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| Valencia’s City of Arts and Sciences |
We’re neither architecture experts nor aficionados, but in the same way that you don’t have to be an art expert to appreciate great art, you don’t have to be an architecture expert to appreciate great architecture.
As we blogged before, one of the reasons we decided to spend time in Valencia, Spain was because of the architecture here. Valencia hasn’t disappointed us in that regard. A city’s great architecture is like a giant, free museum: all you have to do to enjoy it is walk around and look up. We know even less of the styles and eras of architectural art than we do of painting and sculpture, so we simply think of it as “classical” and “modern”.
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| Valencia’s City of Arts and Sciences |
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| Valencia’s Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia |
To us, the City of Arts and Sciences–with it’s massive shallow green pools and blend of glass and concrete buttresses–is a masterpiece. The neighboring Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia, looking like a sand crawler out of a Star Wars movie, would be as well though we couldn’t decide if the rusting metal sides were intentional or part of a restoration or repair project.
Everywhere you look in Valencia is a contrasting blend of old and new. Looking out from our balcony and across the train station we can see an ultramodern glass and concrete apartment building nestled between two turn-of-the-century (as in 1900) buildings. Perhaps it’s this contrast of styles that’s kept Valencia below some travel radars, but to us it’s part of the character of Valencia.
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| A sleek, modern Bridge (ok, so it’s engineering, not architecture, but still cool) |
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| A modern Valencian apartment building of concrete and glass, covered with sliding wooden shade panels |
In tomorrow’s blog we’ll take a look at some of Valencia’s more classical architecture.
