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Showing posts with the label Inverted Collar and Tie

Frankfurt am Main - of Half-Timbered Houses and Skyscrapers

The last time I was in Frankfurt am Main was to drop off our rental car and catch a flight home. This time around, I was planning to stay in Frankfurt for a couple of days before leaving for the U.S. But as luck would have it, I had to change my itinerary and stayed a little bit longer than expected. Which was a good thing. Because Frankfurt has changed in the years since I visited and I had a lot of catching up to do. Most of Frankfurt was destroyed during World War II. But its historical center was painstakingly reconstructed in the 1980s from original floorplans. These pretty half-timbered buildings on the Römerberg in the Alstadt (Old Town) provide a rich contrast to the city of skyscrapers.  This building in the Alstadt has an unusual roofline. The grey-tiled roof flows into the dormer windows like a wave. The Römer with its three-gabled façade has been the City Hall of Frankfurt since the 15th century. The Gothic-style Frankfurter Dom or the Imperial Cathe

Sculptures that Stand Out from the Crowd

Melancholy. Albert György. Bronze. Lake Geneva. Geneva. Switzerland Before I embark on any trip, I always check the net for public art or street art in the cities I plan to visit, especially places I have been lucky to visit a few times. These searches give me options which I may otherwise have missed since these works of art are seldom listed on the "must see" lists. On my recent trip to Europe, I had the opportunity to see these sculptural pieces that beg explanation, are meaningful, controversial, poignant, thought provoking and Instagrammable (lol). These discoveries were lessons in art appreciation and added mileage to a deeply satisfying trip. Nothing represents emptiness better than this sculpture about melancholy.  Inverted Collar and Necktie. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje Van Bruggen. Polymer concrete, steel, fiber-reinforced plastic. Westendstrasse 1. Frankfurt am Main. Germany. The tie as a "traditional part of office attire, its loosening could