What a weekend.
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| Studio/presentation spaces |
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| Exterior of SCI-Arc |
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| Thesis Projects |
Yesterday I decided to visit SCI-Arc to see their graduate thesis projects. It took an hour by bus to get into downtown LA, and then, because I was without a map, I got lost for about an hour and a half... I walked every way but the right way, so by the time I found the building (which is just one big warehouse in the middle of nowhere), I was exhausted and a bit disappointed by its appearance and location. I couldn't even find an appropriate entrance, so I went in through one of their random loading ramp entrances. SCI-Arc is... different from what I was expecting. The studio space is just laid out in a long warehouse. I will say that the projects were interesting though. From what I saw, a lot of them were all about form. I don't know if my mind is capable of thinking like these students think. It seems so out there.
I may have just ruled out SCI-Arc as one of my grad school candidates.
Today I spent most of my afternoon studying for the GREs. Thanks to Yelp! I was able to find a perfect coffeehouse called
The Talking Stick that's very close to my house. I never noticed it before, even though I bike by it every single morning and evening.
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| Studying GRE Vocab Words |
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| The Talking Stick Coffee Lounge |
I'm very happy that I went in. The atmosphere was intimate, the barista was very friendly, and the tea was delicious. I'll probably do most of my studying there from now on.
what depressing wooden desks... thats neat you went to go see it though. i dislike the exterior as well. good luck with the GRE studying, when are you planning on taking them?
ReplyDeletei registered for october 29th, the last friday of the month (taking the day off from work too).
ReplyDeleteHIT vocab??? do you have the listening tapes too????
ReplyDeletehow the heck can you read that, allie?!
ReplyDeleteno, i don't have tapes... it says "the hit parade" which i guess means the words i have to know... and there's about 400 words that i need to know.
Sci-arc took over an existing Depot building in what was a very bad area of LA. Mainly it is was (still is) part of Skidrow-lots of homeless people. The city of LA made a deal with the school to try to help that area of the city come back to some life. This part of LA has always been dead at night--partly because this is where all the goods entered into LA on the semitrucks. So it really is a warehouse area. It is near the LA River (did you see that ?) which is really not a river but a concrete canal built to move water through the city. [ Have you seen the movie "Chinatown" -- if not you must it is about LA in the early years and the struggle to get water to a basically desert city]. The bridge near SCI-Arc and the area around SCI-Arc has many local movies TV shot there. (Dukes of Hazzard with cars jumping over the bridges-- 24 was shot here a lot can sometimes see SCI-Arc in the background in some episodes.
ReplyDeleteThe fact the a school is now in a building that was designed for receiving goods from around the country I think is an interesting point. How the functions of buildings will change over time. If one set out from the onset to design an architecture school one would not think about having such a long linear building. But the fact that kids ride their bikes from end to end or skateboard is great. A long hallway for display is nice too