Month

July 2014
Sir Norman Foster, acclaimed British architect, and his firm, Foster & Partners, are currently juggling multiple commissions in the Bay area. Foster’s success is due in part to his long-term advocacy for technologically advanced buildings that serve the client, while remaining environmentally sensitive. Foster & Partners has proposed two skyscrapers for San Francisco’s Transbay Project...
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The Puya Raimondii plant from South America blooms only once in its lifetime, and then it dies. Ordinarily this plant, also called the “Queen of the Andes”, doesn’t bloom until it is 80 -100 years old. Thus, every time this species blooms, it attracts attention. The Bay area has experienced blooming Puya twice in the...
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Once upon a time there was a tranquil lily pond in Golden Gate Park. It was just off JFK Drive, near the California Academy of Sciences, and was a pleasant home to ducks and fish, turtles, and frogs. Then someone, or something destroyed that equilibrium. The lily pond became a dumping ground for an invasive amphibian,...
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  At Walt Disney Family Museum.  Walt gave this bronzed hat to his mother for her birthday.  He fashioned a heart shape in the crown and filled it with violets.  It was cast from one of his favorite hats.    
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Monterey Bay Aquarium sits where the old Hovden Sardine Cannery used to operate, at the end of Ocean Avenue in Monterey, now called Cannery Row.  School children and adults crowd the Aquarium daily. Exhibits display native and exotic species of fish, mammals, invertebrates and plants. One small exhibit, strategically placed in the front atrium, offers...
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