Innsbruck - Alps Weekend - Sunday

It is kind of funny. I fell behind uploading this post because of travel plans and the necessity to bite off more than I should have for my studio's site model. I'm captioning this post late at night in a hostel bed in Barcelona. And I won't even finish the captions until I arrive back in Florence on Sunday night. So I'm a bit behind due to business. But time to reflect on Innsbruck a week ago. (Zaha was here.) That Sunday morning we woke up to rain. At least I brought my hat!

Our travel group is forming a new architecture firm. Our first commission is called the 'breakfast basilica'

This is an accurate representation of what it looked like that day.

The main street through the old city center. During a nice day, the mountains would tower over everything.

The 'Golden Roof' is a major landmark in town. But McMurica also wanted to contribute to the golden feel, so golden arches were added later.

I'm lovin' it.

Our fun plan was to take the funicular across the bridge and up the mountain.

Every major city, another cathedral. Dom du St. Jakob.

But we had to fuel up on cake and strudel first.

ZAHA WAS HERE!!!!

Zaha Hadid, a famous architect known for ridiculously abstract forms,  designed the entire funicular system in Innsbruck.

The crazy bridge is supposed to have mountains where the clouds are. I guess I'll have to come back another time. (Foreshadowing)

 It was interesting to finally see a project by Zaha in person.

Here is the station at the top of the hill.

At the top of the hill (it led to a town much higher on the mountain, but nowhere near the summit.

Another view of the form.

This is what we could see to down below. We could just hardly see Innsbruck.

We started wondering and saw this. Note the lack of handrails. A bit uncomfortable, eh?

We quirky this little town was a jewel for modern architecture. I've never seen so many residential examples in such close proximity.

We kept going and passed under the lift to the top.

And that road became a trail, one quite beautiful.

Large photos weren't quite doing the place justice. So I tried some close ups, which I think my canon point n' shoot does well.

I especially like this one.

And these roots were cool.

At the higher we climbed, the precipitation was wet snow. As we lost altitude, it all became rain. It was interesting to see elevation affect such a thing firsthand.

Forrest once again climbing.

Back at the lowest funicular station was this concrete form used in Zaha's design. But worthy of being pointed to is the  wood markings pressed into the concrete form work. (Mold to which concrete is poured on site) In architecture, we have learned to notice weird stuff like that.

Another baroque church with the ski jump in the background.

This is where baroque doesn't click with me. It is so complex. So detailed. So cluttered. It is like someone exploded a barrel of paint/ plaster and it splattered all over the room, but in a designed manner. Every side bay has a crazy side bay dedicated to some saint, all adorned with an insane amount of detail, and a bunch of babies with wings. I think it was too much visual information to process.

And I just had to snap a picture of this storefront. American sports team hats. Two Penguins hats, not too bad, Pittsburgh. Making its presence in Austria known.