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Kansas City, Missouri
Stop reading the weather charts, stop counting the playing cards, there's no system, there's no guarantee
Late last year I started becoming obsessed with achieving Silver Elite Status with Continental Airlines, a reward for traveling 25,000 miles with that one airline in that one year. Normally I would split up my travel between airlines, but with just about all of my 2008 work travel on Continental it was finally my chance to get something for nothing, to get an occasional free upgrade, to get to board the plane just a little early (a clear advantage when bringing along carry on luggage). By December 2008 I was oh so close to achieving this magic status (I was at 23,000 miles if I remember right) and became determined that one round trip flight would put me over. The stars all aligned upon (of all places) Kansas City, Missouri- cheap flights, just enough miles, good barbeque and a recently completed building I had wanted to see.
As for my final goal, the flights did in fact push me into Silver Elite territory and started me on my recent rash of upgrades (as of today I'm 20 for 30 on eligible flights). And starting this year, the frequency and range of my work travel has noticeably increased- by January 31st I was already over 25,000 miles for 2009, something that took me all of last year to get. As of today I've banked just over 60,000 miles and I appear to be within easy striking distance of hitting Continental's top Platinum Elite Status for 2009/2010 (75,000 miles). Still knowing my history, if I end up close but not quite there then there's an excellent chance you'll find me back in Kansas City again for no (real) reason other than to achieve yet another imaginary level of Continental Elite Status.
I was surprised at how much I enjoyed Kansas City. The recommended burnt end barbeque at LC's was unfinishable but excellent, the city was reasonably scaled, most of its attractions were worth the trouble. For example, immediately adjacent to my hotel at the (Hallmark) Crown Center was the Liberty Memorial, a stone tower attached to an excellent World War 1 museum. My rushed schedule got me to the tower just at its closing time but still I was able to board the elevator and take the stairs to its summit for a rooftop view of the city. Meanwhile at night the top of the monument is set ablaze with a well meaning but totally fake flame- the effect is not fire but instead a surprisingly effective mix of steam and orange light.
The building (or, to be slightly more accurate, buildings) that I came that far to see was New York architect Steven Holl's addition to the Nelson Atkins Museum. The original museum looks just like what you would expect from an American museum built in the 1930s, while the addition is like nothing you've (probably) ever seen. The building (or, to be slightly more accurate, buildings) is buried underneath a steep, rolling grassy landscape while its underground galleries are naturally lit by a series of translucent glass lenses that pop up out of the hillside and cascade on down the hill. The effect is striking, especially at night when the lenses are internally lit and sparkle and glow against an unbelievably purple sky, as you will soon find out.
From the main entrance of the addition (the Bloch Building), you immediately drop below grade and start to descend even further down the hill as you walk through the galleries. The public areas of the building are gathered on that one (generally) underground level, connecting to the original museum building and (at multiple points) to the sculpture park along the back of the museum. And since there is no admission charge and little security, the museum entries become downright porous at those multiple doors to the sculpture garden, something rarely seen in museum design.
One of the great experiences of the Bloch Building has little to do with the galleries and everything to do with the landscape. A wonderfully winding pedestrian path follows the artificially perfect rolling grassy hills that surround and envelop the lenses as they take visitors up, around, behind and above the museum where a new view of the lenses and landscape await at every twist, at every turn.
Just try to stand under that purple sky and look and at all of those lit buildings and not take a lot of pictures. I dare you.
One of two new museums this slideshow designed by James Stewart Polshek (you'll have to wait a while to see the other one), the Newseum in Washington, DC is probably the weaker design with the stronger collection, or if not stronger at least more unusual. Framed around the idea of extraordinarily wide open subject of news, the collection of odd artifacts represent things that were newsworthy at some point, although often the threshold is so low it could be almost anything. The actual door broken into at Watergate, the actual electric chair that killed the guy who kidnapped the Lindbergh baby, the actual creepy cabin that the Unabomber lived in are all displayed along side reprints of newspapers and well designed video explanations. Even their Berlin Wall exhibit goes a step farther with more than one panel (most museums just have a lone panel) and an actual recreated guard tower, another odd draw for a ticketed museum that needs to compete for business with all those free Smithsonian museums located just across the street.
One of the more effective and interesting artifacts displayed is pictured here. The wrecked metal is all that survives from the very, very, very top of the communications mast at the original (now fallen) One World Trade Center in New York. Surrounding the mast are reprints of worldwide headlines, available tissue boxes and an extremely well produced video of first hand reporter accounts of the attacks. The experience was far more intense than I expected and makes me think that the artifact driven museum currently under construction at the actual World Trade Center site is doomed to failure when trying to balance the need for remembering the attacks with the all too evident danger of just wallowing in it.
Designed by Chicago architect Harry Weese, the Washington Metro is probably the best piece of architecture in the city (take that, East Wing of the National Gallery) and easily the best designed city subway I have ever been to (take that, Moscow Metro). The whole system sports a wonderful theatricality and scale that needs to be seen to believed. First warning lights flash at the edge of the platform, then a train glides into the station blocking out the trackside uplights and creating amazing shadows on the coffered ceiling. Even the details like footlights at the open train doors and the deep escalator tubes carry the design and experience right through, while throughout the color of the faded concrete makes the stations look like they were desaturated in photoshop to recreate a real life black and white photo. Put it all together and its damn hard to beat.
