The wonderful tower of Pisa

If you like traveling, it’s impossible not to know the wonderful Tower of Pisa (La Torre di Pisa), the campanile belonging to the Cathedral of the Italian city of Pisa, also known as The Leaning Tower.

Dating back  to 1173 and even intially meant to be a perfectly vertical structure, the Tower of Pisa is today one curious attraction due to its high leaning at about 3.99 degrees. How this happened? As Wikipedia says: “The tower began to sink after construction had progressed to the third floor in 1178. This was due to a mere three-meter foundation, set in weak, unstable subsoil, a design that was flawed from the beginning.”  Now, the Tower of Pisa is a beautiful landmark in a continuous fight with its harsh environmental conditions.

The well known Italian tower, although one controversial building, as you’ll see, it’s not the only one of such kind… some other towers around the world stand almost like ready to fall – some intended to be like that, some not.

A Luxurious Underground Mansion

The house that will be built under the grounds of Limehurst, a Victorian building converted into flats, is a “£2m property, which will be entered via an unassuming door at ground level and descend up to 50ft below.”
Still a project…

L’Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland

A beautiful place meant to remind of Viking settlements in Newfoundland, Canada. You can consider it the authentic Viking recreation – a wonderful architectural piece for travellers.

Underground house in Greece

Another carved house with just the second storey visible above ground. Designed by Deca Architecture, the eco-friendly home stands proud on the beautiful landscape of the Greek Cycladic Islands and in the windy climate of the Aegean Sea.

Underground House in the Swiss

A unique house situated deep in the mountains in the Swiss village of Vals. Designed by search in collaboration with Christian Muller Architects the beautiful residence, although unusual in aesthetics, has the facilities of a normal home. A common interior, but a wonderful exterior design and a stunning mountain view due to its circular opening.

Malator is a beautiful construction

Malator is a beautiful construction that amazingly blends with the landscape of St Bride’s Bay. More than a strange, contemporary home – one of Wales’ architectural treasures.

Cumbria Underground House

Similar by nature with the two houses the follow her in this post, Cumbria is not a bunker as the Subterra Castle is, but an environmentally friendly, modernly designed home dug into the moutain, more like a burrow.

Beautiful Quito, Ecuador

Quito, Ecuador – Inca Civilization considered gold to be a symbol of the Sun God, so the interior of Iglesia de la Compañia was covered with almost 2 tons of gold. Magical…

Incredible Subterra Castle, Dover, Kansas

Living underground becomes more fascinating when your home is not just an earth-sheltered residence, but an abandoned subterranean missile launch complex. Subterra Castle is the best example on how to transform an old, ugly and forgotten bunker into a livable and colorful home. Behind a strong door designed to withstand the blast from a nuclear explosion, after tunnels and lots of metal, a New Age ambiance lays in the home of Ed and Dianna.

Underground hobbit house in central California

And because we were talking about underground owner built houses this is another interesting one. A whimsical wood home, strangely shaped, in the middle of nature – central California.

Incredible hobbit like house

A lovely home and the one I like most is the hobbit-like house of Simon Dale from Wales. Built with a lot of care for the environment is one of the wonderful and unique places in the world people would like to live in. Close to nature and making plenty use of it to get a comfortable and modern life… “wood burner for heating, water by gravity from nearby spring, solar panels for lighting, music and computing, skylight in roof lets in natural feeling light”.

People have been living underground

Unbelievable? Wild? A bit strange? Since the beginning of time people have been living underground. All history books speak about cavemen. The 17th-century philosopher Thomas Hobbes had a very brutal image of these people and of the human being far away from civilization and called this kind of living “poor, nasty, brutish and short”.
After thousands and thousands of years things have changed a little… 
Today’s earth shelter dwellings are a more friendly and elegant return to nature: comfortable and eco. I wonder what Thomas Hobbes would say about these….

Wonderful Most Ljubavi

Known as a popular spa town in Serbia, Vrnjaka Banja is also the home of a wonderful tourist attraction: Most Ljubavi – The Bridge of Love… The sad story of two lovers separated by the First World War who used to meet on this bridge attracts people from everywhere. Lovers write their names on a padlock, attach it to the bridge railings and throw away the key to seal their love for ever.

Vrnjaka Banja must have a flourishing padlock industry.
A woman called Nada fell in love with Relja a Serbian officer. After they commitment, Relja went to war in Greece where he fell in love with another woman from Corfu.

As a consequence, Nada never recovered from her condemned love and died. Since then, all young girls from Vrnjaka Banja who wanted to protect their own love stories started writing down their names, together with the names of their loved ones, on padlocks and fastening them to the railings of the bridge where Nada and Relja used to meet.

Yunagi no hashi bridge of evening calm

Yunagi-no-hashi (bridge of evening calm)  There is a special bridge in the site. It is a 120m long wooden bridge on the Sea of Japan named Yunagi-no-hashi (bridge of evening calm). The story goes that – if you lock the key of the parapet of the bridge, your love will have a happy ending. Many believers, couples and couple wanna-bes, have visited this bridge and make a wish. It is said that you can see the world’s largest sunset from the bridge.

Beautiful Tumski Bridge

An old road bridge build in 1889 to connect two cities: Ostrow Tumski and Wyspa Piaskowa; now open for pedestrians only to cherish feelings. Thousands of love keys stay for eternity on the bottom of Odra  river.

Lovers Bridge in Penglai

Lovers Bridge in Penglai locks the love up. More than tourism. Accordingly to an ancient Chinese tradition, when a young couple marries, they place a lock on the chain and throw the key in the water. Symbol for everlasting love.

Chortov Bridge - Kiev, Ukraine

The Bridge of Love is a wood and steel pedestrian bridge on the northern side of Mariinskiy Park. This place is like an exhibition for more than 1000 locks with names of lovers inscribed on them.

Lovers Locks in Riga, Latvia

The bridge is the voice of a centuries old tradition from China that symbolizes the locking of ones life and love together.

Unbreakable bonds – Florence, Italy

A 14th century medieval bridge that crosses the Arno River offering a wonderful view for the passing-by lovers as well as a place to seal their love forever in a place full of history and architectural values. “Nel trentatrè dopo il mille-trecento, il ponte cadde, per diluvio dell’ acque: poi dieci anni, come al Comun piacque, rifatto fu con questo adornamento.”

Strong Russian Commitment – Tallinn, Estonia

According to the Russian tradition, when married, a bride and a groom must buy a lock, write their names on it, lock it to the bridge and throw the key into the river. And so their love will be eternal.

Incredible Forgotten Military Facilities

Some facilities are no more than simple structures, but still able to say a lot about people of that time and their beliefs, condition and possibilities. Others are real wonders, architectural masterpieces… Let’s take a tour around the world.

The 5th building of its kind in Aldershot, Cambridge Military Hospital opened the doors to pacients in July 1879. It was the first military hospital in the UK to receive battle casualties directly from the front of World War One and also the first to open a plastic surgery unit. The title it received came from His Royal Highness The Duke of Cambridge, the Commander-in-Chief of the Army at the time.

The illuminated medical minds of the time considered that the wind would sweep away any infection and clean the air. This explains its strategical location on the hill. But the thing that made it famous was not its location, but its supposedly mile long corridor.The wonderful castle is located on Pollepel Island in the Hudson River. In 1900,  a businessman Francis Bannerman VI (1851–1918) bought the island in need of a storage facility for his growing surplus business. When Spanish-American War finished, he bought 90% of the US army surplus. This included also a large quantity of ammunition so he decided to provide a safe location for storage. Next spring, he began to build an arsenal on Pollepel.  It was built in the style of a castle more as a giant advertisement for his business.The island and buildings were bought by New York State in 1967, after the old military merchandise had been remove. Today, the unique castle is a ruin, victim of vandalism and societycarelessness.

The city of Bonifacio was founded as a fortress by and subsequently named after Boniface II of Tuscany in 828. He had led a naval expedition to suppress the Saracens of North Africa and returned to build an unassailable fortress and naval base from which the domains of Tuscany  could be defended at the outermost frontier. Most of the citadel postdates the 9th century or is of uncertain date but Il Torrione, a round tower, was certainly part of the original citadel.

Incredible fairytale houses architecture

You might think fairy tales are for children. Not always!!! What would you say about a few sweet colours and some warm materialsfor a fairytale house with a wonderful architecture… almost waiting for a Snow White to come out and greet you with a smile.
Just think of the equipment leasing rates for heavy machinery, vehicles, and other supplies needed for projects like this…amazing!