March 25, 2009

Today is Capodanno Fiorentino, which is the Florentine New Year. It's also called Annunciazione di Maria or the Annunciation of Mary. Every year on this day, there's a festival in Piazza di Santissima Annunziata with little stalls of clothes and knick-knacks and sweets. Luckily, we had to meet at the Foundling Hospital in Piazza di Santissima Annunziata for studio today, so I headed up there early and got to enjoy the festivities, including some amazing fried dough. The reason we had to go to the Foundling Hospital was to go to a conference hosted by Syracuse University on finding public space in unexpected places. Three different architects presented their ideas on the subject and then there was a round-table discussion. I left after the first two architects, because it was soooooo long. I didn't find it particularly interesting because of how long it was, but it was kind of interesting to go to an architectural conference.