Posts in category: Portrait

Mamuthone Mask_Credits: Enrico Spanu:www.enricospanu.com. License: CC BY-NC-SA..

Sardinia: Mamoiada Carnival

8.01.2023

From man to beast

Even a candidate as stubborn as winter himself must get cold feet at the sight of a Mamuthone (header image) – not to speak of an entranced hoard of them foot-stamping and cow-bell-rattling on streets and around the many bonfires lit for the grave occasion. The noise is deafening and the atmosphere perturbing. The aim of this ancestral rite is to scare winter and any evil away with all the might one can muster. Thus, room is made for spring and to welcome the good it promises to bring. In order for nature not to oversleep, the tradition of stamping and rattling, by employing full weight of body and bells, is a drastic means of reliably shaking her out of hibernation and to remind her: Now is the time for renewal! Measures that seem to have worked over ages.

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Reading time: about 4 minutes
Entrence of the Radio City Music Hall in New York City.

A New York legend: The Radio City Music Hall

11.07.2021

Since its opening in December of 1932, The Radio City Music Hall has welcomed more than 300 million visitors from around the world. They gathered to enjoy stage shows, movies, concerts and colourful special events. The venue was certified with an official landmark status in 1978 and underwent extensive restoration in 1999, costing over 70 million US-Dollars. Money well spent, as the measure brought back original authentic ambiance along with the glamour of the 1930’s – enhanced with contemporary technology. Radio City Music Hall is located at 1260 6th Avenue (Avenue of the Americas) in the heart of the Rockefeller Center – the nation’s favorite Christmas destination.

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Reading time: about 4 minutes
The legendary Ju 52 is a flying treasure and a fine example of German aviation heritage.

Junkers Ju 52/D-AQUI: „Only Ju“

12.07.2020

When gifted inventor Hugo Junkers’s two companies (for engines and airplanes) were merged in Dessau in 1936, the first Ju model – the D-AQUI Fritz Simon – was just about ready for its maiden flight within the Lufthansa route service in April that year. Junkers stroke it lucky with his newly developed aircraft, which is said to have made him the most successful manufacturer of passenger planes worldwide, a happy circumstance to last for many years to come. As for D-AQUI – originally constructed as a water plane – constant changes of ownership in varying countries down to abandonment marked her turbulent path.

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Reading time: about 3 minutes
Hotel Art Nouveau Berlin

A Berlin hotel: Close to a home story

10.01.2020

When planning a stay at a hotel, there is always a choice. Sometimes, preference may be given to a uniform and relatively sterile ambience. Chain addicts best relax when layout and appearance are identical in Paris, Prague or NYC. Yet: A genuine „home away from home“ will come in all different shapes, sizes and outfits – just as people’s residences do. The more variety the interior offers, the more likely it caters to a person’s individual needs. The management of the Hotel Art Nouveau (Garni) in Berlin Charlottenburg is readily being credited for taste and sensitivity and a talent for original style, design and quality food. Enhanced by their ability to create an international atmosphere by weaving cosmopolitan influences into their offering, the result is a smooth concoction of pleasing vintage components.

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Reading time: about 3 minutes
The-warehouse-hotel-evening-river-facade

A Singaporean Heritage: From „Godown“ to Boutique Hotel

17.05.2017

Back in Lim Ho Puah’s time, the banks along Singapore River quivered with sinister activities of underground Chinese and Fujianese secret syndicates. Gambling and prostitution prevailed and the flourishing opium trade reliably accounted for half of the revenue thriving businesses along the Strait of Malacca route generated. Since most smokers were hopelessly addicted and the trade was supported by the colonial government, profits stayed at a long-time high. In the very midst of this illustrious district right by the river lay Lim Ho Puah’s „godown“, the warehouse he had built in 1895.

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Reading time: about 2 minutes