South Germany Excursion - Friday - Leipzig

So we just got back from our excursion to South Germany! Berlin, now more than ever, feels a little like home. Although I didn't get to post due to expensive internet fees, I've kept up w/ my blogging and will just post all at once. Sorry that this will be alot to take in at one time, but we got to see a lot of good things this week, and I hope you'll take the time to read about it! Here it goes....

Bauhaus

This building is in Dessau. It was originally a design school started and designed by Walter Gropius. This building is THE seminal building to launch the International style and thought. This school was unique in many ways for its time: they allowed women to learn in the same environment as men; a dormitory was attached to the school - the first where students could work and live in the same structure; and an entire façade of glass with no columns. One of my favorite parts of this building was the window details with how they opened.

BMW Plant

The central part of the plant was designed by Zaha Hadid. The factory is set up in a way that production is optimized w/ a central space (offices, cafeteria, business, etc) with the factories and production shops stemming from it. Throughout the central space, conveyer belts are running overhead with shells of partially made cars passing by. We got to go into the factory and watch cars go down the assembly lines. At some points robots are the only things putting pieces together. That was really fun to watch. They were huge machines but had human-like motions. We weren’t allowed to take pictures back there, but I probably could have watched those things work for hours. The tour guide said they complete 740 cars a day each car taking a total of 37 hours each. It was interesting to see how the design of the building helped make the production and function of the business run more efficiently.

Leipzig

This town we found not to be as inviting as Berlin and “Sassy Town”. We were too far away from the town center to experience any nightlife. There were lots of boarded up windows, graffiti, etc. that made us feel like we didn’t need to go exploring at night. We ended up watching a soccer game in the lobby. Germany lost their game that day, and we think that put a damper on the people’s attitudes. Even though we didn’t understand a word that was said, you could tell everyone that was interviewed on tv was really sad and upset about the loss.