Saturday, April 12, 2008

Elder Architecture


walkway.jpg
Originally uploaded by oferchrissake
It's hard to tell, when looking at very old structures, what was done for aesthetic reasons, and what for practical ones. Of course there is surely overlap, and it's possible that the folks who planned an executed this found it ugly, or highly functional, or really attractive, or kind of useless, or some combination of all that.

Modern visitors to this space mostly find it charming, but maybe not so practical, I'd guess. It'll keep rain off, unless it's coming sideways. It's not good for storage, there's really no need to defend the area below this, and the view isn't particularly interesting.

Nonetheless, people will pay to find out what it was used for in the 14th century. I find *that* fascinating.

2 comments:

Rufus said...

I think it's the same with a lot of new buildings too. I took a picture of a gorgeous building here in Paris that was recently built. I think what I like about it is that it's impossible to tell from looking what in the heck it could be for.

Rufus said...

I'm also going to save my updates for tomorrow and leave this the "lead story" as it were.