Sky World, Auckland

I wonder, are you tired of my reminiscing as part of many posts? I'm sorry if you are, but I can't really help it, you know.  When you're my age, and retired, you'll probably find yourself doing much the same thing. You'll find that so many of today's experiences remind you of past occurances. You'll enjoy it. You'll scroll through years and years of memories in your mental hard drive, savoring again how you felt your first time around.

Here is a copy of a lithographic print, made by M.C. Escher in 1953. I had a poster of this up on my wall in room 259 of Hunt Hall at N.M.U. I still like it. 

What I like the best about it are the two figures on the uppermost stairway. They are on the same step but on different surfaces of that step. That is some complicated gravity going on there. 

http://www.scottmcd.net/artanalysis/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Escher.jpg

Jeanne and I recently revisited an entertainment center on Queen Street in Auckland. It's called Sky World. Take a look at these two photos of it. I have not found the history of the place yet so I don't know the particulars of how it was constructed, but it appears that the architects took existing buildings and added, and conjoined, and filled in and built up to form the structure that it now is.

It doesn't look as tall from the outside as it does from the inside because it extends at least two or three floors down from street level, depending on where you enter it. 

I'm going to take you inside and show you around. When I walk into this place, I always think of Escher's work. Now, it's not really quite as amazing as his imaginary world(s). Gravity exists in only one plane here, but it is a lot more colorful, in constant motion and smells like a combination of all the cafes and restaurants and popcorn stands that fill it. I get the impression of being inside a giant machine of some sort...

 I am taking these pictures fairly early in the morning, about 11 a.m. probably, and there are fewer people here now than there will be later. I would have liked to have seen more figures on the walkways and escalators.

 Crossings from one building to another with the bullet shaped elevator in the background.

 There it is. It is a fast one too.

 I love this view. They incorporated a building's facade into one side of this new, much larger space. 

Looking down from one point. The stairs you see at the top of the picture link to the outside.
I can almost imagine two figures on the stairway, but 90 degrees opposite one-another. 

A walkway across the chasm

 Looking down from the walkway is an escalator, another lower walkway's railing just visible on the left and a ground floor cafe. 

(and part of my camera case) 

If you need a rest room on some of the floors, you'll have to cross some open space to get to it. Notice the top one. When you leave the floor in the building on the left, you will first walk down a curving staircase like a fire escape, then cross the gulf, before you re-enter another building. The top one is seven stories high. If you didn't really need the restroom too badly when you started out, I think you will, by the time you arrive there. 
I like that the stairway portions have clear glass sides. 

 Do you notice that it's getting narrow up here?  We're approaching to top.

Working our way back down.

The machine I refered to earlier in my post might be a Rube Goldberg creation and I am the ball moving in slow motion...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rube_Goldberg_machine

I like this picture too. The round structure on the right is a circular staircase. 

Notice that at the top of the picture, just to the left of the escalator, a figure is descending some stairs. He's coming into Sky World from one of the many entrances that access it from outside. The lack of definition makes him look like one of Escher's figures. 

Jeanne and I will be exiting Sky World through the same entrance he just came in, but we'll be walking down a different set of stairs to exit. 

Did I mention that I love this place?   -djf