King's X

A rather stunning site photo from John McAslan's new King's Cross redevelopment in London village.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2011/aug/12/constructive-criticism-architecture-kings-cross

Drawing: Crosswaters Bridge

Readers of this site may know I recently visited Nankunshan in Guangzhou province, China, for some quality cycling with some of the colossi guys. Astute readers may know that the title photo I use as a banner was actually taken from my first visit to the area on an mtb in 2009, shortly before I started this blog. In 2009 we stayed at the Crosswaters resort, whereas a couple of months ago Crosswaters was full, so we went for Pattra. Pattra makes more sense for cycling from a logistics point of view, but Crosswaters is that rather unique thing in China- a considered design hotel that embraces landscape and traditional Chinese construction methods but reinterprets in a modern way.

And so I found myself with Mrs bikesandbuldings in Crosswaters last weekend sitting on our villa balcony making this quick sketch of the bridge that marks the entry to the resort. It is predominantly made of bamboo, with a little steel and some concrete where required. Of course, this brings out all sorts of 'fake' cries of derision on tripadvisor, but if you can get over a bit of the grey stuff and appreciate this for what it is, it's a pretty unique piece of architecture set within quite an unlikely landscape.

http://www.thecoolist.com/landscape-architecture-designs-10-modern-masterpieces/crosswaters-ecolodge-guangdong-province-china-3/

W

Keeping with the pool theme, here's a nice way to spend Sunday afternoon in HK- at the 'W' in West Kowloon. Luckily some friends were staying there this weekend past and I got a swim in on the 76th floor.

http://www.w-hongkong.com/en/wetdeck

Peaking

It's been radio silence around here for some time for one reason or another (I've been very busy), and I have quite a lot of things to catch up on. But just for the heck of it, here's a quick photo from this morning's Peak ride. I think my heart was probably still beating at around 170bpm at this point, having just hauled myself up Mt. Austin, so I'm pleased with how steady I managed to keep the iBone to take this!