Barbican Birthday with Aalto

Another year, another birthday.
This one happened to be 27.

Saturday saw us have a pretty boring day, although we did go and see the new David Lynch film, Inland Empire. At three hours long, it almost caused me to have a brain hemorrhage. Lynch is pretty tough going at the best of times, but this film was a complete Head-Messer. A single story, that looks like it is actually five, dream-like sequences, completely surreal/abstract in-between bits made it quite hard to follow, but it was visually and musically stunning, as all of his films are. It finished with a musical number that made you leave the cinema thinking you knew what actually happened, only to realize 10 minutes later that you really had no idea.......I think!

Sunday was my birthday, yeah! Spent the morning reading one of our papers of choice, the Times (the other is the Guardian). Then ventured off to the Barbican to see Alvar Aalto: Through the Eyes of Shigeru Ban.

Having not been to the Barbican previously, I was quite keen to see some early 80's brutalist, utopian architecture. To my surprise, as a complete complex it works very well and more importantly I liked it. At eight acres, it's absolutely huge. I think that some of the recent refurbishment work has dealt with a lot of the navigation problems that I had been warned about, but it's quite simple if you read the signs and follow the lines on the ground to actually get into the place! Bridgette shouted me lunch at the Balcony Bistro, which was very nice indeed. Fantastic salmon and a great veggie burger. Then it was off to the Aalto exhibition.

I had forgotten how beautiful and detailed Aalto's version of Modernism was. The exhibition showed his work through 14 key projects, covering housing, medical, government, educational, cultural and furniture pieces.

The most intriguing aspects of the exhibition was that it was presented by Shigeru Ban, a Japanese architect who creates really interesting buildings and structures with paper tubes. He fits into the 'Ecological Architect' category (what ever that is) but cites Aalto has one of his main influences. Personally I think his work fits nicely into more of an 'Ecological Modernism' category really.

We met Marine (fellow CF Møller employee) afterwards and had a coffee, in addition to a wonderful carrot cake that she presented me with upon arrival. Let just say that after smuggling it into the cafe, there was only a small slither left, I swear it wasn't me :)

The evening was spent at home, Bridgette studying in one corner, and me pulling our bikes apart in the other. Our forks are going off to Mojo Suspension to be serviced for the first time. Will let you know how that one goes in the near future.

Pete