September 11, 2013

Facades









Who can't help but fall in love with the cockeyed canal houses of Amsterdam? While strolling the streets, I saw numerous sofas being hoisted through windows, hanging from a hook on a wonderfully ornate gable. When I arrived with my enormous suitcase in tow, I laughed when I opened the front door to the apartment I was staying in and wondered how in the world I was going to get up the most narrow staircase I had ever encountered. Very carefully and sideways, as it turned out.

Interesting fact: the houses are narrow because property taxes were based on the width of the house, so people built them narrow, deep, and tall. 

September 04, 2013

Ordinary Silence













The beauty of the Icelandic landscape is punctuated by solitary buildings that quietly tuck themselves into their surroundings.