C A C | Valencia

Ciutat de les Arts I Les Ciències is the Valencian spelling. In Valencia you always find at least two spellings of Spanish. Catalan and Valencian.

If the Steven Spielberg movie JAWS was a building...

I drove to Valencia from Vila Joiosa. I´m in the Costa Blanca area to work, but decided to travel out from Cph a little earlier and see some friends on this coast so I flew in to Alicante. I wanted to go to the Arts&Science city in Valencia. It´s important to remember it is a city. Not one building. Not just ONE landmark, but many. I know just a little. I have read and seen the photos of this gigantic space designed and sculpted by the Valencia born Santiago Calatrava and the Oceanographic park is created by Felix Candela. The Oceanographic park I will look more closely at next time. This Valencia trip I dedicated to seeing the paramount sculpture city park that Calatrava has created. I was not ready. I had not grasped how enormous it is. At this cultural&scientific center that holds several museums, opera house, theatre, exhibition areas, restaurants, shops and attractions on a 350 000 sqm area. It is overwhelming. I saw the architecture as sculptures. From tiny to enormous. I could not stop staring. I stared and took photos and felt good. This was a big experience for me. When I saw the Guggenheim in New York,  the Sidney Opera House and the Sagrada Família  was a similar feeling. But....this space/place/landmark is not just one building it´s a whole city of sculptural architecture. If I was a choreographer I would like to create a piece that dances in the shallow pools of water and that moves down the dramatic stairs. If I was an actor/singer I would crave to be in a musical, opera or play that opens in this theater. If I was a director I would plan to make both movie and TV series here - a documentary (hopefully one has already been done and I do not know about it)  has to be made of this cultural, scientific & historic sculptural monument that we luckily can abbreviate to CAC. 

Enjoy!

-I sure did

/Jimmy 

The structure of the buildings are as much the sculpture.

If you have seen Calatrava´s brigde in Buenos Aires than you smile when you see this harp shape.Here you see my blog post from when I saw the Puenta De la Mujer bridge in Bu Ai. 

I can not wait until the greens have taken over this part. It is along tunnel in which I could not be it, but it holds a garden and spaces that I see filled with cultural events. This is hard to grasp from looking at his picture but the highest point in this structure must be over 15 meters high.

Here you almost grasp the enormity of this place.

The pools of water on mosaics is like a sea surrounding CAC.

I think of Gaudi when I see these structural beams.

The beauty of this huge sculpture. If you look at it like I do, it is the largest sculpture in the world.

This is a exhibition by Heinz Mack called www.ninecolumns.com

Think of making an exhibition of water plants in all of these pools.

A playful attitude to art&sciens is applied all over.

Go and see and experience CAC in Valencia, Spain. NOW!

You see Calatrava can not have someone else putting in a bench in his sculpture. He makes a bench like one you never seen before. Just like his vision of a city that we never before have visited. Thank you for sharing your inner city of CAC.

C O U N T R Y | side living

The quiet country home on the hill had a predecessor that burnt down. Magnus Runesson and Rafi Sady found their house on fire and it did not take long for it to be consumed in flames. 

Luckily they were not hurt. They were in the barn style house they had just completed right next to the well kept old gem of a country house that had been kept as a memory of Magnus childhood, growing up close by. 

After the fire, they rebuilt the house and then made some changes. I´m here to visit my friends,  have not been here at their country home for some years.  Rafi is a old friend of mine but we usually meet in Stockholm or elsewhere. Tel Aviv for example where Rafi works and lives as well. The house on the hill have first been rebuilt and then the interior work had begun.

 Magnus is an architect and Rafi is a dancer/choreographer/project leader that has worked with me for a couple of years when we were working with big interior photo shoots with photographers in Stockholm and in Spain as well. 

I will not show you more of their wonderful country home because we have decided to make a photo feature out of it (!) It´such a magical place! Love to work with projects like this and so happy to see how my friends have made this place their home in their own way. Thank you for having us over for a magic summer night at your place.

/Jimmy

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The roofed patio connects that main house with the guest room (where I stayed) and next to it is a round lovely sauna.

The chair and the kids present just made me behave this way...

The interior has a white base but lots of color is injected by the furniture.

Not many have their own lake a small walk down the hill like this couple does.

We had dinner down by the lake with the open fire going. Even a sauna and a dip in the lake (or two)

The house reflects the surrounding nature.

C A S A | adult boho style

Pool cool interiors making the outdoors your vacay living room

Casa Cook on Rhodes,Greece,is a hotel I instantly went for when I saw it. It´s just so wonderful when the interiors and the feeling created just talks to you. 

This Boho chic paradise is
designed by Michael Schickinger and Annabell Kutuc and is for adults only. How nice for a change. 

Casa Cook stands for a new type of hotels, inspired by the spirit of our times. Created for trend-conscious travellers by Thomas Cook.The 90-room adults-only Casa Cook Rhodes is the first on the scene. 

Do you like it?

/Jimmy 

XL basket type of pendant/ceiling lamps making a statement

The outdoor places to be

The tiles in the restaurant seats you in the djungle for dinner.

Soft beach tones along with a earthy base.

Tiles that talks.

OVERSIZED proportions lovingly used.

S T R Ö M M A | farm lodge

The  beautiful part of the Farm lodge, the old mill and the stream.

The artists  performing in the barn this summer at Strömma Farmlodge.

Finally I listened to my mothers advice. She has been saying that next time I come to Varberg, well Getterön, I should go with her to Strömma Farmlodge. So we did. We took the car and just outside Varberg among the fields of barley we see some worn down barns by the stream. First sight of Strömma Farmlodge is a run down farm. A white trash worn down out of the way cow shack. But...the owners have the touch. They have seen the charm that is there. They have taken a shitty worn down ugly farm and turned it from a white trash scrawny ranch to a charmful treasure of Farm lodge with the most lovely surroundings. Here you shop the boho chic, grunge cool stuff&interiors, have a coffey in grandmas recovered cups and stay over with reclaimed stylishness in their B&B. 
We´ll be back!

/Jimmy 

The extremely cool grunge style house shop.

A white trash gone treasure type of shopping shack

The old mill turned café is a sight to see and lots of room indoors and outdoors to enjoy it. Lovely slow food atmosphere.

Cosy being the middle name to the Farmlodge of Strömma.

Nothing like a Ho´down by the Farmlodge by the stream.

T H I E S | plywood home

All photos by Per Magnus Persson www.pmpersson.com

The summer house filled Swedish Residence magazine is in the July issue featuring the home of architect Rolf Richard Thies and his wife Eva. 

Per Magnus Persson and I arrived at the their house among the sand dunes on the east coast of southern Sweden, and were warmly welcomed by Eva. 

We stayed for the day and photographed their house inside and out. We were not only served lunch but also wonderful conversation and company from the since long married couple that inhabited the house by the sea. 

We were to keep contact Eva and I long after the shoot and talked on the phone at least once a month. We found a friendship. 

 Residence magazine have added Rolf´s architecture to their features much due to the use of plywood in house construction, in which Mr Thies was a pioneer. 

Read the piece in the July issue by Anna Carlquist and you will understand. 

Showing you here the pictures that Residence are not showing. The outside of the house has a classic half timbered house structure but more glass/windows was added. The interior has much more of 70´s feel. Really like the type of construction beams that were Rolf Thies own design. Eva sadly died this year unexpectedly. I was supposed to come over this summer. Had planned to arrive with a fresh copy of Residence and show up unanounced. Life surprises all the time. 

Eva you are missed!

Tack Rolf Richard Thies för att vi fick komma hem till er. 


/Jimmy