Villa Savoye and the Eiffel Tower

Hello everyone,

Look at me updating again. haha. Anyways yesterday I ventured off to a Paris suburb, Poissy, to see a famous vacation house built by an architect called Le Corbusier. I did my term project on him last semester in my french class and found him more interesting than I was expecting so I was eager to go check out the place. He was a pioneer of modern architecture between WWI and WWII. He designed a lot of buildings but for my project I focused on 3 of his buildings, Villa Savoye being one of them. It is a house he designed for a rich Paris couple to use as a vacation home to get away from Paris. During WWII it fell into disrepair because the Nazis actually occupied it. The Savoyes (people who owned the home) were pissed because the architect seemed to care more about showcasing the home as an architectural piece of art rather than care about the functionality of the home....such as the fact that it leaked horribly. Recently they put money to renovate it and fix the leaks so it looked pretty good when I visited it. I just found it neat that everything he designed was for a reason. For example, the house is built on pillars so a car can drive underneath it, and the curvurature of the house is the exact curvature of a cars turning radius. He also believed in open airiness and unobstructed views. For this reason he used ramps and spiral staircases and also had roof gardens and sky slights throughout the house. Come to find out as I was reading a poster there, he designed 2 buildings on Matt's campus! One is right next door and its funny because I had mentioned to Matt how that building was in the exact style of an architect I had studied. I guess I didnt even need to make a day trip! haha.

Anyways after visiting the house I wandered around the town of Poissy. It was actually quite charming and felt small-townish considering how close it was to Paris. I enjoyed a delicious lunch of Indian food and then read in a park that was at the base of a chateau. Although I never saw the chateau so I only half believe it was there. Haha. The town was also right on the Seine so they had a nice walking path right along it. I enjoyed my afternoon there.

Then last night Matt and I went up the Eiffel tower. We didn't go all the way up, mostly because we've already done it and there was a really long line. It was actually sort of neat to walk up the 600-something steps..it gives you an interesting perspective. To actually be inside the Eiffel tower. I found it really neat. Especially since it's lit up blue. I apologize that all the pictures are mixed up I don't know why the blog rearranges them like that.

Anyways tomorrow Matt and I are heading to Brussels. I can't wait to go back! we're taking a 4 hour bus ride to get there. We have to catch the 5:30 metro, which is just about the 1st one so its going to be an early morning. We're going to spend friday night and saturday night there and head home Sunday evening to Paris. Then I'll be in Paris Sunday and monday night and take a train to Amsterdam early early Tuesday morning where I'm probably going to try to get a flight back on Tuesday afternoon. I hope returning goes as smoothely as getting there! we'll see I guess.

Thats it for now. Oh and P.S. mom - it got really hot here the second you left. Haha. For the past couple days its been 85 and sunny.