at the university of toronto.

the end.

oh wait, no! there were some food trucks (like real roach coaches, not these gentrified things all over LA these days) that parked across the street from our hotel at night.
so kydrich and might have snarfed some poutine.
and ate it too quickly before either of us had a chance to take a photo.
oink.

there was also something called winterfest happening across the street from our hotel.
oh yeah, the hotel we stayed at was sheraton city center or something.
a pretty standard sheraton, but you can't beat the location and its easy access
to public transportation (like you take an escalator from the lobby down underground,
and you're there in the tunnels and near a subway station).
or the discount that our toronto-native studiomate's travel agent mom got us.
oh, and toronto is VERY walkable with good public transport.
i love cities like that.
anyway, winterfest.
live music.
shows.
an outdoor ice rink.
fireworks.
a surprising number of people out and about despite the freezing temperatures.


we got there too late to ice skate.
but got a cute photo at least.
that's big T (california girl).
kydrich (california girl).
me (california girl).
and freckles (grew up in boston, but california girl for the past 5 years).
yes, we were cold.
but still smiling.

fin.