Dallas, Texas. Taken at the same spot as this photo – turned 180 degrees.
Tag Archives: Architecture
Tower Building
Tower Building at Fair Park, Dallas, Texas
Artist who restored Fair Park’s Tower Building in ’98 is quite unhappy State Fair of Texas installed security cameras on historic landmark
I looked at my photos – the cameras are now gone.
Borg Cube
(click to enlarge)
This HDR picture of the top corner of the Wyly theater was taken from the same spot that I took yesterday’s photograph of the Winspear Opera House.
I have always been amazed at the strange appearance of the Wyly, of its clockwork like theater machine interior, and was very happy and impressed when I saw The Tempest there. It is surprising how inexpensive the productions are (if you are willing to go for the cheap seats – which are still pretty damn close) and I can’t believe that the shows aren’t selling out.
It’s probably the economy… and people simply don’t think of doing stuff like that. I’ll tell you, it’s hard to find folks that want to go to plays, live plays, even if they cost about what the newest 3D Googleplex Shopping Mall crap does.
Opera House
(click to enlarge)
Ever since I moved to Dallas thirty years ago, I have yearned for the city to have a center, a heart, a place where people gathered. The city planners and developers, such as they are, want that too – but there are the challenges of weather, history, and the city’s car-based culture to do battle.
Now, with the emergence of the city’s Arts District with it’s line of award-winning buildings there is some hope that the vision might be completed. I have been going down there a lot lately (sometimes to simply watch ice melt) and it is a place of varied and interesting attractions.
The heart of the district may be the plaza outside of the Winspear Opera House. The huge elevated grid of aluminum louvers is surprisingly effective at suppressing the roasting summer sun while still allowing a breeze and light to penetrate.
This HDR tonemapped image shows the opera house plaza with a couple of the melting blocks from the transcendence art project.
It is depressing though – most of the times I go down there, in the midst of billions of dollars worth of buildings and artwork, carefully planned, constructed, arranged and maintained – I have the place to myself. It can be a gorgeous, lonely world.
Beck Park
From when I worked Downtown I have had an fond appreciation for small “pocket” parks in the dense urban core. I have a deep love for these tiny jewel-like pieces of nature stuck down in the concrete vastness.
A really nice one in Dallas is Beck Park, a private oasis that is open for public use. Carefully designed, it is a set of four “room” with a waterfall, some rocks, grass, and tables.
I like it and miss the days when I worked down there. Maybe some day during the holidays the weather will be nice enough for me to go down there and sit for a while, read a little, write a little, relax. That would be nice.
A skyscraper towers over the water feature in Beck Park
I forgot to write down the name and artist of this sculpture in Beck Park
New Orleans Architecture – Lower Garden District – Kayak Storage
In art – in the life worth living – there is always a struggle between beauty and functionality. I love finding examples that combine the two.
In the Lower Garden District – St. Andrews and Chestnut – Someone is using a beautiful old wrought iron balcony to store a couple of kayaks. I’m not sure why, but I really like that.
New Orleans Architecture – The Garden District
The Garden District in New Orleans is one place where time has ceased to exist. The ancient, worn mansions, massive greenery, and unique architecture keeps sitting there in the humid gulf air, sticking a middle finger at floods, storms, and modernity itself. The best place for a peaceful afternoon walk. It’s no wonder so many rich and famous end up there.
The Garden District is famous for its collection of giant stately mansions. But I like some of the little details the best. Look at this beautiful little curved porch off a bedroom overlooking Magazine Street. I would like to have a morning coffee on a balcony like this at every dawn for the rest of my life.
Look at the iron railings and the colors on this building. I love the lime green on the underside of the porch overhangs. All through New Orleans you see the little round punched tin lights like you see here – they are beautiful at night.
Another cool overhang. this one is painted sky blue and you can clearly see the round lights.
The trees and the porches – they seem to be growing together.
I never get tired of looking at the intricate and beautiful details on the wooden overhang bracing.
New Orleans Architecture, French Quarter
I love the wrought iron railings throughout the French Quarter. They are beautiful even when they are not crowded with Mardi Gras crowds showering topless women with cheap plastic beads. Most of the balconies are decorated – many with tacky sports stuff – but some are particularly attractive with loads of live plants.
Something you see in tropical climates is the idea of a shaded green interior plaza or atrium with a water feature. The water and plants add a coolness, making the mid day heat almost bearable and the rest of the day delightful. These are wonderful and usually hidden living spots.
A bare balcony showing off the beauty of the elaborate wrought iron.
New Orleans is the most original of all American Cities. The French Quarter has become a tourist Mecca, but in the mornings it still feels like the natural heart of the city.
My Favorite Bit of Street
And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack
And you may find yourself in another part of the world
And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile
And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful
wife
And you may ask yourself-Well…How did I get here?
—-David Byrne
It’s not a street, just a strip of a few houses. They aren’t even big houses, they are classic New Orleans Shotgun Houses – these have a second floor in the back, called Camelback Houses. It’s at Sixth and Camp in the Garden District.
(click to enlarge) Sixth and Camp in New Orleans - a beautiful row of Camelback Shotgun Houses
I love the colors. I love the front porches, so close to the street. I love the floorplan. I really love the brackets supporting the roof apron over the front porch.
I first saw this street at night when Candy and I walked through the area from the Saint Charles Streetcar on the way to eat on Magazine Street. Under the streetlights the houses looked like they were made of icing – so bright and delicate. I came back during the day to see if they looked as nice under the sunlight.
They did.
We are such stuff as dreams are made on
I remember when each and every building in the Dallas Arts District went up – starting decades ago when I worked downtown and they built the Art Museum and I’d sit in the sculpture garden and eat my paper sack sandwich lunch (it was free back then, believe it or not). Then the Symphony hall, and the Nasher. Finally, the completion of the district with the Opera House and the Wyly theater (there is still one more theater under construction).
I love the area and hope that Dallas can make it into the vibrant urban spot they want. So far, it’s a beautiful but usually desolate destination. It hasn’t reached the tipping point where the vast population out in the suburbs think of downtown as a place to go – but the city is working on it.
One fact that I was definitely wrong on is that, as much as I loved the Wyly as architecture, I was afraid I’d never be able to actually go to the thing. It felt like a gift to the wealthy, a plaything for the rich, and the poor proles like myself, the workin stiffs, would never be able to afford to visit.
I was mistaken. I read that the Dallas Theater Center was producing The Tempest at the Wyly and I surfed over to check out the price. It cost about what a 3D movie is going for. Well, I love me some Shakespeare, so I clicked on to a Tuesday night and bought a couple tickets. I was as interested in the theater itself as the play, so I bought the cheapest seats – up in the nosebleed section.
The Wyly Theater.
The Wyly is a magnificent and unique piece of architecture. It is a theater of a revolutionary “Stacked” design – the the boxoffice and lounge, performance space, rehearsal and ancillary spaces are piled up on top of each other to give tremendous flexibility and endless possibilities for unique performances. I looks like a Borg Cube has landed in downtown Dallas and it operates like a theater “machine.”
I was excited to actually see the thing in action. Oh, and I love “The Tempest” too.
We rode the DART train downtown to the Pearl Station and walked over to the Wyly. You descend down a ramp to the main entrance which is beneath the building itself. Then you ride an elevator up to the seats. We were in the cheap seats – but they were still great. We were looking down onto the stage from a short distance away – I can’t say these were any worse than the premium seats (only a few dollars more, actually) below us.
Kids Splashing in front of the Wyly Theater. An HDR image I took on the opening day of the theater.
This was a pared-down version of The Tempest which let the skills of the actors shine through. Still, there was plenty of clever stagecraft – a terrifying plane crash in the beginning (with the rows of seats tumbling down through a hole in the floor) – a character emerging from beneath the earth through a crack in the chalky island soil, and a terrifying spirit descending from above to deliver the message of doom.
The production was gorgeous to look at.
One nice touch was that the lighting would subtly change whenever a character would deliver a soliloquy or aside. It was an effective way of signaling what was going on.
All modern Shakespeare productions, especially The Tempest, are modified to some extent. At first, I thought they had simplified the language, because I understood it so much better than I usually did. After a while, I realised that the text was the same, it was simply that the acoustics are so good in the Wyly that I could hear the actors like crystal. Greatness! Oh brave new world that has such people in’t.
In my opinion, a production of The Tempest rises or falls on Ariel. Can the Actor/Actress (I’ve seen both… about 50/50) make a believable sprite? Can they be light as a breeze when needed while as powerful and terrifying as a storm? This production had a local actor that has made it on Broadway, Hunter Ryan Herdlicka … and he did a great job. They were able to use his singing voice as a powerful tool to move the drama along – too often I’ve seen the songs in The Tempest be more of a distraction than an effective part of the play.
Reviews:
So, I went down there to see the theater, and I was not disappointed. And I came away impressed with the production, I really enjoyed it… and after all, the play’s the thing (oops, wrong Shakespeare play).
Gentle breath of yours my sails
Must fill, or else my project fails,
Which was to please. Now I want
Spirits to enforce, art to enchant;
And my ending is despair,
Unless I be reliev’d by prayer,
Which pierces so that it assaults
Mercy itself, and frees all faults.
As you from crimes would pardon’d be,
Let your indulgence set me free.
Aluminum Tube Skin on the Wyly Theater
Bill Chance 