A couple years ago my family went to the Guggenheim Museum in New York. I’m not very into art and the art I saw didn’t do anything to change that. I did like the building though. I like the way it sits like a mushroom on the street corner just as much as I like the inside. While a regular building would have something boring like stairs in order to go from one floor to another, the Guggenheim has one massive spiraling ramp.

You can look at the art in one long go rather than going one way on a floor and then getting lost before accidentally looking at all the same artwork again. It is actually impossible to get lost when your on a ramp because there is only one way to go. For the way I like to experience art, the Guggenheim was perfect. Would go again.

The Bruder Klaus Field Chapel is a monument funded by local farmers in order to honor Bruder Klaus, a 15th century saint. The construction materials are largely similar to Peter Zumthor’s other works but the end result is not. While from the outside it looks like a stone book, the interior is a wigwam of 112 tree trunks. Inside is charred wood and a floor made of frozen lead.

The Bruder Klaus Chapel serves no purpose other than to exist. That being said, to walk through it would have to be an incredible experience. Its how I imagine a temple on an alien planet would look.

This is a picture of what used to be Clair E. Gale Jr. High where I went for 7th and 8th grade. They tore it down and put us in high school a year early before rebuilding it into Compass academy. What used to be the low income Jr. High became a magnet school for students who wanted a “non-traditional” education. It hasn’t been much of a success. The auditorium is the dome and it was there when the school was Clair E. Gale as well. My family’s friend Mr. Crouch ran the weights class and that was the reason I looked forward to going to school. No matter what the rest of the day was like weights class was a constant and we always had a good time.

The Kolumba Art Museum in Cologne, Germany, is another utilitarian design by Peter Zumthor. It sits atop the ruins of a former church and re purposes some of the remaining stonework. The inside consists of supporting concrete pillars which stand out against the stained wooden floors and stone remains of the destroyed church. The perforated wall sections let in light and highlight the stained glass within. This is definitely my favorite of Zumthor’s projects because I like the way he linked his minimalist style and made perfect use of the history of the location.

Every year since fifth grade I went with my mom to work the state track meet. The AstroTurf was always burning hot and running the triple jump became monotonous but we went to Baja Fresh to get burritos after so I always had a good time. The field is too shiny on TV but they’ve done a lot to fix that over the years. In person however, the blue turf looks great and adds to the experience of going to games or just being in the stadium. Its also the only college in Idaho I would have wanted to go to since I lived next to it and heard all the football games for years. I’m looking forward to seeing more games and eventually going in person once the virus is over.

Peter Zumthor’s Rest stop at the Allmannajuvet Zinc Mine Museum stands out against the background of rural Norway. I like the stonework below the bathrooms and the way they sit atop it like some sort of watchtower. The museum in the background, also Zumthor’s design, is set high up on timber stilts which is a bit scary since it looks like it could slide off at any moment. The buildings share the same black rectangle construction with timber supports and framing covered by a zinc roof just like the zinc that was extracted from the mine in years past. Though minimalist, Zumthor has fit Allmannajuvet’s museum and support buildings perfectly the the environment.

Redfish Lake Lodge in Isolalated Stanley Idaho was where my family and our friends from Boise spent most of our breaks from school when I was growing up. It sits on Redfish Lake, is surrounded by hiking trails, and doesn’t get any cell service or WiFi. Usually my family camped instead of staying in the lodge or cabins, but every so often we would eat breakfast there and it was one of the high points of going to Redfish for me. The food was much better than whatever we cooked over the campfire for the rest of the week. The adults spent a lot of time at the bar inside but that wasn’t one of my experiences. I did buy a lot of worms for fishing from the convenience store next to the lodge though. Sometimes there would be live music on the lawn and we would hang out there, but most of the time my friends and I met up at the chairs in front of the lodge before we went out on the lake. Hopefully i’ll get another chance to go to Redfish Lake when we’re all older but for now I can just look forward to it.

The Cloud Rock Wilderness Lodge designed by Peter Zumthor is located in Moab, Utah about three hours from where I grew up. Designed by one of the top hundred architects of the century you would think google images would have more than two pictures of the building. You would be wrong. The Cloud Rock Wilderness Lodge is the center of a lot of controversy about bringing consumerism and investors into one of America’s last really isolated wilderness areas. Design wise, the building has some interesting columns and window layout, but this is the only view I could find so that’s about it. I thought the controversy was interesting on its own and currently the building out of the lodge is on hold for the forseeable future. If you want to read more on it the website of a Grand County newspaper this is it. https://www.canyoncountryzephyr.com/oldzephyr/june-july2002/cloudrock-controversy-lchristie.htm