Author: Eleanor Bennett

Sad to Leave Santiago

Sunday and Monday everyone asked how spring break and Chile was and all I could respond was amazing! They would ask well what was amazing?, and I would respond with everything. I explained to a few that my favorite part was climbing up the old and uneven stairs of Cerro Santa Lucia and reaching the top of the castle and looking over the entire city but still being overwhelmingly surrounded by mountains. I explained to others that the most difficult part was the language barrier, but that once I took a step back I could understand what they might be saying due to the activity. To others, I explained that I need to find a really amazing spanish restaurant in Columbus to feed my new found empanada obsession. No matter what I told anyone, I was not able to fully explain how amazing the trip to Chile was. 

I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to travel there and experience a culture and architecture that is so unlike that in the United States. I truly feel that the lessons I have learned from observing and aiming to understand their culture will really help me in the rest of my education and career. 

I am frustrated that the pictures don’t do the country and city justice and my words don’t either, so I have been telling people that if they are ever offered the opportunity to travel to Chile, they have to go. 

Shoutout Christine! When I told her I was considering going to Chile she said you have to go, and so I did! So thank you for encouraging me to take such an amazing trip!

A City and the Sky

View of the Andes from the Benedictine Monastery Lookout

 

Sketch of the City and it’s Mountains

At this view, I was amazed at how the buildings met the mountains. The two stood apart but were understood together. Through this sketch, I aimed to capture how the two connected to one another. I imagined that the mountains were hollow on their underside, and the buildings clipped onto the end of the mountains shell. That way, the buildings do not creep onto the mountains at all, but stand at their periphery, dictated by the location and sprawl of the mountains. It is not as if the mountains are more important than the buildings, they are just much larger and the buildings must respect their space. Similarly, the mountains create valleys to respect the cities space. 

I am planning to color the sketch in with green and blue alcohol markers, so that the green foreground and blue sky will be colored and mountains and city will not. I believe the color will enhance the emphasis upon the relationship between mountain and city.

View of my sketch and the view

Universidad Adolfo Ibanez: Contrast, Trick, Purpose, and Community

The Universidad Adolfo Ibanez is a private design school with an interest in systems engineering. The physical school has been rewarded for its complex design.

View of Rectilinear Exterior Volumes

At first, I thought the interior curvilinear forms (Ramps and rooms) were possibly a response to the curvilinear nature of the mountains meeting the sky and the landscape. Then, the more rectilinear exterior forms would stand in contrast to the site and the interior. Additionally, the white exterior continues to stand in contrast to the blue sky and brown earth, while the off white and light brown interior relates to the earth of the exterior. Therefore, the site, exterior, and interior react equally with one another, and dictate the design. 

View of Weaving Ramps

After taking a closer look, I realized the organization and form as a reaction to the exterior was unlikely. This is because the apertures in the main corridors are rectilinear and random; Very rarely are they related to the human, room, or hallway scale. Additionally, any stairs are designed to appear as they are floating in the middle and grounded at top and bottom by differing stair thickness and tread length. Lastly, the ramps are not understood alone but as a weaving of ramps, which is disorienting through circulation. Therefore, I concluded that the relationship between interior, exterior, and site was not the only design solution, but that the school is designed to trick and confuse the eye and disorient the user. 

View of Floating Library Stairs

In relation to Lo Contador, and the comment made my a professor there, what is the purpose of having a confusing building. At first, I thought there is no purpose. But, Knowlton is a confusing building to outsiders but not to us. Most likely, Adolfo Ibanez is confusing to us but not the students and faculty. Similar to Knowlton, this most likely increases the sense of community of the building and in the school.

Museo Chileno de Arte Precolumbio

I chose to sketch the statues at the Precolumbian museum because I found them particurly interesting and knew they would be a challenging sketch. In order to increase my understanding of the  space that holds the statues, I decided to sketch the relationship of the statues to their surroundings. Therefore, I sketched the statues as they were and placed them facing the artifscts as if they were always looking at them. So, I drew the artifacts in order (front to back) and in the correct organization (left to right). That way, I drew what everyone looks at, and then drew what they (the statues) look at.

I found this to be difficult but very helpful in understanding spatial qualities and relationships of the amazing space!

Statues View of the Artifacts

Full Sketch (View of the Statues and the Staties View of the Artifacts)

View of the Statues

Ellie’s Pre Departure Post

I am writing this waiting for our flights to Santiago. I couldn’t be more excited to land and start to experience the culture and warm weather! I am excited for what the language barrier challenge will show about my non existent Spanish skills, and I am hoping that I leave this trip with a better understanding of the language. I am grateful that a handful of people on the trip are confident in their Spanish skills! I am also extremely excited for the warm weather and how all activities can be down outside. Specifically, I researched restaurants around our hotel, and one has a patio on the street, so I wouldn’t be surprised if I wrote a lot of my blog posts and finished my sketches there.  Overall, I am unbelievably excited to visit the selected sites, and more, and experience Santiago’s rich culture!

After traveling to London, I am confident in some of my traveling skills. But I believe Santiago will be much more difficult – I am up for the challenge! I am particularly excited to have this experience as a stepping stone in my education as I learn about South American culture and architecture in relation to North American architecture.

I am so unbelievebly excited for this trip!