near the rosengarten in mainz you can find this art nouveau gem.
like i wrote before, going on long strolls with the dude was one of the things i loved most in our dating time. it always resulted in discovering the most wonderful places, and experiencing them in breath-taking light ( or through rose-coloured glasses ). on one of our last walks together ( before a big vacation trip my parents and i made to the czech republic ) we explored a little more of mainz, which was basically his home base ( he lived outside the city in a smaller village, but could practically roll into the city with ease, as that village was only a few kilometers away from mainz ). again, i realized how much this city has to offer in terms of architecture and history and how lucky i am to live in close vicinity of this remarkable city ( and, you know, the rhine-main region in general ). it ensures that i will have things to explore for a looong time, without ever getting bored of it, as of course city life also means that things change constantly and you will eventually return to a neighborhood you visited before but discover it anew, as your own personal interests or the time of day or the people you visit these places with, shift and create new perspectives.
i don't know for sure anymore where we started our journey and by the time we made it to the house above and below, we had already clocked a few kilometers in. i am pretty certain that i made more photos that day, but apparently they are lost and i can't seem to find them anymore. well, it's nothing i am all too upset about, just shows that things sometimes vanish and it turns out you don't miss them too much, despite feeling a tiny speck of wishful thinking that it would be nice and feel more complete if they would return. maybe that is an analogy on how i feel about that time in the past, you decide ;)
this particular building attracted me because of its art nouveau details like the beautiful doorway arch painting and the flower elements of the gate. the building was erected in 1912 by the architects jakob krug and georg finke ( who both actually were from darmstadt, a city that was a huge art nouveau hub back in the days ).
the flowers of the arch painting seem almost minimal when you look at more intricate artwork of art nouveau, but it still bears the handwriting of that style. curiously, this is what i liked the most, as it was almost abstract and alien, almost announcing a new direction of art nouveau.
i also adore these iron elements...
... and the gate flowers.
in the area close to the rosengarten ( and the stadtpark ) you can find a LOT of art nouveau houses and i was pretty excited to see so many! a lot of them are pretty minimal in design and only boast a few details, but finding these clues is always bringing me great joy. i also love discovering old rusty things like this gate! it belongs to another jakob krug building that he built in 1909. as stated above, krug was mainly active in darmstadt, making him a part of the architectural scene there, working with well-known architect joseph m. olbrich on the famous hochzeitsturm and several villas surrounding that tower.
texturrrrressssss. i love cracked painting.
here's another detail of the house, a beautiful bird mosaic. there was one more on the other side of the door and the door was also spanned with an iron vaulted awning. the glazed brickstones also added an interesting layer. i think i will have to return to that area of mainz eventually and take some more in depth pictures of the art nouveau villas there. sometimes our strolls kept me from taking more detailed pictures, as i often just wanted to be in the moment and focus on the person accompanying me than on my surroundings.
and a macro shot of the iron gate. the oxidation process created a perfect pattern of decay!
we moved forward to the rosengarten ( rose garden ) which is situated in the stadtpark ( city park ). this garden was created in 1925 by august waltenberg on the occasion of a rose exhibition. there are still over 4500 roses here and in all variations! a lot of them were still blooming, which was awesome ( autumn roses are my favourite roses ❤ )
also, somewhere around here a famous figure of the past was executed in 1803: schinderhannes. he was a high profile outlaw who committed a lot of crimes, among them robbery, murder and blackmailing.
there are some really beautiful statues inside the rose garden, such as this girl petting a cat.
... and this girl reading a book.
some putti are scattered throughout the area as well, probably being allegories of the seasons. this nekkid baby portrays spring.
and on the other side you have the depiction of summer.
there are benches everywhere inviting you to sit down and enjoy a little bit of repose.
i found some random polished rock where a fossil was still embedded in the structure!
these flowers, marigolds, captured me hard. their autumnal colours were warming my heart big time and i almost couldn't get enough staring and taking photos of them. usually they are summer flowers, but since the summer of 2018 lasted waaay into october you could still find these around! ( the rhein-main region is well-known for its mild climate which is beneficial for the flora around here ).
these were really cute, especially because of the colours.
this pastel purple rose smelled heavenly. sometimes i wish i could photograph smells, too, there are so many good fragrances in this world!
the colours of peaches.
some fallen rose petals.
another pretty colour variation and a most perfect form.
this little wintery boy is in a state of constant frost. i loved the squirrel on his shoulders 😙
oh, and here we have the season of the grapes: autumn.
inside the stadtpark you can also check up on some birds, namely flamingos.
we left the park and continued to walk back to the city. the night was approaching fast and with it nocturnal illuminations. here's a scenery where modern architecture and fortress architecture meet and unite in a unique way. on the left you can see a remnant of the fortress past of mainz, a former casemate of the franziskus bastion ( where now the restaurant citrus resides ) and on the right is the head office of DB cargo - a company owned by deutsche bahn which mainly focuses on the cargo operations. the casemate is around for centuries already, at least since the 17th century. the head office though was built in 1998 by the architecture firms of INFRA and RKW.
on the other side of the street this americana-inspired car glaziery wins you over with soft curves. in the back on the right you can see the building of the fort malakoff park - a huge office block / mall / hospital / hotel / theater.
the entrance to the malakoff passage has pretty neat lighting. this massive building was brought to life in 1997 by JSK architects.
moving on to calmer parts of the city.
or maybe not that calm after all ;) the inner city of mainz is absolutely gorgeous at night with its cobblestone streets and old medieval structures. the lovely building in the middle is haus zum spiegelberg ( house of mirror hill ) and a wonderful example of baroque architecture with medieval influences. it was originally built in the 17th century.
in a side alley i found this awesome bathroom cabinet that i guess was from the period between 1960 to 1970. if i had the space for something like that i probably would've taken this with me. unfortunately there was simply no way this was going to work in my tiny bathroom. but how cool would it have been if i had been able to install this? i think it would fit really well into a home with futuristic elements. instead i took a rag rug with me that still resides in my bedroom ( and keeps reminding me of finding the most awesome things together with the dude ). i refuse to get rid of it, though, because it also reminds me of my childhood bedroom where something equal once lay on the floor as well. i also found a typewriter on a different day, one of those old ones from the 50ies. it's still working and i'm keeping it in hopes that i will one day sit down and use it for poetry or letters or simply to get rid of internal conflicts. until i do that i will of course enjoy the aesthetics of it ;) ( it's a triumph gabriele 35 ).
sometimes the things you can find on the streets are awesome af.
a really cool entrance with stained glass. we found this near the church st. stephan's ( where you can find chagall windows, in case you are interested in that artist - i will definitely check this out someday ).
the baroque church belfry of st. stephan illuminated in the night. the history of the church dates back to 990, which is a true mind-boggle. the current building's ground structure can be traced to the late 1200s, and over the years it got a baroque appearance, too. it overlooks mainz in a really spectacular way, which i hope to one day experience myself. on that night we didn't stay around there very much longer and continued our way until we ended up at the kästrich near the kupferbergterrassen.
the kästrich is actually an area close to the kupferberg terraces and it is a really good viewpoint on mainz. they built a huge complex of appartments in 1994 ( hpp architects ) here which overlooks the city probably even more spectacularly than st. stephan's. unfortunately my camera is not really made for nightly views, so i'm just posting this picture here of the appartment complex. the kupferbergterrassen are embedded into the kästrich and house a cellar for the production of sparkling wine that seems to be the deepest sunken wine cellar in the world spanning about 6 levels underground? that sounds so awesome to me, and there's an image coming up in my mind about mysterious hidden secrets persevering there. we enjoyed the view from there for a while until we made our way back.
the final discovery for me that day was another 'sad girl', a new random maria. it's always good to see her ❤
after this stroll we drove back home and spent a last night together before i headed to thuringia to go on vacations with my parents. i didn't know then that those almost 2 weeks would end up being the end of our relationship. at least that's what i think was one of the catalysts. maybe that span of time was simply enough to let him realize that he could do without me easily. maybe i should've used those two weeks for spending more time with him instead of vacationing with my parents ( even though that trip had been planned and paid for even before i met him ). i don't know what exactly happened with our connection during that time, because there were no indicators that something was wrong. only when i returned and i introduced him to my parents ( finally... ) there were teenytiny signs of something going awry ( which i still somehow managed to wave off as insignificant, or at least as things that could be worked on ). up until he told me via mobile message that he couldn't see us two together in the future, i was always in the mindset that our relationship would last longer and we'd overcome those ( to me ) succinct discrepancies, minor errors that i felt were not justified making a huge hoopla out of them. but sometimes the magic vanishes more quickly for others than it does for yourself and i guess that was the case with him. while he didn't exactly tell me what was wrong with us i think that my biggest fault was simply that i was too unapproachable and distant for him, in many aspects. i have other suspicions, too, but i am jumping ahead a little too fast here, so let's return to the upcoming vacation.
upon arriving at my parent's place i immediately documented the growth in the garden. i absolutely love my parent's garden and am always excited to see the growth of the plants or the changes that happened while i was away.
huge golden vine leaf. there were no grapes on the vines anymore, but the plants itself still glowed wonderfully enticing in the autumn sun.
our sunny balcony.
the fruit of the silk tree where holding secrets in their pods! tiny baby seeds :3
that tree is probably my alltime favourite tree in the garden. at night the leaves close up on themselves and re-open when daylight hits them again. also, the blossoms are alien beauties and very popular with bees and insects.
dad had grown a good number of decorative gourds.
... with tiny knobs and warts on them.
another very autumnal flower: the firewheel flower! definitely lives up to its name :)
those colours are everything to me.
our little ilex tree also had a few colour surprises in store.
as did some other bushes around like this winter jasmine.
can you believe that the clematis bloomed in the middle of october? i couldn't really grasp that. it was really nice, though.
on the evening before we made our way to the czech republic my mom and i headed to weimar and had a walk through the woods nearby ( the protected area of prinzenschneise to be exact ). it is protected mainly because of two landscapes: heath-rush/beech woods and also cleaver/oak tree/hornbeam woods.
panicled asters are typical autumn flowers and i love seeing them out in the wild.
just wandering around in the woods and taking in all the autumnal signs and sceneries... this is what my heart desires.
i also love stumbling upon high seats. maybe i should start a series about them, because not every high seat looks the same. they are so many different varieties and the sceneries obviously differ too!
collecting gorgeous leaves. that batik print leaf was pretty neat.
this tiny pond gleamed happily in the late afternoon sun!
doesn't this look like a forest spirit soaring above the water? i'd like to imagine that. it was a magical moment sitting there by the water and enjoying this last flash of light before the evening dropped on us again.
and now the adventures of our czech republic vacation can commence!
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