bike ride to schipluiden

after buying the bike on friday afternoon, i rode out to IKEA by the highway. did i mention i am 5 minutes away from an IKEA? i just looked, though, and then ate their delicious soft serve for only 50 eurocents. there was a time when i was addicted to soft serve but now i have overcome that demon.

on saturday i set out on a bike ride and found the city of delft transformed. there were stands and stalls everywhere selling every type of thing. flowers, ancient comic books, fruit, pillows, antique picture frames, ceramic ashtrays, delftware, food, cell phones, everything. i bought myself a super stroopwafel and walked around.

on the main markt, a thin layer of sand had been delivered and men were playing a game where you tossed heavy metal baseball-sized spheres, trying to get close to another type of ball or knock other metal spheres out of the way. i watched for a while and tried to discern some rules of the game. people took it seriously though; they played in teams of two and took turns tossing these metal spheres. some had quite fancy windups before tossing the sphere with a lot of backspin like a softball pitcher. they kept score too.







then i rode west out of delft for a while. there was a church covered in ivy that is now a restaurant. lots of cows and the smells of cows. farmland. the start of the A4 highway. in the distance large wind turbines. old barns. canals of all medium sizes crossed by bridges of all types. i saw a henhouse with an m.c. escher poster. here the gravel consists of tiny crushed bits of seashells. i saw one old windmill that wasn't in use. the country is obviously flat but surprisingly overgrown. i rode a bit past schipluiden and then turned around, stopping in that town to admire its deserted streets and drink some water before returning, a round trip of about 15 or so kilometers.










on the way back i ventured off the main road and found myself in a bizarre development with all the streets named after classical composers. the streets included mozartlaan, strawinskylaan [sic], bizetstraat, mahlerpad, chopinlaan, toscaniniweg, beethovenlaan, etc.

and of course, there is always time for waterfowl.

een nieuwe fiets

also on friday, i got a new bicycle. i had trouble finding a cheap but decent bike before then because all of the other bike shops were sold out of used bikes. i suspect that the students who arrived at TUD before i did bought them all out. i tried a new place recommended by a guy in my studio. it was west of campus. a guy operated a bike repair and sales shop out of a complex of garages in the courtyard of an apartment block. he is only open 2-5 on the weekdays. i followed the guy's directions and after a few minutes found the place. it is an older guy with good english. at first i told him i wanted a road bike and he scoffed and said "these are all road bikes." but when i specified one with handbrakes and gears like for cycling, he said, "oh you mean like the tour de france, eh?" then he proceeded to talk about how cyclists should be banned from riding in groups because they could hurt people and how it was much more comfortable to ride sitting fully upright than hunched over. he said if i wanted a road bike, i should go to france or belgium because dutch bikes don't look like that. this mentality is part of a larger dutch attitude about bicycles that i should talk about later. for your amusement, though, try this link where a dutch mother gives a short introduction to dutch bike culture.

long story short, i bought a bike. it is an old batavus, the cadillac of dutch bicycles. i think it is especially appropriate because the model name is "cambridge." it has three speeds (well, two that i can tell) and handbrakes. it is black forest green. here are some pictures:




the front light is powered by a dynamo that rotates and then rubs against the front wheel.


i don't know what to name her yet.

the why factory

on friday i had my first legit encounter with the why factory. we all met on the mountain for a lively introduction from winy maas (the M of MVRDV). i sat in the front row. he talked in excited tone about the projects that this research group has completed and the upcoming studios. he seems like a lively and intelligent guy, curious as some architects are with crazy projects and overturning urban normalities. he said he'll be around every week. so as i found out, the studio i wanted to take (the green cities calculator) is not being offered as there is too much commercial interest to leave it to masters students. they are developing it elsewhere in the why factory. but, i am in the automated cities Msc2 studio. the brief description seems a trendy, contemporary topic but i am excited to flex some BLDGBLOG muscles on this stuff. the first month of the studio is research where we gather precedents, study what previous T?F studios have done, and formulate a written opinion about our ideas on automation and city form. automation as a generic idea covering anything from automated food production to trash removal to transit and manufacturing. then we pick some specific technical intervention and design how that affects urban form and landscape. they stress that the two components of studio are the production of the text (theory) and the image (applied theory). i think they expect to see some decent things from me because i am from MIT (so i must be in love with robots) and because i am the only native english speaker in the studio out of the 9 or so students enrolled and the two tutors.

our first assignment is to gather precedents across a variety of media (film, literature, architecture, inventions, philosophy) that deal with automation. it is generic but i feel like i have things to say on this topic. i am excited to see what happens here. i also found out that a course i thought only met in the second half of the semester meets the entire term and i had just missed the first class this morning. it is a large lecture class led by patrick healy on "philosophy of the image in architecture." oh well.

also, here is the mountain where the why factory exists:

the current picture on the why factory website is from winy's talk on friday. my head is obscured by the "we make future cities" block, but here my features are visible.