Lübeck, the Queen of the Hanseatic League

2 June 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  6 minutes

Town Hall on Market Square © Mylius

Town Hall on Market Square © Mylius

The Hanseatic City of Lübeck is the second-largest city in Schleswig-Holstein, in northern Germany, and one of the major ports of Germany. It was for several centuries the “capital” of the Hanseatic League (“Queen of the Hanse”) and, because of its Brick Gothic architectural heritage, is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. In 2005 it had a population of 214,000.   read more…

Nordkirchen Castle, Versailles of Westphalia

30 May 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  6 minutes

Main building with Venus Island in front © Mbdortmund

Main building with Venus Island in front © Mbdortmund

Schloss Nordkirchen in the Gemeinde Nordkirchen in Kreis Coesfeld, Westphalia, Germany, built in 1703 to 1734, is known as the “Versailles of Westphalia” as it is the largest of the partly moated Wasserschlösser in that region. It was originally one of the residences of the Prince-bishops of Munster.   read more…

Vienna’s Ringstraße

30 May 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Living, Working, Building, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  8 minutes

Vienna Burgtheater (Theatre) © Peter Gerstbach

Vienna Burgtheater (Theatre) © Peter Gerstbach

The Ringstraße is a circular road surrounding the Innere Stadt district of Vienna, Austria and is one of its main sights. It is typical of the historical style called Ringstraßenstil (Ringstraße Style) of the 1860s to 1890s.   read more…

Weimar – Goethe, Schiller and Bauhaus

19 May 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, European Union, European Capital of Culture, Museums, Exhibitions, Sustainability, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  7 minutes

Weimar City Palace © Maros M r a z

Weimar City Palace © Maros M r a z

Weimar is a city in Germany famous for its cultural heritage. It is located in the Bundesland of Thuringia, north of the Thüringer Wald, east of Erfurt, and southwest of Halle and Leipzig. Its current population is approximately 65,000. The oldest record of the city dates from the year 899. Weimar was the capital of the Duchy (after 1815 the Grand Duchy) of Saxe-Weimar (German: Sachsen-Weimar). Weimar’s cultural heritage is vast. It is most often recognised as the place where Germany’s first democratic constitution was signed after the First World War, giving its name to the Weimar Republic period in German politics, of 1918–1933. However, the city was also the focal point of the German Enlightenment and home of the leading characters of the literary genre of Weimar Classicism, the writers Goethe and Schiller. The city was also the birthplace of the Bauhaus movement, founded in 1919 by Walter Gropius, with artists Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Oskar Schlemmer, and Lyonel Feininger teaching in Weimar’s Bauhaus School. Many places in the city centre have been designated as UNESCO World Heritage sites.   read more…

Tours, the Garden of France

16 May 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture Reading Time:  5 minutes

Town Hall © Anima

Town Hall © Anima

Tours is a city in central France, the capital of the Indre-et-Loire department. It is located on the lower reaches of the river Loire, between Orléans and the Atlantic coast. Touraine, the region around Tours, is known for its wines, the alleged perfection (as perceived by some speakers) of its local spoken French, and for the famous Battle of Tours in 732. It is also the site of the cycling race Paris–Tours. Tours is the largest city in the Centre region of France, although it is not the regional capital, which resides in its second-largest city of Orléans. In 2006, the city itself had 142,000 inhabitants and the metropolitan area had 307,000.   read more…

Schwerin, the city of seven lakes and forests

6 May 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture Reading Time:  7 minutes

Schwerin Castle - Parliament of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern © Kolossos

Schwerin Castle – Parliament of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern © Kolossos

Schwerin is the capital and second-largest city of the northern German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The population, as of end of 2007, was 96,000. Schwerin is surrounded by many picturesque lakes. The largest of these lakes, the Schweriner See, has an area of 60 km². In the midst of these lakes there was once an Obotrite settlement (dated back to the 11th century). The area was called Zuarin, and the name Schwerin is derived from that designation. In 1160, Henry the Lion defeated the Obotrites and captured Schwerin. The town was subsequently expanded into a powerful regional centre. A castle was built, and expanded upon over the centuries, on this site. It is supposedly haunted by the small, impious ghost, called Petermännchen.   read more…

Edinburgh – Books, beer and cookies

5 May 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Architecture, Sustainability, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  9 minutes

Hopetoun House © George Gastin

Hopetoun House © George Gastin

Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland and the seventh-most populous in the United Kingdom. Located in the south-east of Scotland, Edinburgh lies on the east coast of the Central Belt, along the Firth of Forth, near the North Sea.   read more…

Theme Week Marseille, France’s oldest and second largest city

3 May 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, French Riviera, European Union, Bon voyage, European Capital of Culture, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  9 minutes

Corniche - Petit Nice © Jddmano

Corniche – Petit Nice © Jddmano

Marseille, known in antiquity as Massalia, is the second largest city in France, after Paris, with a population of 852,395 within its administrative limits on a land area of 240.62 km2 (93 sq mi). The urban area of Marseille extends beyond the city limits with a population of over 1,420,000 on an area of 1,204 km2 (465 sq mi). 1,530,000 or 1,601,095 people live in the Marseille metropolitan area, ranking it third among French metro areas. Located on the southeast coast of France on the Mediterranean Sea, Marseille is France’s largest commercial port and largest French city on the Mediterranean coast. Marseille is the capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region, as well as the capital of the Bouches-du-Rhône department. Its inhabitants are called Marseillais. Marseille enjoys a Mediterranean climate. The summer/holiday season lasts for six months, from May to October, although also in April sometimes there are temperatures above 20 °C (68.0 °F). Winters are mild, with average temperature 12 °C (54 °F) during the day and 4 °C (39 °F) at night in the period December–January–February.   read more…

Floating prefab house settlement in the Netherlands

2 May 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Yacht of the Month Reading Time:  6 minutes

© Luuk Kramer

© Luuk Kramer

An amazing neighborhood of 75 modern floating homes has popped up in IJburg, Netherlands, paying tribute to close relationship that the Dutch have with water. Using docks as sidewalks and the IJ Lake as a backyard, the flotilla is a large-scale adaptive development in a country that will be disproportionately affected with rising seas due to climate change. The modular homes by Architectenbureau Marlies Rohmer feature a flexible design – wall panels can be swapped for windows to adjust each house to its site. On a hot day residents can jump off the porch for a dip, or in winter they can strap on a pair of ice skates to get around.   read more…

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