Tuesday, March 2, 2010

NYC Day 2 Part 2


So back to the hotel after Central Park and the Met to check out the new view from our hotel. Gorgeous.


I'm not sure that there's another building more graceful or soaring in shape and idea than the Chrysler building. It's elegance in concrete and steel. If it wouldn't ruin the specialness of the existing building, then I would argue that every city should have the same tower to remind urban people all around the world what grand, tall architecture can aspire to. (Sorry Sears/Willis Tower. . . despite your height, you still have plenty to learn. . . )


But we shouldn't ignore the shorties or the Modern in New York. I love this color-blocked blue/white/gray building as well. I don't know what it is or what its use is, but the way all of the repeating shapes of the windows play against one another but also multiply the shape of the whole building? It's clever. It doesn't soar, but it's smart. (You might say, "This building has a nice personality.")

After resting at the hotel for a bit, we hopped the subway down to the Staten Island Ferry.


And I swear we didn't plan to go at sunset. There was no reason to even suspect in the overcast day that there would be one, but the following pictures show that we were lucky, so very lucky to have caught the ferry at the most amazing part of the day.



The light was ridiculous.


Ferry, Statue of Liberty and Sunset? Does this happen everyday.






Even the shipping yards looked great in this light.


All of the pilings with their individual round snowcaps just struck me as silly or cute or in this light, an interesting study in negative space, how the snow made seeing the dark shapes beneath them possible in low light.



I hope New Yorkers don't take their city for granted.

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