5 Year Anniversary

A few weeks ago, Rachel and I celebrated our Five Year Wedding Anniversary. What is the perfect romantic getaway for a five year anniversary, you might ask? Pittsburgh!!! Look out Casanova... Steve Kennedy really knows how to treat a lady.

OK. Maybe Pittsburgh is not the number one romantic getaway for couples, unless you are out of vacation and need a location to celebrate your 5-year anniversary that is within driving distance of Philadlephia. However, we were pleasantly surprised by how cool the Steel City is. Although the weather was rainy all weekend, we managed to enjoy our stay in Pittsburgh. We will definitely go back.


In addition to PNC field, the home of the Pittsburgh Pirates (pictured above), Pittsburgh is also home to Heinz Field and the Pittsburgh Steelers.








This is a picture of the hotel that we stayed in. It is a very interesting design.
















The video below is of the Duquense Incline.



We took the incline to the top of the hillside on Saturday. There are restaurants on top of the ridge that overlook the city. The title picture of the Pittsburgh skyline and the picture of Heinz Field were both taken from the top of the Duquense Incline.






Saturday evening, we went to the Pittsburgh Pirates vs. St. Louis Cardinals game. Unlike for the Yankees and Mets, we were able to get really good seats 6 rows up on the 3rd base line for VERY cheap. There was nobody there. I bet there weren't 10,000 people at the game. It may have been due to the weather. The game was awesome! Pittsburgh won in the 11th inning.


REFLECTIONS - FALLING WATER






Sunday morning, Rachel and I drove 75 minutes towards Philadelphia and stopped to see Falling Water - the most famous Frank Lloyd Wright house.




Designed in the 1930's, Falling Water is probably Frank Lloyd Wright's most famous design. The house, designed for the Kaufmann family (famous retail store in Pittsburgh), is built over a waterfall and incorporates the rock cliff into the structural design of the house.


The living room actually has stairs that go down to the water. This access, combined with opening the windows in the living area provides effective air conditioning in the summer by drawing the air flow across the water and then through the room. It also provides a very peaceful water sound inside the house.



The Kaufmann's son actually left the home to the state of Pennsylvania before he passed away. The home, the guest house and all of the furniture inside of both were all designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.









Wright used the layout and design of the windows to make the indoor living spaces seem much larger than they actually are. A lot of the design features on the house are really cool. For instance, the windows are built into the stone but do not have actual seals. I have no idea how they do not leak, but they don't. I also don't know how it deals with freeze/thaw cycles, because I would think that glass and stone have different coefficients of expansion (the windows should crack as they expand at a different rate than the stone, when the temperature swings).




The shelving in the kitchen was built into the walls and actually folds up to form additional table space for visitors or servants.






The living room also had built in shelving. You will also see a large outdoor living area through the window in the living room. Falling water actually has more square footage in outdoor living space than it does on the inside. Almost every room has a outdoor space. The house is totally designed to fit into its surroundings and to cause its guests to focus on the outside.


The fireplaces were really cool. The living room and each bedroom had a fireplace. A single chimney served the fireplaces of each room, but each room had its own chamber. You can see that the stone work for this room's fireplace is a lot wider than the fireplace itself. This is to house the other chambers.




A picture of one of the bedroom patios with the mountain in the backdrop. Not only was the home beautiful, but the surrounding land is gorgeous.








This is a great picture that shows how the windows on one of the reading rooms open up completely. The windows opened from both sides, making the room feel a lot more open.







More of the outdoor living spaces.





Here is Rachel enjoying the herb garden outside of the son's room. Notice that she is wearing her purse on her front. This is so she would not bump into any of the furniture and damage it. As it is all antique, they ask that you be very careful about bumping anything.







A walkway connects the main house to the guest house. This is a statue in the walkway. What is cool is that water from the roof is actually diverted through piping that turns this statue into an indoor fountain.










The living space outside of the guest house.













This is a picture of the living room water access from outside of the home. Notice the waterfall is directly behind this access point.







If you ever have the chance to visit Falling Water, I strongly suggest that you do. If you are ever visiting Pittsburgh, drive out and see it. It is well worth the trip. It is an amazing house. You will never see anything like it. You never will be able to; as the tour guides point out, this house would never pass building codes today. It uses too many creative and non-conventional engineering solutions that would cost an architect a fortune to get approved on a case-by-case basis these days.