strikingly random thoughts and 'maximum data existentialisation'
About a year ago I adopted the French Republican Calendar for my personal journalling. Why? Really for no other reason than to be different. It offered me the opportunity to learn the Republican Calendar through practise (a word-a-day sort of arrangement). The upheaval of the switch to a new system in France in 1795, caused […]
From the realm of ‘too far fetched’ to be believed comes word that members of the UX, a shadowy underground organisation, have been cleared of charges in their daring, but clandestine operation to restore an antique clock at the Patheon in Paris. According to UrbanResources, the UnterGunther is “Swiss-French urban explorers team whose activity is […]
Speaking with Matt Leighninger this morning I was reminded of one of my best tips for those looking for offbeat sights in Paris – the military models at the Musée de l’Armée. The museum is a treasure. A grande promenade stretching from the Seine leads up to the building. The courtyards are filled with captured […]
It’s always amusing and often telling to compare where we are now to where we thought we’d be. Whether through sci-fi novels, advertisements for the house of the future, or in this case prints from an exhibition at the Bibliothèque nationale de France (bnf), facets of the futurethink can provide a particularly prismatic view of […]
Having just returned from one of my favourite cities in the world, I was fascinated to find a Paris Metro Virtual Experience. This media-rich site offers wonderful history of the Paris Metro and the opportunity to take a virtual tour with static images and rel-time soundtrack along a number of lines. Additionally, the author of […]
I attended a great talk by Steven Bednarski of St. Jerome’s University today. His CV lists UQAM, York, Toronto as places of experience. His framing question today: How does a social historian make use of a research database? Bednarski explains that he was trained in the French school and considers himself a storyteller by practise. […]
The Gardens at the Palais Royal are distinctly different from those at the Luxembourg. A grand urban courtyard, the Palais Royal have been a public garden from immediately prior to the Revolution. The Palais Royal was owned by the Duc d’Orleans, an aristocrat who sought popular appeal. As today, the courtyard was surrounded by cloistered […]
There’s a neat spot, a little off the beaten track, in Paris that I have some fond memories of. It’s an oasis, small in scale and slow in pace. It’s not the sort of place that you find in the tourist directories and its not enveloped by the legend of Paris vacationeering. Bercy Village is […]
I have long wanted to jot down some thoughts about some of my favourite places in Paris. Meaning to eventually present these as an appropriately georeferenced set with appropriate navigation, for now I thought I would add them as simply blog entries. When I thought about where to start, it took me all of a […]
French architect Jean-Pierre Houdin has unveiled a quite fascinating theory of pyramid construction. Apparently based on a decade of investigation, he is able to proposed a series of concepts proposing that internal construction ramps allowed for the efficient and remarkable construction of the Pyramid of Cheops. Additionally he demonstrates the most efficient means by which […]