" slowly polished by traffic and sunshine...slowly polished by traffic and sunshine..."

One of the delights of life is to happen upon the casual application of imagination to the banal. (That's why I get annoyed by the pretentious posturing of starchitect poseurs who work so hard to gild the lily.) Talking about banal, old French MANHOLE COVERS would seem to fit. (In Seattle we call them personnel covers, if you can believe it.) Take a look at how a bit of effort can inform even the most mundane things.

Thank you Michael Jennings for the link.

Comments

[clew]

Seattle City Light calls them hatchcovers, actually:

http://www.cityofseattle.net/light/neighborhoods/nh4_art.htm

I still like the You-Are-Here maps best of the four Seattle designs; I only wish the relief showed the underlying hills as well as the street layout.

The Eastlake sidewalk inlays of nifty unicellular organisms are informative, too. I can't find a picture online, though.

[Brian Miller]

Cool site.

There was an interesting, rather sad article in the SF Chronicle the other week about the Phoenix Iron Works in Oakland-who used to forge all the area's manhole covers. They are now reduced to a tiny office, brokering foundary deals between end users and the voerseas (Chinese and Indian) foundaries that have the business now.

[Ian]

You've remnded me of some photographs I have of circular manhole covers in Malaga, perfectly inserted into rectangular paving with absolutely consistent gaps around them. I will have to dig them out and post them.

[David Sucher]

The Seattle "You Are Here" design is shown in City Comforts, btw. (I worked with Anne Knight, the designer, way back when we were all children, and her design is indeed a subtle charmer.)

[winifer skattebol]

Another manhole site:

http://www.recoveringthecityscape.com/