Tanks

The whaling industry worked here in the early 1900's; the development of ship-based whaling and a collapse of the market due to oversupply led to this station being permanently shut down in 1931. These old tanks, which once held whale oil and fresh water, were destroyed by the British in 1942 so they couldn't be used by the Germans.

Now they rust in the snow, and lean and list like a Frank Gehry building.

Geometries

Because every building has to have a back door -- how else are the staff going to sneak out for smokes?

Here's the Frank Gehry version, from EMP in Seattle.

The bathrooms are also fun

Inside EMP

Here are two not great shots of the interior. I didn't actually visit the exhibits; that will have to wait for a return visit when I have more time. Instead I had a nutritious lunch of garlic parmesan fries at the restaurant while I waited for the hop on trolley to take me back to downtown.

Paul Allen does seem to have more fun being a billionaire than anyone else I can think of.

"How about a museum dedicated to music?"

"And how about if we also cover fantasy and sci-fi?" 

"And let's hire Frank Gehry to design it!"

"Cool. Here's a couple hundred million. Make it so."

Grass Blades

I don't like the EMP building that much -- its "in your face" quality, especially in the front, is wildly appropriate as a structure to honor pop culture, but it's exhausting to look at.

This public art installation across the street, on the other hand, I love. It's called Grass Blades, designed by John Fleming, and consists of strands of steel painted to resemble bamboo. It complements the steel curves of the less ostentatious side view of EMP perfectly.

Seattle, take two

I was not myself yesterday.

I was tired, my foot ached from the stupid hills in this stupid city, and I was very upset about one of my co-workers, one of the sweetest people I know, who was badly beaten in a mugging and is in the hospital. (Prayers for a quick recovery, Tom.)

I spent more time looking at my phone to see if there were any updates or if his father had called me back than I did looking around me. Which is absolutely the right reaction, I know -- Tom being okay is much more important than whether I get a good photo of the Seattle skyline. But I also felt that I wasted the entire day yesterday because I didn't really look at the things around me.

So today, I retraced my steps, and went back to most of the places I went to yesterday. This time I actually saw them, and I liked the city so much more. And no surprise, paying attention meant that the pictures I took were better as well.

Here's the space needle again, this time rising behind the unmistakably Frank Gehry-ian curves of Paul Allen's EMP Museum.

The Jay Pritzker Pavilion

The Gehry bandshell in the park.