Sometimes - only once in a very small while - the air smells so good outside that I just want to breathe in more than I am physically able. I become conscious of my own breathing; the exhales are now a mere waiting period for the next inhale.
. . .I think this happens mainly in May.
I move closer to the open window.
And then, its funny, but three floors down someone lights a cigarette and that tiny little stick of burning organic matter is capable of entirely consuming the smell of spring.
It's quite amazing even with the whole huge outdoors and how big spring is, that one tiny source can emit such a smell that competes and overpowers all the goodness that is outside right now.
I cannot help but note the contrast of what might be the best smell ever with one of the most horribly offensive.

(My extreme aversion to second-hand smoke likely stems from my childhood. My dad would light up in the car on the way home from well, anywhere, and it would be january-type cold, the window down a bit, blowing icy air into my face in the backseat. I would beg him to close the window, and then when he did the smell made my head spin. He would smoke in the house too, but things are always easier to deal with when you aren't cold).
ahhh, scent and memory.

Hm, they must be done.

inhale. . .

As I was perusing Kunstler's "Eyesore of the Month" entries, I was amused to discover a picture of the new Canadian Human Rights Museum - "the largest centre for human rights in the world" - and even more amused that he called it "a wad of discarded scotch tape".
After a little more research, I discovered that the design was a global competition that gained a response from 61 architecture firms in 21 different countries.
Not overly impressed with the giant scotch tape ball, I looked up the designs of the other finalists, only to discover more abstract sculptures made of various other refuse products. (scrap metal, broken mirror, etc.) So much for that.

Let's just review how many things are wrong with this picture:
The winner of the design contest, Antoine Predoc, is an american from New Mexico. Going out on a limb here, but wouldn't it make sense to have a Canadian designer create the Canadian Museum of Human Rights? Apparently, the architect doesn't need to understand our context and history, or have any attachment to the project whatsoever.
And then there's the Canadian climate that he seemed to completely disregard. But I guess New Mexicans wouldn't think about such a thing as a heating bill.
Furthermore, you would think that a building built for human rights would be the perfect candidate to showcase sustainable building practices. But no.

Let's see. . . what else is wrong with this picture?
That the field of architecture has been made so irrelevant to our culture today that no less than 61 firms invested a lot of time, money, and effort into entering a contest just for the chance at maybe getting the job. Granted, it's a very prestigious project, but shouldn't the clients be seeking the right firm, not architects clamoring for a chance to get hired? Architecture firms are fighting over the few good projects across the world just so they get a break from designing costco stores. Our society values economy, not beauty. Why hire an architect and pay for quality materials when its cheaper to just build a box. think: office towers, retail stores, new bank buildings. . .
And contemporary architects are only making matters worse. To further the irrelevance of the field of design, architects in their insecure position in society have gone abstract. Let's try even harder to get noticed. Let's prove to the world that we are important.
Extreme form, theory over functionality. . . resulting in buildings that no longer serve the needs of the people who use the space, buildings that sever rather than integrate the existing urban fabric, that are dehumanizing in scale, only to passify the ego of the architect. If you need more visuals, just page through the monthly eyesores from kunstler.com
And don't even get me started on the male dominance of the field. (What a very male thing to impose your erection upon the landscape).

I leave with an abstract (no pun intended) from Antoine Predoc describing the form of the Canadian Museum of Human Rights:

Our proposal for the Canadian Museum for Human Rights reinforces an optimistic recollection of the history of the struggle for human rights, with an intention to uplift, made legible in an architecture of dualities: light and shadow, ephemera and stone, gravity and weightlessness, reflection and opacity, earth and sky. The massing, the spaces within, and its materiality reinforce the Museum as an embodiment of a universal humanitarian consciousness, necessarily a vessel of knowledge and history charged with hope. Rooted in humanity, the architecture renders palpable the communal and universal struggle for human rights.

. . .ummm, what?


PS. They actually expected us to write stuff like this in architecture school.