maragritaville....

quickly, i discovered that being a vegan in dallas, and i assume pretty much anywhere in texas (aside from austin), is extremely difficult.

my first full day in town began with me going to a fancy grocery store much like whole foods, in search of a tofu sandwich. i walked up to the first lady i saw and asked for a tofu sandwich. her face twisted and she responded,a very thick texan drawl...it's where they talk real slow and draw out the sounds on the vowels..."where you from?" i said,"oregon." her reply shocked me, and quite frankly sort of offended me...she said,"...well that's okay honey, now i don't have any tofu, but if you like, i can take you around the store and make you anything you'd like." then she grabbed my arm and proceeded to drag me around the store. she was shockingly over-helpful.

the following days, i went to an awesome indian resturant named, cosmic cafe (shown below)...the place is super cool. good food, people are friendly and less hick-ish than most people you encounter around texas, and they do yoga and meditation upstairs




i also returned to a bar, called the new amsterdam coffeehouse, that i hold fond memories of. the name is deceiving, and the atmosphere is raunchy...my kind of place...





while shooting these pics, some guy heckled me, screaming "i'm gonna need that film little lady"...so i responded, "if you can get the film out of my digital camera, i'll give you $2000." the bar laughed and he bought me a drink and tried to buy me a shot of tequila...i hate tequila...unless it is in a margarita...

...which some of you may remember my 9:30am text messages asking if it was wrong to be drinking a frozen margarita with a shot of chambord on top before noon...
by the way...i drank that in 5 minutes and then had another...

i was really tipsy having to face my entire bible-beating-christian-family, in which three of them are pastors for various churches...at my family farm, in which my grandparents had been living for the past 50+ years...my grandparents being members of AA and Ala-non, for almost that long.

yeah, it went over well...

AND WHAT NOT....

you know it is funny that i used to drive by all those great architectural works that i posted previously, but i never really paid very much attention to them, they just never really stood out, probably due to the abundant amount of trees that are planted in front of them...reminds me of the famous quote stating that doctors bury their mistakes and architects plant vines...well, in this case, they must have planted trees. but i don't know why because some of them are really great and i would love to see the exterior too.

well, anyway, back to this building...it is the federal reserve bank, and is sort of across the street from all those great buildings in the arts district i referred to earlier. but it is very unique to dallas and to banks in general...

instead of me telling you what i think, how about we all participate...add a comment and let everyone in blogland know what you guys think...i hope the pic is adequate.

...and stay tuned more pics to come...when i have time to post between classes, and WHAT NOT (heehee---that's for you adis and crew)

I.M. PEI

allied bank tower





this is a cool building and looks different on everyside and brings a flare to the skyline....


morton h. meyerson symphony







another great place, except the inside reminds me of the vancouver public library, in b.c., designed by moshie safdie...interesting...i may post the pics of both side by side if i remember...

dallas museum of art: EDWARD LARRABEE BARNES

(anyone recognize the tall pointy building??? if not...stay tuned to the next blog)




the DMA was greatly dissappointing, especially after visiting the nasher. i had high hopes for this museum. i thought, it has to better on the inside...afterall, it is designed by a harvard guy...soooo not the case. not only did the building have terrible lighting and lack personality, but even the art was bad (aside from the french and italian realist and impressionist paintings--they were really good, and i don't usually like that type of painting.)

they did have a really cool modern silver collection being exhibited...which led me to the portland building--in the form of a teapot collection







---oh that michael graves cracks me up....

nasher sculptural garden: RENZO PIANO

this is a must see building of piano's. not only is it wonderfully designed, but the sculptures are quite amazing. the collection includes works by richard serra, as well as many from pablo picasso. the lighting is ambiant and very pleasing. sadly, i never visited this work of art while i lived in dallas, but i went to de menil, another renzo piano museum, quite often while living in houston.

the kalita humphrey theatre: FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT

alright...so my first stop was the dallas theater center, designed by frank lloyd wright, located 10 blocks from my last apartment in dallas (in one of the ritzy parts of dallas, turtle creek.) i have attended film festivals in the space and had no idea that the building was famous, until i began architecture school. the place is a typical FLW building. there are very low ceilings in the main areas (something like (7' or 8') and incorporates the surrounding natural elements (or in this case references the trees and nearby creek). it is a rather dingy building, which may be due to lack of funds (or they spend them to keep the roof from leaking....hahaha...bad joke...well i asked a lady that is on staff there and she told me that she wasn't sure if it leaked, but it probably did and that is more than likely how the fountains stay running...then she directed me to the stairs leading up to the balcony of the theater, and told me that she thought the architect had a sick sense of humor)....so i went to the stairs and quickly realized what she meant. the stairs are steep and reside at an angle of about 33 degrees, is poorly lit, and has black walls and red carpet. i wish i could have gotten a photo to show you all, but it was so dark the i just could not get my camera to shoot a good one.

well...i am super frustrated with this computer because it is not importing my pics. so you'll have to wait a bit for the pics i took.

my flight to dallas was very smooth and the view while descending was amazing. i had forgotten how big dallas/ft worth is. the illumination from the lights below, created and astral effect that led to downtown dallas. it resembled free-flowing lines, yellowish-orange lights, spiraled out from the city center, with blue-ish/white lights laid out in a grid pattern filling the spaces between. after getting off the plane, i saw this woman that so perfectly fit the image of dallas women (well..older women) that i remember.

i got to roam around dallas yesterday. i went the the arts district. there are a few buildings that i wanted to see again, like the nasher sculptural garden, renzo piano is the architect. i fell in love with one of his other works, de menil-in houston. i used to visit that all the time, so naturally, i was curious to see how the nasher compared. it was awsome, it is a quaint musuem, with a large garden in the back that housed some really great sculptures. a large portion of the works housed inside are by picasso. the ones outside are by some random people, of whom i forget. i tried to snap as many pics as possible without getting kicked out by one of the many security guards that seemed to be watching me closely, i guess they aren't used to people looking at the building instead of the sculptures.

i also went to the dallas museum of art, designed by a guy out of havard, i think his name is edward larrabe, i probably butchered that. i was very disappointed with the museum. not only did the building not offer any moving spatial experiences, but most of the work housed in it left a lot to be desired. the museum did have a very good french and italian realist and impressionist installation...very much worth seeing, even though i really am not into that style of art. needless to say, i didn't hang around very long.

after that i headed over to deep ellum, where i spent most of the day. for those of you that do not know about deep ellum, it is essentially the music strip in dallas. there are so many music venues, tattoo shops, eclectic shops, and food places. the buildings used to be walls and walls of graffitti, but it has been cleaned up a lot. i did manage to snap a few pics of some of the cooler ones. oh, and steve....i went by trees to get some pics, but i found out that it was closed a few weeks ago...sad times...

i should get off of this thing and get out to take some more pics...and search for a computer that will allow me to post pics....

going back to texas

...leaving for texas tomorrow...and believe it or not, i am actually looking forward to seeing that grimy city again, along with all my friends...

now i have the opportunity to take pics of all those places in dallas i love...

stay tuned