The Hometown Moon by SYN Architects

Synarchitects have created an amazing public space and chapel in China near Mount Tai. Called The Hometown Moon, the structure features a half moon skylight above the building, floating on and reflected in a pool of water, while below the same half moon can be seen reflected on a silver ceiling. It is a stunning creation.

https://www.synarchitects.com/

Musée National Pablo Picasso, La Guerre et la Paix

All photos by JEF

The Cloud of Luster Wedding Chapel

The Cloud of Luster Wedding Chapel by KTXarchiLAB is a new addition to the La-Vienne Wedding Ceremony Hall located in Himeji, Hyogo Prefecture, Japan. The gorgeous glass-sided, all white, organically-shaped structure seems to float on a pool of water. And I love that the aisle is a floor lighted from below that is reminiscent of the floor from Dave Bowman's final room in "2001: A Space Odyssey."

This space is lovely and reminds me greatly of other glass chapels I have presented before: The Wayfarer's Chapel in California (previously here) and The Birch Moss Chapel, also in Japan (previously here).

http://ktx.space/

BEAUTY: Installation--Kimsooja

South Korean artist Kimsooja has installed the most recent iteration of her meditative piece To Breathe in St Bartholomew's Chapel at the Yorkshire Sculpture Garden. Originally developed for the Palacio de Cristal in Madrid in 2006 and shown again at the 2013 Venice Art Biennale, this piece features a mirrored floor and film on the windows that diffracts sunlight into rainbows, bouncing colored light off the floors, and reflecting onto the walls and ceiling. A recording of the artist breathing plays in the otherwise silent chapel. It seems that the experience would be transcendent, transporting the viewer to a secularly holy place. To Breathe is on display until September 29, 2019.

http://www.kimsooja.com/
https://ysp.org.uk/

The Birch Moss Chapel

This has got to be one of the loveliest architectural concepts I have ever seen. Japanese architecture firm Kengo Kuma and Associates built a chapel in the mountain town of Karuizawa, in Japan’s Nagano prefecture out of birch trees, steel, glass, acrylic, and moss. This lyrical, stunning structure is perfectly camouflaged among its surroundings. The architects used the birch trees as pillars and the stone and moss-covered pathway that leads to the chapel continues inside, blurring the line even more. A glass curtain wall and acrylic pews allow only the natural aspects of this special place to be present.

https://kkaa.co.jp/works/architecture/birch-moss-chapel/

BEAUTY: Architecture--Wayfarers Chapel

Designed by Lloyd Wright, son of legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright, and built in 1951, The Wayfarers Chapel located in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, is a miracle of engineering. Comprised of precious few redwood beams and a tremendous amount of glass, Lloyd Wright called his design a "tree chapel."

When construction was complete, it was just a building on a dusty hill, surrounded by saplings. But Lloyd Wright said, “When the trees that surround the Chapel grow up, they will become the framework, become a part of the tree forms and branches that inevitably arise from the growing trees adjacent to it. I used the glass so that the natural growth, the sky, and sea beyond became the definition of their environment.” Now, the chapel does indeed blend in with the grove of redwoods that surrounds it. It is a stunning sight, and an important part of the lineage of the history of architecture.

Above: Frank Lloyd Wright, left, with his son Lloyd and grandson.

On a personal note, I had a dream some time in 1981, where I walked into a church that looked almost identical to the Wayfarers Chapel to see my grandfather who had died nearly a decade earlier. At the time of this dream, I had never seen the structure and did not know of its existence. I can still see it clearly in my memory of the dream, and it was astonishingly beautiful, even ethereal, because of the part of the church that was not there--the walls--as well as for the seamless link to the surrounding trees and sky.

http://www.wayfarerschapel.org/