I’m sure some of you must be wondering, so let me say this, I am learning things over here. We haven’t just been on an extended field trip. It was only an extended field trip for the first couple weeks. We were orienting ourselves to the town, getting to know its history, and touring our new home. After completing the two workshops in this post, we really started to buckle down and hit the books when in Orvieto. It’s simply that we study differently.
One way we do this is by water coloring. No we are not art students, but art does play a large role in architecture. Yes, we create buildings. But the most important part is creating beautiful, functional buildings that accommodate and effect human behavior on a physical and psychological scale. If you simply want a four walls and a roof, find yourself an engineer. You’ll get yourself a nice sturdy box in no time.
But to be a good architect, you need to have a basic understanding of art. It lets you express yourself and create something beautiful. Art reveals the mathematics of beauty. Beauty is not in the eye of the beholder. It is in numbers and proportions, and making sure the shapes and elements of a façade come together in harmonious ratios.
Creating sketches of a building façade is the same thing as a mechanic, taking apart the components of an engine and reassembling them to see how everything works. We sit and observe, really observe, our surroundings. We see them for what they are, what they could be. We see how the lights plays across their surfaces and how people interact with their bases. We learn.
At the same time we improve our sketching skills. Architecture is one of the few remaining professions in which it is a necessary skill to know how to draw. We create our work from scratch. Structures from our imaginations, completely unique at their core. But we do not create these objects for ourselves. We create them for others. So for others to understand, we must be able to draw our ideas. Voicing the idea will not work. This is why we watercolor.
The fact that I already liked to do this on my own is just a side benefit.
Authenticity
We also got to learn a little more about Italy this week. When you think of Italy what do you think of? Rome, pasta, wine, and leather. We’ve already been to Rome. We’ve completed our wine workshop. Our pasta workshop would have happened, but it was moved due to family emergency. So what’s left? The leather workshop.
That man in the center is names Frederico Badia. He owns the shop we’re standing in front of. If you go inside, you’ll find something that men across the world dream of: custom, handmade, Italian leather shoes. Possibly the only time you’ll see a guy lusting after a shoe. And hey! For 2000 euros, a couple fittings, and two or three months of back and forths, they can be all yours!
Needless to say, we learned in the hands of the master. Everything about leather: how it’s cured, dyed, and formed. Then how that leather is turned into some of the highest quality products in the world. Obviously we’re not walking out of there with our own pair of 2000 euro shoes. Heck, even a pair of flip-flops would probably be time consuming and pricey. Not to mention, totally beyond our capability. But we can make a sketchbook in a few hours. Something easy and more useful to an architect, honestly.
After being given multiple scraps of leather in every color and texture, we decided what we would use for the cover and spine of our books. Many of my classmates were adventurous and went for teal, hot-rod red, or a mustard yellow. Myself, being the boring and OCD person that I am, went with grey and black. Something understated and versatile that would match the growing collection of black sketchbooks I fill at school. Deciding it had to be a bit more personalized, I added a deep red wrap with a button and called it good. Once again, my friends added more creative and vibrant patches and ties to their books, but what can I say. I like simple and elegant things.
It’s partially why my family had to buy a fancy Christmas tree that has both multicolored and white Christmas lights. My family loves the multicolored, but me, being the color snob that I am, insist that white lights should be the ONLY lights on the tree. Fight me.
In the end though, what matters is that I now have an elegant and beautiful journal for my time in Italy, crafted with fine Italian leather, and made with my very own hands. It doesn’t get much more authentic than that.
The Cherry on Top
The last thing we did this week was a Svinnere workshop. What’s that? Something not just local to Italy, but to Orvieto itself. Look it up on google and Svinnere is practically synonymous with Orvieto.
Svinnere is a cherry wine, created in Orvieto. About two generations back, the grandmother of the wife of that guy on the left got the idea to handpick local chokecherries and soak them in red wine. Though the cherries themselves are too bitter to eat raw, after a couple months of soaking in vino rosso, they can be pressed for their juices. Let that juice ferment for another year or ten and you have Svinnere. A fruity and delicious desert wine with a whopping 19.5% alcohol content.
Unlike the shoes, this one we actually got to bottle and take home with us. Not sure what a single bottle costs, but it has to be a lot as they literally do everything by hand. Every year they go out and hand pick every single cherry and bring it back to their workshop where they hand bottle everything. What made this workshop special like the last one, was they let us complete that process ourselves.
So we didn’t just walk away with a small bottle of Svinnere. We walked away with a bottle of Svinnere that we had filled, corked, sealed, stamped, and labeled ourselves. The owner’s hands never touched our bottles once. I have decided this will be our Christmas or New Year’s Eve Toast beverage... even though my family doesn’t drink and may or may not appreciate the masterpiece I bring them. Heck, I’m not sure if we even own a bottle opener or not. It’s going to be great ;)
Long story short however, I have now sketched Rome, watched a soccer match on TV, made my own pesto (with my own pasta soon to come), bottled my own wine, crafted my own leather sketchbook, and have switched to using ciao as a greeting even with my American friends. I’m officially Italian.
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