Each time I leave for a plp trip, I’m don’t have a solid idea of why we are going to these certain places, like Calgary or Ottawa. It’s only when I return home and reflect, that I realize how much information I took in during the time I was away. Field studies show us that you are learning constantly, wherever you go theres something to appreciate and gain from the experience. Of course we didn’t go to Seattle solely for the fun of it, we had a main focus and we were confident that Seattle could show us what our main focus really meant. 

But what’s our main focus? What’s something we could learn just by being in Seattle itself? Because of the large range of quintessential examples of unique and skilled, people and companies that reside in this city, it is a perfect example of “our definition” of the word crazy. This was the word we were searching to find in Seattle, from the MoPop to Chihuly to Microsoft, what was it that made these companies/people so out of the ordinary and special? 

 

Microsoft Campus 

Our first destination of the trip was visiting the Microsoft campus, including a tour of the visitors centre and a special opportunity to get a tour of the Garage. This experience was a great way to begin the trip, it was a very inspiring place to be, working in a place like the Microsoft garage would be so engaging and educational. Before visiting Microsoft, I had little to no knowledge of the company or what it was creating. As we were toured throughout the centre there were tributes to Paul Allen and Bill Gates, technological archives and opportunities to try their products aswell. Though I was tired from the early departure of the trip, I gathered an understanding for our reason for visiting. The ways that Microsoft as and will be changing the way people live, is absolutely insane, from the most popular video games to agricultural innovation, Microsoft is doing it all.

 

Chihuly Gardens 

In the past I had seen some of Chihuly’s work, but I never had a name to put to the work, in a sense you could say I had never seen his work. So going to his gallery was something completely brand new to me, and I was stunned. When going to gallery’s, you are usually there to see the artists work and we too all had the freedom to stroll around and admire his work, his glass, tapestry and paintings were all displayed. Along with an indoor theatre and an extensions of the gallery into the outdoors. The reasoning was to learn about Chihuly himself aswell, what kind of person he must be, to jump into the unknown of glass art. From interviewing a worker and seeing his work in person such as, the glass house sculpture, the sun and mille fiori and sea life tower, we found the beginning of our answer to our question.

 

Final Product  

Like I said in my Pecha Kucha, crazy is only a label used by someone doing something out of the ordinary. Not a skill or a talent, but a need to alter the normal. This is the video that Kai, Maggie and I created to explain this idea.