Shanghai World Financial Center

28 June 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  9 minutes

Shanghai World Financial Center (left) and Jin Mao Tower © Mr.XY/cc-by-sa-3.0

Shanghai World Financial Center (left) and Jin Mao Tower © Mr.XY/cc-by-sa-3.0

The Shanghai World Financial Center is a supertall skyscraper located in the Pudong district of Shanghai in China. It was designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox and developed by the Mori Building Company, with Leslie E. Robertson Associates as its structural engineer and China State Construction Engineering Corp and Shanghai Construction (Group) General Co. as its main contractor. It is a mixed-use skyscraper, consisting of offices, hotels, conference rooms, observation decks, and ground-floor shopping malls. Park Hyatt Shanghai is the tower’s hotel component, comprising 174 rooms and suites. Occupying the 79th to the 93rd floors, surpassing the Grand Hyatt Shanghai on the 53rd to 87th floors of the neighboring Jin Mao Tower. It is the second-highest hotel in the world after The Ritz-Carlton in Hong Kong, which occupies floors 102 to 118 of the International Commerce Centre. The building has a floor area of about 380,000 m² (4,107,500 sq ft). The construction costs reached USD $ 1.20 billion.   read more…

Theme Week Istria – Motovun

28 June 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  6 minutes

© Aconcagua/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Aconcagua/cc-by-sa-3.0

Motovun is a village in central Istria. The population of the village itself is 500, with a total of 1,000 residents in the municipality. The Parenzana was a narrow gauge railroad that ran from Trieste to Poreč between 1902-1935, passed valley below the town. Motovun is a medieval town that grew up on the site of an ancient city called Kastelijer. It is situated on a hill 270 metres (886 feet) above sea level with houses scattered all over the hill. On the inner walls are several coats-of-arms of different Motovun ruling families and two gravestones of Roman inhabitants (dating from the 1st century).   read more…

Anchorage in Alaska

27 June 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  7 minutes

Anchorage and Chugach Mountains © flickr.com - Frank K./cc-by-2.0

Anchorage and Chugach Mountains © flickr.com – Frank K./cc-by-2.0

Anchorage is a unified home rule municipality in the southcentral part of the U.S. state of Alaska. It is the northernmost city in the United States with more than 100,000 residents and the largest community in North America north of the 60th parallel. With an estimated 299,000 residents, it is Alaska’s most populous city and contains more than 40 percent of the state’s total population. Altogether, the Anchorage metropolitan area, which combines Anchorage with the neighboring Matanuska-Susitna Borough, has a population of 381,000.   read more…

Theme Week Istria – Umag

27 June 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  6 minutes

© Peko/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Peko/cc-by-sa-3.0

Umag is a coastal city in Istria. The city hosts a yearly ATP tennis tournament on clay courts. It is the westernmost city of Croatia, and the municipality includes Savudrija, the westernmost point of Croatia. In 1993 with the establishment of the new local rule Umag became an independent municipality (općina), and in 1997 was awarded the status of town or city (grad).   read more…

Theme Week Istria – Poreč

26 June 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  5 minutes

Main square with church © Johann Jaritz/cc-by-sa-3.0

Main square with church © Johann Jaritz/cc-by-sa-3.0

Poreč is a town and municipality on the western coast of the Istrian peninsula. Its major landmark is the 6th century Euphrasian Basilica, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1997. Ever since the 1970s, the coast of Poreč has been the most visited tourist destination in Croatia. Poreč is almost 2,000 years old, and is set around a harbor protected from the sea by the small island of Saint Nicholas/San Nicolo (St. Nicholas). The town’s population of approximately 12,000 resides mostly on the outskirts, while the wider Poreč area has a population of approximately 17,000 inhabitants. The municipal area covers 142 square kilometres (55 sq mi), with the 37 kilometres (23 miles) long shoreline stretching from the Mirna River near Novigrad to Funtana and Vrsar in the south.   read more…

Bauhaus Dessau

25 June 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Intelligent Buildings, Living, Working, Building, Museums, Exhibitions, UNESCO World Heritage, Universities, Colleges, Academies Reading Time:  8 minutes

© Lelikron/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Lelikron/cc-by-sa-3.0

Staatliches Bauhaus, commonly known simply as Bauhaus, was an art school in Germany that combined crafts and the fine arts, and was famous for the approach to design that it publicized and taught. It operated from 1919 to 1933. At that time the German term Bauhaus – literally “house of construction” – was understood as meaning “School of Building”.   read more…

Theme Week Istria – Labin

25 June 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  6 minutes

© Alessandro Vecchi/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Alessandro Vecchi/cc-by-sa-3.0

Labin, with a town population of 7,000 and 12,000 in the greater municipality (which also includes the small towns of Rabac and Vinež, as well as a number of smaller villages), lies on the east coast of the Istrian Peninsula, halfway between Pula and Opatija.   read more…

Theme Week Istria – Mošćenička Draga

24 June 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  5 minutes

© Roberta F./cc-by-sa-3.0

© Roberta F./cc-by-sa-3.0

Mošćenička Draga is municipality in Primorje-Gorski Kotar County. It has 1,600 inhabitants. It is situated southwest of Opatija under Mt. Učka. The centre of the municipality is the former fishing village of Mošćenička Draga which is today a tourist resort with seven beaches, small marina and walking paths. Above Mošćenička Draga there is the hilltop town of Mošćenice.   read more…

Theme Week Istria

23 June 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  7 minutes

Rovinj © David Orlovic/cc-by-sa-3.0

Rovinj © David Orlovic/cc-by-sa-3.0

Istria, formerly Histria (Latin), is the largest peninsula in the Adriatic Sea. The peninsula is located at the head of the Adriatic between the Gulf of Trieste and the Bay of Kvarner. It is shared by three countries: Croatia, Slovenia, and Italy.   read more…

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