Watching In the mood for love on New Year’s eve
It is level 3 in Seoul which means restaurants are only open for take-out and entertainment is all but nil. So when I found out that movie theaters were open (with capacity limits) on New Year’s eve, that’s how I was going to spend the evening in this oddest of the odd years. I was…
Loving (Kim Hwan-gi) in the time of pandemic
The Pandemic reduced my mobility to a radius of inches, not hrs in flight time. Greatest challenge I had to endure is the oppression of the mundane. Groundhog Day in this uninspiring Punxsutawney urban living in Seoul (since lockdown in Singapore I left to Seoul, first to maternal comforts of three hot meals during 2-week…
K House
Way beyond Galle and past Ahangama and Matara in the Southern Province of Sri Lanka is K House, a secluded beach front property surrounded by lush Indian Ocean flora and open ocean views. It is where minimalist architecture of two villas effortlessly blend into nature and stand in comfortable distance to provide intimate privacy within.…
Yakumo Saryo – in cloud eight
My taxi ride is getting longer, going deeper into nondescript residential neighbourhood. I pass by some oppressive modernist gymnasiums of 1960 Tokyo Olympics era … and then it keeps going again. Finally I’m dropped off curb side in front of a gated residence (again nondescript) and I wonder “is this going to be another sit and…
Hotel KOO – collection of seven rehabilitated machiya’s in Ootsu
KOO is a collection of seven rehabilitated machiya’s (traditional Japanese townhouses) refurbished with modern furnishings, some as private villas and others with two or three separate guest bedrooms creating 13 units in total. Japanese machiya’s are small – typically around 1,000 sq. ft – and split into two levels. Insisting on key features such as…
Human scale of Sydney Opera House
The first time I saw Sydney Opera House was in 2000 during my first visit to Sydney and the obligatory walk down to the rocks. I still remember my first reaction at the time – ‘it’s not as a big as I imagined…’ but no less awe inspiring’. Many times had I seen the images…
Tsingpu Retreat – The Walled, Yangzhou
Sun sets and the contours of this horizontal modernist compound come to life. Architectural up-lights raise lit columns along the perimeter, down lights flush the layered brick walls and guest rooms and dining hall become punctuating light boxes. I don’t know quite how to describe Tsingpu Retreat The Walled as a hotel. It’s certainly a modernist architectural…
Trunk Hotel, Shibuya
It’s a common misconception for would be travellers to Tokyo that this city of super abundant creativity and modernity has numerous well-designed, boutique hotels. Well … there aren’t. There’s probably many reasons and this blog isn’t meant to be for real-estate finance mundane so I’ll curb it to a couple of inter-related reasons: prohibitive land/development…
House of Finn Juhl, Hakuba Hotel
It’s a wet late fall day in Hakuba and rain drizzles as the temperature falls in the valley. Hakuba, the site for 1998 Nagano Winter Olympics, is not known for beautiful lodging options – in fact far from it – so I’m particularly delighted that a new, design minded lodge quietly opened its doors. House…
Road to Capella di Vitaleta
Unexpected yet direly needed relief from punishing summer heat, cool northern breeze moves in on a cloudless day. Val D’Orcia in mid-summer is an utterly beautiful expanse of golden wheat fields where harvest just completed and hay rolled up neatly doting the valley. Drive up north from Bagno Vignoni and veer off right just south…
Normal . 