March 26, 2009

went to visit a bunch of sites today. During Architecture in Italy, we visited Palazzo Davanzati. I guess it's an unusual palazzo because of how tall it is. Palazzi usually have more of a horizontal organization but the Davanzati family made their palazzo really tall with a central lightwell giving it more of a vertical organization. After class, Nikul and I visited the Galileo exhibit in the Palazzo Strozzi Museum. We have to write a paper on Palazzo Strozzi, so we were required to visit the inside, but the exhibit was actually pretty cool. It was all about the solar system and the horoscopes and how math, music, science, and all sorts of things have influenced people's theories on the universe over the years.

Studio was also spent visiting sites in Florence. We took a bus to the outskirts of Florence to see the suburban area called Novoli. The architecture there is really different because it's much more modern than the Renaissance historical center, but it still ties in with the general style of Florentine architecture. After walking around for a while, we went to a real estate fair that's being held in the building that used to house the train station. We went around to the different booths, collecting pamphlets and brochures so we can get a feel for the way European apartments tend to be laid out. This is to help us with our current project which includes designing apartments for the University of Florence School of Architecture.