IJburg

Last week Matthias needed to head out for some fresh air between studying for midterms and writing papers, so we rode across the bridge to IJburg. IJburg is a neighborhood of artificial islands in the IJ lake to offer more housing/a new neighborhood so Amsterdam can continue expanding somehow. So why not reclaim some more land from the water! They even have a word for this "Polder" although it's possible that only refers to land reclaimed from the sea...anyway, IJburg is appears to be a bit of an architectural free-for-all. There are all kinds of crazy facades and fun angles and bright colors on the residential buildings. We peeped in on all sorts of different living situations from the street level windows and admired the reckless abandon/meticulous attention to detail with which the buildings were designed. I bet architects everywhere were falling all over themselves to get in on this project.

photos by Matthias