In this day and age of granite countertops and stainless steel appliances, the guy who built out this Somerville loft I’m in thumbed his nose at the trendy and went with an all white kitchen. I like it. The island has the fake granite, though; I wonder why he didn’t choose the same white formica for that. One thing i like about it is that it reflects the colors and the flavor of the day outside through the wall of windows on the opposite side of the room. Right now it’s sunrise on a cloudy day, and with so many windows and so much white, I feel connected to the sky. Fortunately, being on the 5th (and top) floor, I’m not too connected to how brutally cold it can get in Boston – all heat coming up from below and all the sun coming in the south-facing windows keep it toasty in here.
The Brickbottom lofts were converted from industrial buildings: a bakery, a cannery, and a foundry. This loft is in the bakery, and the floors are the original red brick atop another foot of concrete. The ceiling is also cement, with the patterns of the 2x4s that were used to set it clearly visible. There are three large cement pillars that fan out towards the 14′ ceiling that give a sense of the weight they support in this huge building. The walls that separate the rooms are drywall.
What with all the glass, brick, and cement, you might imagine how live this place sounded with nothing in it. I was a bit concerned about that. I thought long and hard about where to put the monitors and whether I’d even be able to mix in here. Recording, also, will be very difficult with the traffic and trains just below. There is also the problem of no symmetry in the space – there’s a sleeping loft on one side of the room, the kitchen on one side, and the windows on another. My solution was to put the main monitors just under and in front of the sleeping loft overhang, which might cause bass buildup problems, but functionally, it seemed like the only solution. I will be trading my 5 Roland surround monitors in for a better stereo pair. I’m thinking about getting one of those plug-ins, or even a set of monitors, that analyzes the room for you and automatically adjusts the EQ. But I’m skeptical. Have any of you tried those plug-ins? They’re very popular for small rooms, but I’m not sure how well they’d work in this huge live room.
I think for any critical recording or final mixing, I might make use of the studio at the Media Lab, and maybe I can just use this space for composing, producing, performances, and band rehearsals (there’s another whole empty room here). I’ve also already started making plans to build an initial version of my Aurrery for burning man. Maybe we can use that room to build stuff for that.
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In the continuing tradition of providing you with links you have probably already seen, winners have been announced for Science Magazine’s 2008 Science Dance Contest. They selected winners in four categories: Grad student, postdoc, professor, and popular choice.
