Rather than words comes the thought of high windows:
The sun-comprehending glass,
And beyond it, the deep blue air, that shows
Nothing, and is nowhere, and is endless.
– High Windows by Philip Larkin
(2) John Pawson, Architect of Restraint (WSJ)
“I’ve never studied religion, but I find little to disbelieve. I have access to Cistercian Trappist monks and you have just to see their faces to see what an amazing life and what comfort that belief brings.”
(2a) A related quote from Arise from Darkness by Fr. Benedict J. Groeschel, C.F.R.
In the course of the years one becomes weary of conflict and sorrow. One longs for the fulfillment of the most profound needs of the human heart–for peace from conflict within and without, for a place free of danger and disappointment, for relationships untroubled by change and unmarred by selfishness. One longs to see, at last, the beauty of God, which has summoned us throughout life, shining out here and there. The words of the Psalm take on a poignant meaning as one gets older, “I have loved, O Lord, the beauty of thy house and the place where thy glory dwells” (Ps 26:8). One desires to embrace again loved ones gone long ago–from childhood and adolescence. Death becomes a possibility of going home to our Father’s house. For the believer, it begins to lose the bitterness and sting that St. Paul spoke about and begins to faintly resemble what death was supposed to be before the Fall, a passing on to a far better place, a coming home after a long journey.
(2b) Saint Joseph’s Abbey
(3) Tom Dixon Makes Things Better
Dixon has harnessed a process known as mineral accretion—a tool of bioengineering—to subject the chairs to low-voltage charges of solar power that encourage the growth of limestone at something close to three times the usual rate. Once they have acquired a beautiful patina, he will fish them out and let us all share in the magic. He adds, “The scientist [Wolf Hilbertz] who developed this method intended to use it to develop bio concrete. You could literally grow cities in this way.”
He admits to never having had a master plan, “but things always seem to work out slightly better than I hoped they would.”
(4) The scan is from The Art of Arrietty.