Welcome to Vicenza

I know I know, You guys have barely heard about Rome, let alone Florence, Sienna, Bologna or Lucca.  But I haven't written those, and a lot of interesting stuff has already happened in Vicenza, so that's what I'm going to write about now.


After much debate on how to get there, we finally got to the front of the line at Santa Maria Novella station only to find that the trip could be done before noon and for about €20 less than we had previously thought.  Yahtzee.


After a few changes, quite a bit of sleep, and a few uncomfortable moments in tight spaces with our luggage we arrived in Vicenza where it was dumping buckets of rain.  And I'm from Oregon, so you know it was bad.  We start off with getting lost, but thankfully it's such a compact city center that it was easy enough to correct our mistake and made it to studio where we were reunited with Mom and Dad (Jenny and Don) after our 4 day break.  It was nice to see them.


We met our program director (basically the caretaker for the building and the one in charge of making sure we're all okay during our stay in Vicenza), got our keys, ate some decent €5,00 pizza (drink included!) and headed over to the apartment.


With the exception of my parents' house, best accommodations I've probably ever had.  Apparently a major judge for Veneto lives in our building.  We have a buzzer at the front door.  We're talking average middle class, but it's nice to finally be in a real place, somewhere a little more concrete.  It was like we're finally home after four weeks on the road.


All the guys are in one apartment and all the girls are in another, both located at opposite ends of Corso Andrea Palladio - that's right, a street named after an architect.  What a wonderful place.


That evening we had an orientation to the facilities, got new cell phones (which I immediately disassembled, removed the SIM card, and put it in my phone)*, went over rules, etc.  After we got to try the self-service restaurant that we'll be most likely eating at nearly every weeknight in Vicenza.  My verdict: food was good, especially the pasta e fagioli, but the worst wine ever.  Like, spicy vinegar bad.  Overall, avoid the wine and I should be good for the next 2 months.


*My new number is this: +39 349.241.3337.  If you call me on skype when it has the 'to mobile' symbol I can receive the call for free!  This is especially important since I don't have internet at my apartment.  So call away!  But remember most days I'll be in studio from dawn til dusk.


As you may recall, it's been raining like the world was going to end this whole time.  So as we walk back to our apartment we notice that everyone is at the bridge looking at the river.  Police, old ladies, kids, everyone.  As it turns out the water level raised something around 2.5 meters since we'd been there.  Another meter and our whole area of town would have flooded, but not knowing that the water was reaching it's high point we decided to help out by helping distribute sandbags.  That's right, less than 10 hours in Vicenza and we're already doing community service.  While JohnNils (roommate at home) still has the philanthropist of the year award for buying a homeless man a fish sandwich on new years, I feel like we should at least get best supporting philanthropists.  Though, I must say, it was more idea than action as there were so many people and so few sandbags that each of us ended up carrying about 4 or 5 off a truck, a few more to peoples' cars or houses.


Quick side story: over night, wicked awesome thunder storm.  Lightning was striking what looked and sounded like only a few blocks away, never more than a half mile away.  It was great.  I think Italy probably gets the Best Thunderstorms award.


This morning we had our first studio meeting.  We have what I consider the dream studio slot: 9am-1pm.  Freshman year we were put through the hideous 8am-12pm, and now in Eugene we're subjected to 1pm-5pm, but getting it done in the morning is so much easier.  Studio itself is amazing.  We're in this gigantic room with widows on both sides and an exposed truss roof.  Everyone gets two desks, we're all against windows, and it is absolutely wonderful.  My view is directly into the canopy of about 10 trees which is beautiful and out the right side of studio I have a nice view of medieval city fabric.

STUDIO!

WARNING: this post is about to get realllllly boring for those of you who aren't in architecture, so I would advise to skip to the end.


Our project is a mainly civil building adjacent to Palladio's building in the central piazza.  We have our choice whether we want to 'demolish' the existing building or keep it, either way there is the main piazza and two secondary piazzas to deal with on the site.  The challenge is that our new project must fit in the context without mimicking the surroundings, create three areas of good public space, and facilitate better circulation between the three public areas, all while containing the program which includes public meeting facilities and administrative works.  I'm quite excited for it, as I am a big fan of sloped sites and really excited to be focusing on external connections and facades.  Should be a good term.


Next week we go to Verona, and Venezia (Venice) so there will definitely be a new post somewhere in there.  Otherwise it's studio as usual, I'll update if anything interesting comes up.  Ciao ragazzi.