All posts by henritdehahn@yahoo.com

Architectural Education: about conceptual diagraming

Architectural Education

Architectural Education: about conceptual diagraming. I cannot count the number times I’ve listened to colleagues and former professors of mine promote the idea that learning about architecture begins by confronting Architecture (yes, with a capital A) with one’s prejudices about what constitutes a building.  While I often question this pedagogical approach, especially as a way to initiate students to architecture—possibly denying their “suburban” autobiography—I favor that any learning about architecture (yes, with a lower-case a) should be, first and foremost, about finding a strong ethic, method of self-reflection, and empathy toward creating an art form based on space making.

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Memories of The New York Sunday Times

Art & Design

Memories of The New York Sunday Times. There is something rewarding about the world wide web (www), it is instantaneous and research resourcing can be done in the snap-of-a-finger from the comfort of any prosthetic digital device. Fondly called in the early 1990s, the World-Wide Wait (as the new superhighway of cyberspace), I remember when searching was nicknamed “surfing,” to be rapidly replaced by to Google or googling as in “to use Google, the internet search engine, to find information on a person or thing . . .”

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Breakfast bread pudding ham cups

Food, Travel

Breakfast bread pudding ham cups. Breakfast will always be special and, as I’ve said before, the variety of items that constitute the day’s first meal remains endless. However, while I most often return to my favorite selections, I do find myself wanting to try new ways to cook, present, and interpret breakfast staples. Recently, I came across an innovative way to use three basic ingredients: bread, eggs, and ham.

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What does the choice of furniture have to do with architecture?

Architectural Education

What does the choice of furniture have to do with architecture? In recent years, I have proposed a loft renovation project for my second-year architecture studio students, with an emphasis on interior design principles that extend to the selection of furniture and the detailing of cabinetwork.

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Puff pastry with Swiss cheese, bacon and asparagus

Food

Puff pastry with Swiss cheese, bacon and asparagus. Over the past months, I have enjoyed cooking with ingredients readily found in my well stocked pantry or fridge. Using either canned, fresh or frozen vegetables, with occasional left-overs, meals rarely required a last-minute outing to our nearby grocery store.  With some intuition it is fun to combine flavors, textures, and colors and even meet the challenge to cook dishes in less than twenty minutes, from start to seating.

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German Apple Pancake

Food, Travel


German Apple Pancake. After a good night’s sleep, who is not eager to start the day with a temping breakfast—an English word referring to “breaking the fasting period of the previous night.” It’s a morning ritual that defines the day’s first meal and is often referred to as “the most important meal of the day.” Each country favors ingredients that create breakfast specialties that leave us with memorable flavors and visual feasting.

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Peter Zumthor, the lemniscate, Part 2

Architectural Education, Architecture, Travel

Peter Zumthor, the lemniscate, Part 2. While one finds many free-standing architectural masterpieces that utilize a single geometrical shape, few buildings have had an impact on me more than Peter Zumthor’s (1943-) Caplutta Sogn Benedetg near Sumvtig, Switzerland (1985-1988). The chapel, its siting and usage of materials, and the all-encompassing interior space are pure poetry.

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Peter Zumthor, the chapel at Sumvtig, Part 1

Architectural Education, Architecture, Travel

Peter Zumthor, the chapel at Sumvtig, Part 1. Whether you are a student or an architect, you will remember visiting a famous architectural work for the first time. Confronting one’s ‘academic’ knowledge with an in-situ (often through sketching) experience often results in moments of epiphany followed by long lasting memories. Architecture has a tremendous physical power in orchestrating the five senses, eliciting different emotions, and often leaving us speechless in front of the grandeur of a masterpiece.

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Twice baked potatoes

Food

I know, the title twice-baked potatoes seems all too familiar. We have favorite double or twice-baked foods: twice-baked potatoes, New York style cheesecake, Zwieback (zwei in German meaning two, and back[en] meaning to cook, similar to American Melba toast), Italian Biscotti, and even biscuits a word which comes from the “French derived from Latin bescuit—words bis (twice) and coquere (to cook).” Many ways of being twice-cooked.

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Herzog et de Meuron Tavole House

Architectural Education, Architecture, Travel

Herzog et de Meuron Tavole House. Within the plethora of contemporary domestic houses, I continually return to study the Tavole House (Stone House) designed by Swiss architects and 2001 Pritzker Prize Laureates Jacques Herzog (1950-) and Pierre de Meuron (1950-)—the first Pritzker Prize given simultaneously to two architects.  

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