Siena's Cathedral: Some Highlights

Siena cathedral has amazing floors,
inlaid marble scenes over every inch of the interior.
From dome to striped piers
to the elaborate floors
(which I was lucky enough to see being repaired-
a fascinating process where the old black lining
is chiseled out and new tar-like substance put in)
to the candles burning in the dimness,
this is a really lovely building.
(The floor detail scene shows Elijah,
ascending to heaven in a fiery chariot.)

Wells cathedral- the scissor arches

Wells is famous for these 'scissor arches',
put in to stabilize the central crossing tower.
I think they are pretty gorgeous, myself!

And the fancy vault prize goes to...

I saw a number of gorgeous vaults on my last trip.
It felt as if I were judging a contest.
Here are the results!

The second runner up is the Exeter cathedral nave.
Great carved bosses.

The first runner up is Gloucester abbey's choir.
Terrific perpendicular lierne vaults.


And the winner (drumroll...)
Sherborne abbey choir.
It's not the artificial lighting
(which I unsuccessfully couldn't figure out how to cancel.)
Look at the intricate fans,
all painted in numerous designs.


The best thing about Sherborne abbey is that it was wholly unexpected.
I went to Sherborne to see the almshouses.
And since the abbey was next door,
I just popped on in to look around.
And-- WOW!

I admit that before I use these photos
I intend to rotate them a bit in photoshop.
(But I'm here at the airport doing some quick posts
before my plane leaves,
so no time for photoshop at present...)

Dr. Foster went there too

There's an old rhyme about how "Doctor Foster went to Gloucester."
I don't remember what he did there.
I went to see the cathedral
(quelle surprise!)
Aside from the terrific fan vaults in the cloister,
here are three highlights:
the Perpendicular retrochoir,
the Decorated tomb of Edward II,
and this gorgeous modern glass
in a chapel off the south choir aisle

Three Spires

okay, these are all 'raw cuts'-
they will look better once I do a bit of photoshop adjusting
(mainly to straighten out the tilt lines)
but I love these spires.
Top: Norwich cathedral,
Middle: Chichester cathedral
(a Victorian rebuild by G.G. Scott,
but still nice)
Bottom: Salisbury cathedral.
Fabulous!

Research in Freiburg

Gargoyles aside, the real reason I went to Freiburg
was the choir portals,
which were carved by the Parler workshop.
Above is the north choir portal.
Below, a detail of the Creation sequence on the archivolts,
showing God with the spheres of the heavens
(looking sort of like a trimmed onion held upside down,
decorated on the exterior with stars):

The creation of plants:

Probably my favorite:
the creation of birds and fishes
(I think that is a lobster in the water mass by God's left hand):

Thanks to this project I have been noticing archivolts more attentively.
It's amazing how many details are included.

Gargoyles at Freiburg-im-Breisgau

The snow and ice highlights gargoyles in amusing ways.
Ice spouts for mouths, dripping off hats...

Most of the gargoyles have been outfitted with a modern water channel
(visible here to the right of the icicle)

For Some Reason, though,
they omitted a water channel in the gargoyle at top left
(look closely):

This mooning gargoyle is rather famous,
and famously is oriented toward the city Ratshaus.

Out Came the Sun

Finally, a bright morning!
I grabbed my cameras and headed over to the cathedral.
The winter sun position made the south side perfectly illuminated,
and a good chance to photograph details,
like these 18th century gargoyles (above)
and 14th century grotesques atop pinnacles (below):

One of my favorite west front details:
the stork
(on the pinnacle in front of the bishop in his baldaquin):

Storks are Very Important in Alsace.
They bring good luck.
Legend has it that wild storks voluntarily nested
atop the cathedral while it was building.

Zoom Comparisons

On this weekend's visit to the Madeleine cathedral,
I took Camera A and Camera B.
I didn't have time for an in-depth tripod test,
but hand held and the stained glass showed some useful comparisons.
Above is Camera A and the north transept glass,
zoomed in to its maximum,
and then zoomed out- not quite to its full extent-
but enough to fill the frame with the window.

Camera B, below, does just fine and dandy with the overall view
(again, it too can zoom out wider than the whole window)
but the range of its closeup zoom is much more limited,
as you can see from the photo directly below.

Have You Seen the Jack in the Green?

When I was a kid, I used to listen to my brothers' rock & roll records.
One of my favorite groups was Jethro Tull.
I especially liked their album "Songs from the Woods,"
and one of my favorites from that album was the song
"The Jack in the Green."
Jack, or the Green Man, is a genuinely interesting figure
(despite his popularity in the unscientific community of Unsubstantiated Wierd Theories)
and I particularly like these views of green men,
all taken from England's Southwell Cathedral chapter house.

St. Mary of the Assumption

This has got to be one of the most unusual cathedrals in existence.
It's in San Francisco and I've seen it before,
but on this trip I made an effort to visit it, with Dad's good Nikon camera.
The interior has the most amazing concrete 'dome',
crisscrossed with a ribbon of stained glass forming a cross.
The dome rises high,
but lowers at the edges,
and so approaching the center of the building feels heavy and low:

The church is more closely tied to congregational than traditional principles,
with the emphasis on the seating benches,
and the shared space of the community in the center of the dome.
From the exterior, the 'dome' appears like the keel of a ship:

I quite like this building.

Daisy field

There are a lot of these miniature daisies blooming everywhere.
They look especially gorgeous surrounding a lovely Gothic structure, like St. Mary's, Beverley.

Where the Wild Things Are

They've migrated to the portals of St. Mary, Beverley!

Doors of Chester Cathedral

Medieval doorways are such interesting things.

I love the ironwork on old doors:

Scrolls and nail studs:

Look at this fleur-de-lys closeup!

Good Photographs of Carlisle Cathedral

These photos were all taken on Saturday afternoon.
Lovely light on the west end (alas, not the east):

Gorgeous ceiling (restored in the 19th century.
The blue background is silk, which explains the rich color.)

The great east window, from the choir:

A charming detail of an owl seizing its prey, on one of the choir aisle capitals.
(It reminded me of Jennifer!)