Ack!

Ah.

I decided to change the template. As if it isn't already very obvious to you, I need to be more active (in blogging in general and in designing in particular) and attentive to the design detail considering that I will become a designer of some sorts in the future (hah!) and paying meticulous attention to his/her immediate milieu should come naturally to every designer. Yes, I kid myself a lot.

Nooo... I kid you not. Just like painters who ponder what color expresses what corresponding emotion, some clothes designer and contemporary architects in fact do a lot of research on material, pattern, and method, trying to formulate a perfect recipe that best articulates their ideas. Okay this might sound ridiculous to some, but to sound like the fattest snob ever, I think these people's brains must be all used up, worn down, and wrinkled because they never stop thinking about shit. (However, as one of my friends once put it, outside of the art world who in this world takes art seriously anyway? Whatever...)

Take as an example the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, Scotland, which I had the honor to pay a visit to this past winter break. Designed by Eric Miralles, the architecture of this new parliament building has won numerous awards for its creativity, originality, and its genuine and successful attempt at representing and articulating Scottishness through the design and material.

Aerial View at night

Aerial View from the Top
(on the right across from the Parliament is a Scottish palace, which you can't see in this picture)

A l'interieur

So what did I mean when I was talking about the exterior design and the articulation of the underlying idea? Basically, the building incorporates and reflects the ideas of earth, land, and the Scottish indigenity. When I read the Statement, I was suddenly reminded of a Sanskrit word Bhumi, which to me doesn't mean just land in its bare physical sense but transcends to the national ties the people have to their homeland. Personally, I'm not too sure if I feel anything at all (admiration, disapproval, etc) towards the building, but I sincerely respect the architect's choice and more importantly I appreciate the fact that the steel-and-glass dogma of contemporary architecture is employed to speak for something deeper than the clichéd "simplicity."

I visited the Scottish Parliament as part of my visit to Scotland (which is in turn part of my trip to the UK). The Parliament in fact also function as a museum displaying, well, itself to the visitors. There is an exhibition on the history of the project on the first floor with tons of brochures with many different languages.I took some of the most beautiful pictures in Scotland, only to lose them all later due to some technical difficulty on my friend's laptop (hah!). But despite all this, a good time was had. I love Glasgow and Edinburgh and would certainly love to go back if a second chance comes around.

On an unrelated note, to pick up on my last post on my pathetic insomniac self that I left off at last time. Dear good god, this occasional friend of mine Insomnia for some reason has changed his mind to prolong his stay. With me. But his pattern is different this time around, mind you. Instead of keeping me perfectly awake from 3AM to 10AM, he now plays a game of deception. tsk.tsk.tsk. He lets me sleep - or at least me think I am sleepy - at around 3AM and three hours later smacks me right in my head. Results? Me fully awake again at around 6AM like no man's business. Ridiculous.

Ok, I vow to pimp my blog once inspiration comes around. Man this is just so bad to live simply on other people's inspiration.