Week 3

This week we traveled to Northern Italy and went to several cities to view some of the most influential pieces of architecture.  Our first stop was in Florence; once we arrived we immediately visited Santa Maria del Fiore.  At the historic church designed by Brunelleschi, we climbed to the top of the Duomo.  After climbing over 450 steps to get to the top, we had a tremendous view of the city.  Once we all registered the panoramic views, we descended to the bottom and continued our journey throughout the city.  Other buildings we visited were the Palazzo Strozzi, Santa Croce, the Pazzi Chapel, Santa Maria Novella, and the Piazza Michelangelo.  Though the weather was very cold, we were fortunate enough to sketch at all our destinations - the Florentine steak at our group dinner wasn't bad either.

After a couple days in Florence we then took a train to Venice.  I was always intrigued by the city and was curious to see how a city operated with no cars.  We visited several churches and studied how they were all influential to eachother and the impact they had on architecture.  Piazza San Marco was a very profound space and was a very large urban space - I was very impressed.  We also explored several of Carlo Scarpa's buidlings and details.  I had never heard of him before, but after experiencing his spaces I like his work.  During our free time we were able to take a short ride in a small gondola (not the real deal but it will do) and explored the city - many of the streets leading to a dead end or a bridge over the several canals in the city.

The next two cities we visited, Verona and Vicenza, were both smaller and was a nice change of pace from Florence and Venice.  Vicenza was a very quaint town and was composed of several Palladio designs.  Villa Rotunda and Teatro Olimpico were my favorite buildings and spaces from the trip.  I enjoyed the pace of Vicenza more than any other city and I favored the architecture styles as well.

Our last city was Milan - the largest city out of all of them.  The Duomo was a very elegant piece of architecture and was the first Gothic building we had seen on the trip.  The Galleria Vittorio Emmanuele was an outstanding space and captured the idea of an interior/exterior space very well.  On the last day, we took an architecture tour of the modern architecture in Rome and we toured a Renzo Piano building.