a different take on new & old architecture in frankfurt
This is the first view you’ll get of Frankfurt as you step out of the central train station, the “Hauptbahnhof,” and it pretty much sums up my initial impression of the city, at least in terms of its physicality, its architecture. There’s a mix and a contrast of an old European city, with low-level buildings, in a classic style with decorative facades (some original and a lot rebuilt and abbreviated/modernized in style) — and the city’s 17 or so skyscrapers, mostly in an ultra-modern mirror-like style.
Frankfurt is the home to the European Central Bank (possible that tower in the back to the right) as well as a large stock exchange and financial sector, which accounts for the huge office buildings, commonplace in many parts of the US but an anomaly here in Europe — particularly “foreign” to cities like Paris or Rome which are justifiably concerned with keeping their historic character. To get ahead of myself, this aspect of the city’s economy also accounts for its prosperity as a small city, and it’s vibrant scene of small modern restaurants and myriad of lunch types of places and “happy hour” bars and cafes, another big difference from my last experience in Rome.
The facades of some old buildings, reflected in the modern European Central Bank.
Frankfurt was bombed heavily during World War II and a lot of the architecture was destroyed — particularly in the large original Medieval neighborhood near the central “Rom” square and the cathedral (not pictured). All except one I believe of these medieval-style houses that you can see today are re-creations (“You can tell because all the lines are actually straight!” as someone pointed out to me), as was the famous landmark of the Alte Oper (operahouse), which is seen below. It was destroyed and this one was built replicating the original in the 1970s.
Above you can see how a lot of the rest of the city coped with the destruction: what appears to be a building half-destroyed in the war, with the left in the original style, and the right half built with a nod to the old architectural elements, but unabashedly modern.
Personally I really like this idea — the destruction of war is obviously an awful thing, but it has also given Frankfurt an opportunity that many European cities like Rome don’t let themselves take, to carve out a new 20th and 21st century identity, looking solely forward. New buildings that break with old styles are not aberrations to be debated by the city and inevitably hated by half the citizens, but they are an inevitability.
The small number of towers, loosely spaced around the center of the city, lets you actually get a look at them as well, unlike in a place like New York where it’s a tourist move (and a quite literal pain in the neck) to look up and try to get a sense of the scale of the buildings. The center also has a large amount of green space to help you breathe a little oxygen, the result of an interesting twist of history that I will write about soon!
So this is a first little look at Frankfurt, as I am still finding my footing in the city myself. I know of course, and have no illusions, that it is not a city with the grandeur of Rome, but I am quite looking forward to what it will have in store for me, in part because it is so vastly different from what I’ve seen before.
blending the old and new in italian palazzi
I try to see as many art and design exhibits as I can here in Italy in small galleries and palazzi (old buildings build for aristocratic families in centuries past), because I am often disappointed by the larger museums. A great post on another blog about the incorporation of contemporary art into chateaus in France made me think about one of the aspects of these small galleries that I like the most — the perfect eye that curators and exhibit designers often bring to mixing and contrasting the old, history-laden spaces with new art, new creativity, and a hyper-modern way of presenting it. I always find that the shows I like the least are those that try to stay all historical, or all contemporary. Neither exists without the other, and a country like Italy or France has a unique ability to incorporate this into exhibits that galleries in the US unfortunately do not.
One of the best examples of this I’ve seen was an exhibit held for just two days in Milan’s Palazzo Marino last year by Dolce & Gabbana to celebrate 20 years of their menswear collections. Elegant rooms with painted and sculpted ceilings, frescoes and portraits and marble covering every inch, were filled with slick chrome and glass walls, multimedia displays flashing through their history in images and quotes, as well as interactive photo galleries and huge books to flip through everywhere. The exhibit celebrated Dolce & Gabbana, their cutting edge style and quality of craft, but framed this perfectly in the context of the many centuries that Italy has been at the greatest heights of art and design and embellished details, renowned for its tradition of valuing beauty.
Embedded in plexiglass around the halls were dozens of iPads for flipping through the image galleries at your own pace.
The old, delicate details of the old palazzo were also contrasted by rough, mismatched wood used in these book stands.
My favorite detail of the exhibit though was how they very literally brought the nostalgia of craftsmanship together with modernity: in a side room a tailor sat on a very slowly turning platform, working on finishing a hem or buttonhole or other details, as people passed through and watched. Next to him on a little table a radio played those classic, instantly recognizable Italian songs from the 50s and 60s, and around the room were finished tuxedo jackets on mannequins, patterns pinned up, all the accoutrements of a classic tailor’s shop. Something you can still see in fact if you happen to pass by an open sartoria door today. The whole thing might seem a little kitschy I suppose, but personally I found it sincere, a tribute to the often forgotten detail work, which in a lot of ways is what has made this country great. I guess I had a personal attachment as well though, as once upon a time I studied pattern-making and sewing in night classes in New York.
One of the somewhat controversial blendings of old and new in Rome however is the Museum of the Ara Pacis. It is an “altar to peace” from ancient Rome, amazingly preserved, which several years was housed in a very modernly designed museum, designed by American architect Richard Meier, to protect it from the elements. Romans are understandably finicky about adding anything to change drastically the look or character of their city, particularly when it comes to their ancient architecture, but I think that the simplicity of the design — all glass, metal, crisp white walls and neutral stone — is a fitting way to house the monument stylishly without detracting from it, allowing much of the altar and sculptures to still be visible to anyone walking by. A beautiful fountain in front of the museum has turned it into a gathering place as well, especially beloved by children exhausted by the hot sun.
The Museum of the Ara Pacis, Rome.
A few days ago I was in Bologna, seeing my aunt and uncle who are traveling in Italy with friends, and again the museum which stands out as most successful in my mind is the Palazzo Fava: a beautiful old house famed for its Renaissance frescoes showing the story of Jason and the Argonauts and Medea, but which filled much of the rest of its space with contemporary art. I particularly liked a series of sculptures of cypress trees, a quintessential feature of the central Italian landscape, in blocky marble, wood and even one made of thin blades of rusted sheet metal. On the top floor of the palazzo there was also a small exhibit about the design of a new concert hall being built, which itself takes its asymmetrical shape from the old outline of the city walls of Renaissance Bologna: a perfect tribute to history.
Cipresso e la sua amica pioggia, by Angelo Micheli, 2009, at Palazzo Fava, Bologna.
day tripper in siena
Siena is a small city in the hills of Tuscany, incredibly popular with tourists because, within its walls, it is completely preserved with all its medieval architecture: narrow streets, imposing stone walls, little shops everywhere selling all the classic items — leather, silk scarves and ties, lithographs and prints, antiques, artisinal foods. If you want to step back in history, this is the place to go.
One of the things that the city is most known for is horses, because every June a legendary horse race takes place right through its central square, Piazza del Campo (which roughly translates to stadium square). The rest of the year, of course, this piazza just serves as the social heart of the city, a place where tourists and locals alike mill about and lounge around as soon as the sun is warm enough in the spring to do so.
From Rome, with one change of trains, the trip takes around three hours, which is a little longer than is ideal for a day trip, but passing through the hills of Tuscany as you do in the train is a worthwhile endeavor in itself, so it doesn’t feel like wasted time. Olive groves, crumbling old towns and farmhouses, hills with dew rising in the morning sun and horizons dotted with cyprus trees… It’s really like another world, not reality.
I had been to Siena before, and logic would probably state that I should have tried somewhere new, seen something else instead, but there’s something nice about going to a place you know you’ll love, that you know lives up to the hype. There are several other “medieval cities” around Tuscany, but Siena is probably considered the classic example.
Each neighborhood in the city has a symbol and colors to go along with it, in this case the turtle, with yellow and blue. Vendors around the Piazza del Campo sell scarves with each neighborhood’s insignia and colorful patterns, and in June you see them hung up around the city as flags, because it is these “teams” that compete in the horse race.
Cities throughout Tuscany are mostly comprised of red brick buildings, and shades of brown and orange stones, but in their cathedrals a popular style are these white and dark stripes, as seen below on Siena’s duomo. Think of Florence’s famous duomo, which has dark green stripes and also pinkish red ones along its sides, then a red brick dome. Against the intensely bright blue sky, it’s quite a contrast, especially in the haze and shadows of the narrow streets around.
“Antique” and modern styles of food shopping…
Carciofi (artichokes) 15 for 5 euros… not a bad deal. I read recently that they are technically a flower, which is why they are in season now in the spring.
While the beauty in Tuscany is breathtaking, even for someone who’s been in Italy long enough to take it for granted here in Rome, what I really love about the region is the atmosphere, the culture, at least what I perceive it as. The people in Tuscany seem so much nicer, so much friendlier than anywhere else. Maybe more like how Italy used to be years ago, provincial in a good way.
They’re used to the high volume of tourists I guess and they take it in stride, rather than having the cynical attitude toward it that we have in NY for example. The main piazza is filled with tourists, yes, but sitting there in the afternoon sun there were also lots of local people, a meeting place for friends to drop by, sit with a beer or bottle of wine, relax, read, talk (Compare with Times Square, which yes is a different scale, but a local wouldn’t be caught dead there). These cities like Siena and Florence and even Venice in a sense — they seem to find their own pace, their own rhythm underneath the bustle of so many strangers in and out each day. And because Siena is mostly a day-trip destination, as the afternoon wears on into evening, you see the population diminish, the sun fades, the city is all theirs again.
Outside of context, perhaps this won’t make sense, but I want to post it anyway. It’s from a brochure for La Biennale in Venezia, the architect describing his work renovating an old palazzo for contemporary use. I found it interesting, a “found poem” of sorts…
“For the ancient Hall of Mirrors (Sala degli Specchi), I conceived a design of signs and fragments of images and surfaces, of mirrors and reflections, of elements that emerge from the wall to bring it alive like black traces on white paper… it is the beginning of a new story.
The traces of light that move like water and earth, like the marshy lands of the lagoon where solid and fluid alternate with the motion of the tides. Inside and outside communicate in a single stream of reflections and refractions, of real images and images of light. The real and the imaginary, surprise, reflection and discovery come alive in images of natural and artificial light.”
Each neighborhood in the city has a symbol and colors to go along with it, in this case the turtle, with yellow and blue. Vendors around the Piazza del Campo sell scarves with each neighborhood’s insignia and colorful patterns, and in June you see them hung up around the city as flags, because it is these “teams” that compete in the horse race. 
