The USS Constellation

1 May 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Tall ships, Museums, Exhibitions, Yacht of the Month Reading Time:  10 minutes

© 350z33/cc-by-sa-3.0

© 350z33/cc-by-sa-3.0

USS Constellation, constructed in 1854, is a sloop-of-war/corvette and the second United States Navy ship to carry the name. According to the U.S. Naval Registry the original frigate was disassembled on 25 June 1853 in Gosport Navy Yard in Norfolk and the sloop-of-war/corvette was constructed in the same yard using material salvaged from the earlier ship. Constellation is the last sail-only warship designed and built by the Navy. Despite being a single-gundeck “sloop,” she is actually larger than her frigate namesake, and more powerfully armed with fewer but much more potent shell-firing guns. The sloop was launched on 26 August 1854 and commissioned on 28 July 1855 with Captain Charles H. Bell in command. She remained in service for close to a century before finally being retired in 1954, and preserved as a museum ship in Baltimore, where she remains today.   read more…

Williamsburg in Virginia

1 April 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Museums, Exhibitions, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  8 minutes

Governor's Palace © Larry Pieniazek/cc-by-2.5

Governor’s Palace © Larry Pieniazek/cc-by-2.5

Williamsburg is an independent city in Virginia, with a population of 15,000. Located on the Virginia Peninsula, Williamsburg is in the northern part of the Hampton Roads metropolitan area. It is bordered by James City County and York County. Williamsburg was founded in 1632 as Middle Plantation as a fortified settlement on high ground between the James and York rivers. The city served as the capital of the Colony of Virginia from 1699 to 1780 and was the center of political events in Virginia leading to the American Revolution. The College of William & Mary, established in 1693, is the second-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and the only one of the nine colonial colleges located in the South; its alumni include three U.S. presidents as well as many other important figures in the nation’s early history. Along with nearby Jamestown and Yorktown, Williamsburg forms part of the Historic Triangle, which attracts more than four million tourists each year. Modern Williamsburg is also a college town, inhabited in large part by William & Mary students and staff.   read more…

Centre Georges-Pompidou in Paris

11 March 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Museums, Exhibitions, Paris / Île-de-France Reading Time:  11 minutes

Centre Georges-Pompidou © foto@NikolasBecker.de/cc-by-sa-3.0-de

Centre Georges-Pompidou © foto@NikolasBecker.de/cc-by-sa-3.0-de

Centre Georges Pompidou, commonly shortened to Centre Pompidou, is a complex building in the Beaubourg area of the 4th arrondissement of Paris, near Les Halles, rue Montorgueil and the Marais. It was designed in the style of high-tech architecture by the architectural team of Richard Rogers and Renzo Piano, along with Gianfranco Franchini. The sculpture, Horizontal by Alexander Calder, a free-standing mobile that is twenty-five feet high (7.6m), was placed in 2012 in front of the Centre Pompidou. The nearby Stravinsky Fountain (also called the Fontaine des automates), on Place Stravinsky, features sixteen whimsical moving and water-spraying sculptures by Jean Tinguely and Niki de Saint-Phalle, which represent themes and works by composer Igor Stravinsky. The black-painted mechanical sculptures are by Tinguely, the colored works by de Saint-Phalle. The fountain opened in 1983. The Place Georges Pompidou in front of the museum is noted for the presence of street performers, such as mimes and jugglers. In the spring, miniature carnivals are installed temporarily into the place in front with a wide variety of attractions: bands, caricature and sketch artists, tables set up for evening dining, and even skateboarding competitions.   read more…

The Star of India

1 March 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Tall ships, Museums, Exhibitions, Yacht of the Month Reading Time:  11 minutes

150th Anniversary Sail © flickr.com - Port of San Diego/cc-by-2.0150th Anniversary Sail © flickr.com - Port of San Diego/cc-by-2.0

150th Anniversary Sail © flickr.com – Port of San Diego/cc-by-2.0

Star of India was built in 1863 at Ramsey in the Isle of Man as Euterpe, a full-rigged iron windjammer ship. After a full career sailing from Great Britain to India and New Zealand, she became a salmon hauler on the Alaska to California route. Retired in 1926, she was not restored until 1962–63 and is now a seaworthy museum ship home-ported at the Maritime Museum of San Diego in San Diego. She is the oldest ship still sailing regularly and also the oldest iron-hulled merchant ship still floating. The ship is both a California Historical Landmark and United States National Historic Landmark. Named for Euterpe, the muse of music, she was built for the Indian jute trade of Wakefield Nash & Company of Liverpool. She was launched on 14 November 1863, and assigned British Registration No.47617 and signal VPJK.   read more…

The American Museum of Natural History on the Upper West Side in Manhattan

29 February 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Museums, Exhibitions, New York City Reading Time:  9 minutes

American Museum of Natural History with Theodore Roosevelt monument © Ingfbruno/cc-by-sa-3.0

American Museum of Natural History with Theodore Roosevelt monument © Ingfbruno/cc-by-sa-3.0

The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH), located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, New York City, is one of the largest museums in the world. Located in park-like grounds across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 27 interconnected buildings housing 45 permanent exhibition halls, in addition to a planetarium and a library. The museum collections contain over 32 million specimens of plants, humans, animals, fossils, minerals, rocks, meteorites, and human cultural artifacts, of which only a small fraction can be displayed at any given time, and occupies 2,000,000 square feet (190,000 m2). The museum averages about five million visits annually.   read more…

The Everglades National Park in Florida

19 February 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Miami / South Florida, Museums, Exhibitions, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, Environment, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  7 minutes

Everglades National Park World heritage plaque © Daniel Schwen/cc-by-sa-4.0

Everglades National Park World heritage plaque © Daniel Schwen/cc-by-sa-4.0

Everglades National Park is a U.S. National Park in Florida that protects the southern 20 percent of the original Everglades. In the United States, it is the largest tropical wilderness, the largest wilderness of any kind east of the Mississippi River, and is visited on average by one million people each year. It is the third-largest national park in the lower 48 states after Death Valley and Yellowstone. It has been declared an International Biosphere Reserve, a World Heritage Site, and a Wetland of International Importance, one of only three locations in the world to appear on all three lists.   read more…

The Architect of the Capitol

2 January 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Museums, Exhibitions Reading Time:  5 minutes

Map of the United States Capitol Complex © Architect of the Capitol

Map of the United States Capitol Complex © Architect of the Capitol

The Architect of the Capitol (AOC) is the federal agency responsible for the maintenance, operation, development, and preservation of the United States Capitol Complex, and also the head of that agency. The Architect of the Capitol is in the legislative branch and is responsible to the United States Congress and the Supreme Court of the United States.   read more…

The Museum of World Cultures

1 January 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, House of the Month, Museums, Exhibitions Reading Time:  6 minutes

© Dontworry-cc-by-sa-3.0

© Dontworry-cc-by-sa-3.0

The Museum of World Cultures (German: Museum der Weltkulturen) is an ethnological museum on Museumsufer in Frankfurt. Until 2001 it was called the Museum of Ethnology (Museum für Völkerkunde).   read more…

Musée Picasso in Paris

30 December 2015 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Museums, Exhibitions, Paris / Île-de-France Reading Time:  7 minutes

Musée Picasso Paris in Hôtel Salé © Pol

Musée Picasso Paris in Hôtel Salé © Pol

The Musée Picasso is an art gallery located in the Hôtel Salé in rue de Thorigny, in the Marais district of Paris dedicated to the work of the artist Pablo Picasso (1881–1973). The hôtel particulier that houses the collection was built between 1656 and 1659 for Pierre Aubert, seigneur de Fontenay, a tax farmer who became rich collecting the gabelle or salt tax (the name of the building means “salted”). The architect was Jean Boullier from Bourges, also known as Boullier de Bourges; sculpture was carried out by the brothers Gaspard and Balthazard Marsy and by Martin Desjardins. It is considered to be one of the finest historic houses in the Marais. The Hotel Salé was selected for the Musée Picasso after some contentious civic and national debate. A competition was held to determine who would design the facilities. The proposal from Roland Simounet was selected in 1976 from amongst the four that were submitted. Other proposals were submitted by Roland Castro and the GAU (Groupement pour l’Architecture et l’Urbanisme), Jean Monge, and Carlo Scarpa. For the most part, the interior of the mansion (which had undergone significant modifications) was restored to its former spacious state.   read more…

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