Culin Thompson - Study AbroadGermany - Czech Republic - Italy

Spain - France - EnglandSummer 2015

6 WeeksArchitecture + Urban Planning

May 31 - June 4: Berlin, GermanyJune 5 - June 7: Prague, Czech RepublicJune 8 - June 11: Berlin, GermanyJune 12: Hamburg, GermanyJune 13 - June 15: Munich, GermanyJune 16 - June 19: Venice, italyJune 20 - June 21: Florence, ItalyJune 22 - June 27: Rome, ItalyJune 28: Terracina, ItalyJune 29 - June 30: Barcelona, SpainJuly 1 - July 5: Paris, FranceJuly 6 - July 8: London, England

Program Itinerary

Brandenburger TorBerlin, Germany

Constructed: 1791

Completed in 1791, the Brandenburger Tor (Bran-denburg Gate) was built on the site of the former city gate marking the beginning of the Unter den Linden.

The monumentality of the gate echos the milita-ristic and brutalist nature of German culture.

While visiting the gate the kickoff for the UEFA Championships was host-ed surrounding the gate providing an interesting scenario in which the gate and surrounding streets were utilized as a public pedestrian zone (seen below).

Triumphial Arch

Berlinner DomBerlin, Germany

Constructed: 1454

Berlinner Dom - the Berlin Cathedral - is marked by natural light and a striking contrast of spirtual architecture and statuary against the harsh and brutal architecture of soviet-occupied Berlin. The large painted dome is topped with a clearstory window allowing additional natural light into the heart of the Cathedral.

Light & Contrast

St. James CathedralPrague, Czech Republic

Constructed: 1400’s

Prague was an incredi-ble city characterized by a wide spread of architectur-al styles.

St. James Cathedral was a beautifully crafted baroque Cathedral in the center of Old Town Prague. The stripped simplistic front facade topped with molding emphasizes the large-scale ceiling frescoes and interior sculptures and paintings on the interior of the Cathedral.The unfin-

Baroque

ished architectural forms such as the exterior columns highlight the beautiful fres-coes which dominate the interior of the church.

In comparison to the other churches visited during the trip, St. James Cathedral featured bright colors and vibrant, ornate details.

St. Vitus CathedralPrague, Czech Republic

Constructed: 1344

St. Vitus Cathedral was constructed within the complex of the Czech Re-public Catle and embodies the different architectural styles and characteristics of Prague. The gothic front towers contrast strongly against the centralized clock tower - seemingly designed within Baroque or Rococoo inspired stylistic elements.

The interior of St. Vitus Cathedral, in stark con-

Juxtaposition

trast to St. James Cathedral (the other main cathedral in Prague), is plain and gothic in its style. The stone arches and vaults structually support (alongside the buttresses) the thinned exterior walls filled with stained glass windows letting in natural colored light.

This colored light fills the interior volumes of the church, lighting the floor and creating a magical experi-ence while one attends ser-vice or visits the Cathedral.

While in Prague I addition-ally had the opportunity to attend church service inside of St. Vitus.

A bird was inside of the church during the service and seemed to echo the chants and prayers of the monks and churchgoers attending service and wor-shiping inside of the space.

The large vaulted ceil-ings inside of the nave of the cathedral created an awe in which one feels the omnipotence of Heaven

and portrays the vertical ascention one experiences to the afterlife.

Berlin OlympiastadionBerlin, Germany

Constructed: 1936Capacity: 74,475

One of the strongest identities in Nazi architec-ture was a sense of monu-mentality and the highlight-ing of the axis within urban planning and urban design.

The design of the Berlin Olympic Stadium highlight-ed this strong central axis within the park’s design. This axis runs from the central plaza, through the central entrance towers, into the stadium, and through the stadium to the bell tower.

Axial Emphasis

Sachsenhausen Concentration CampBerlin, Germany

Constructed: 1936

The immediate feeling and sense when walking in the front gate house of Sachsenhausen was terror. A feeling of darkness, op-pression, and terror strikes one and emotions take over.

The barren and void yard with gravel traces of barracks, surrounded by guard towers and tall fences produces a feeling of entrapment and oppres-sion in which individuals wander solmenly around the yard aimlessly not knowing what to look at or for.

Place of Terror

Munich OlympiastadionMunich, Germany

Constructed: 1972Capacity: 57,450

Munich’s design for their Olympic Stadium - in strik-ing contrast to the Berlin stadium - highlighted the idea of equality, democra-cy, and non-monumental-ity.

By building the stadium into the ground instead of monumentally develop-ing it above ground, the design referenced Greek amphitheaters built into the hillsides.

Stadium for Democracy

Allianz ArenaMunich, Germany

Constructed: 2005Capacity: 71,137

Built in 2005, the Allianz Arena in Munich was the newest area I visited. The area features 2,875 ETFE panels which comprise the facade of the stadium.

Designed by Herzog & de Meuron, the build-ing illuminates to proudly display the home team (red

Modern Machine

for Bayern, blue for 1860, and white for the German National Team).

Though the building fea-tures modern technology, it still required steel gate modi-fication to reduce the Venturi Effect from drafts entering the stadium at the gate level (seen on the right).

Venice, Italy

Founded: 421Population: 260,060

Venice was an incredible location due to its unique property of being nearly frozen in time - its water channels prevent cars and therefore streetlights, airplane noise and other modern day polluters are rarely seen or heard within Venice proper.

This experience, cou-pled with the piazzas and squares scattered through-out the city created a city of true urban design at the pedestrian scale.

Frozen City

Piazza San MarcoVenice, Italy

Constructed: 800-1100

The Piazza San Marco is perhaps one of the most influential public zones in the world - serving as the principal port and method of trade for the city-state of Venice in its historical pres-ence as a center of trade.

While in Venice I had the opportunity to sit and study the square, including how people utilized its different zones and began to mi-grate throughout the public space. One of the first ini-tial observations I encoun-tered was the fact that due to its historical significance and culture, the draw of tourism had manipulated how the square was first designed to be occupied.

This created what I describe as clusters, or crowds of individuals either observing the square or resting and occupying the public zone. These clusters, however, rarely congregated in the middle of the plaza. They gathered for the most part around the corners of buildings, in front of the Cathedral,

City Square

and along the edge of the square nearby the cafes and restraunts.

This allowed for pedes-trians walking through the square to utilize the central passages if they desired to, however, I observed that as one approached the Cathe-dral the individual began to favor a specific side of the square rather than continuing down the central axis of the main square (see diagram to the left). When turning towards the water, however, the axis became much small-er and as a result individuals walking through to the wa-terfront began to utilize the central passage oncemore.

I credit this fact to the termination of the axis at the Cathedral and the natural tendency of persons to migrate towards a terminus - despite the area or size of the passageways.

Fondazione Querini StampaliaVenice, Italy

Founded: 1869

The famous Italian architect Carlo Scarpa de-signed the Venice location of the Fondazione Querini Stampalia. The renovated building features a height-ened sense and focus on water - as the flooding of venice created the neces-sity of a design solution to move and prevent water from destroying artwork and installations within the

Perspective & Detail

foundation building. These design features include trenches, steps and retain-ing walls both inside and outside of the building in order to address and pre-vent water damage.

The detail work of the building additionally fea-tured strong lines of axis in both the vertical and horizontal directions. This

strong sense of lines of axis generated strong perspectival views of which the artwork framed.

Though the detail work by Scarpa involved a tremendous amount of thought and design thought, the construction of the spaces did not live up to the potential of the design. Numerous axis

lines were not parallel or did not match to the level of construction required to complete a building designed with the level of detail to which Scarpa desired.

Trenches and retaining walls allow water to flow in and out in an easily direct-ed manner.

Strong horizontal and vertical lines emphasize detail work in design, while the tops of the stone panels do not match the level of detail construction required.

Duomo di FirenzeFlorence, Italy

Constructed:1436

Similar to the gothic arches in St. Vitus Ca-thedral, the interior of the Duomo di Firenze features simplistic, gothic styles in which the walls are stripped of most ornamen-tation and allow in natural light.

Perhaps the most im-pressing feat of the design

Innovation

of the Duomo was the lack of understanding, engi-neering, and preparation in its construction. Construct-ed purely off of intuition and experience, the Duo-mo is an engineering feat and wonder.

Rome, Italy

Founded: 753 BCPopulation: 2,900,000

St. Peter’s BasilicaVatican City

Constructed: 1506-1626

I truly believe that pic-tures and sketches cannot express the beauty and experience of being at Vatican City. The second I stepping into the out-stretched arms of St. Pe-ter’s portico, I experienced something I’ve never felt before and became awe-struck in a manner unfelt elsewhere on this trip.

The pure craftsman-ship of the stonework, the beauty in the fine detailing, marble patterns, cuts, and

Ascention

lines all converge to create an atmosphere of spirtu-ality and reflection within a space that can only be seen in person to truly comprehend.

The amount of natu-ral lighting, intergration of the numerous dome structures, statuary, sheer volume of space alongside the spirtual significance of St. Peter’s and Vatican City create a true wonder in my eyes.

PantheonRome, Italy

Constructed: 118-128

The Pantheon is truly a marvel of technology, construction and innova-tion within architecture and design. Utilizing concrete within the Ancient Roman Era the Pantheon displays the advancement of the ancient romans. The occu-lus at the apex of the roof allows in light and displays the relationship the Roman Church previously housed within the building held with the stars and heavens.

Innovation

The size of the dome structure was amazing - one of the largest concrete domes in the world. One notable fact I found when visiting the site was the slope of the floor. Peaking at the center under the occulus, the floor slopes downwards towards the edges of the building - where drains are located to drain the water out of the building.

ColosseumRome, Italy

Constructed: 70-80

Piazza del CampidoglioRome, Italy

Designed: 1538Completed: 1940

Designed by Michel-angelo, the square is bordered by Renaissance designed architectural facades and serves as the governmental center of the city of Rome.

Perhaps the most interesting feature to the square, in my opinion, is the fact that it does not take a rectangular shape, but rather adopts a poly-gon.

This allows a forced perspective viewplane out from the center of the square down the stairs and to the rest of the city of Rome.

Perspective

The congruence in design of the three build-ings bordering the square allows a continuity to be formed - uniting the square symbolically as a united city between the 7 hills of Rome.

The central building features a clock and bell tower - symbolically relat-ing the building to the level of importance churchs hold with their towers. This rais-es the importnace of the level of democracy within the Roman and Italian gov-ernmental systems.

La Sagrada FamiliaBarcelona, Spain

Designed: 1882

The initial foundation and basement church were laid and constructed in a Gothic style - upon which Gaudi changed when ap-pointed as the architect.

Parc GuellBarcelona, Spain

Constructed: 1914

The LouvreParis, France

Constructed: 1546 (palace) 1989 (pyramid)

I believe the Pyramid at the Louvre is a phenom-enal addition to the mu-seum. Its glass simplicity allows the design to softly juxtapose the classicism of the Louvre Palace behind the design while still allow-ing a sense of modernism and independency to be adopted. It provides an illuminated entrance and

Distractionglobally recognized symbol for the museum to adopt.

Perhaps the most frustrating portion of the Louvre was the addition of seeming temporary shelters at which tickets are sold - bright red boxes placed without any consid-eration to the design of the Pyramid or the Palace.

Villa SavoyePoissy, France

Constructed: 1929-1931

Studying the Villa Sa-voye in classes it was built up to be a masterpiece of architecture which stood the test of time against de-cay and importance. When visiting it in person, how-ever, I became very disap-pointed with the product that was in front of me.

The Villa has fallen into disrepair. The most frus-trating point of the building is its lack of visual stimula-

Distraction

tion in any of the elevation-al views.

Studying the building it seemed grand and per-fected from every angle, however lines did not carry over, grid patterns were broken, and the overall experience of the building was limited by its simplistic nature and lack of sur-rounding environment.

Biblioteque Nationalede FranceParis, France

Completed: 1996

The new national library of France is an incredible complex. The complex features a lush green forest in the center surrounded by four towers containing offices and stacks of books - offering views of the surrounding Paris skyline in all directions.

The green forest space is surrounded by a board-walk which seems to melt

Public Useout onto the streets of-fering places for Parisans to sit, talk, eat, or even skateboard.

The use of grill as an accent on the facades and the push of the staricases to the edge of the towers creates a highlight empha-sizing the verticality of the design.

Arab World InstituteParis, France

Constructed: 1981-1987

Centre Georges PompidouParis, France

Constructed: 1971-1977

Fondation Louis VuittonParis, France

Constructed: 2008 - 2014

The ShardLondon, England

Constructed: 1506-1626

Funny PicturesEurope

Summer 2015