Build it to last

no-longevitySo, I’m in this conference center. Well, at least the second floor was a conference center. Anyhow, one wall along the entrance consisted of several backlit photographs of famous site around the city of Boston.

Problem: all were faded. That tarnished my impression of an otherwise nice facility. Solution: simply painting the plexiglass panels a neutral color and putting small framed prints in the center of each panel would look much better at a fraction of the cost of getting new photographic panels.

The interior designer may not have known how quickly the panels would fade. Or the panels might have been there for ten years. In either case, putting them there without knowing the colors’ shelf life – or planning for their replacement – was a mistake.

Takeaway: How are you building that project to last? Or how are you planning for its replacement?

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New England converges with Old England

boston-convergesThere are many aspects of Boston that remind me a lot of England. The further west one travels in the USA, the more the old-world feel and heritage get lost. It was fun to see many similarities between the old part of Boston and London. Several pubs I saw the outside of could have been in nearly any town in England. The closest equivalent in Colorado is an Irish pub in Boulder that is not quite authentic.

Hackney Carriage? I remember seeing those in London when we lived in the south of England. I think that represents an obscure license for taxis. I would have thought that since carriages quietly slipped out of use maybe a hundred years ago, that title would have been left behind maybe 50 years ago?

No.

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Schraffts

schrafftsI lived in the suburbs of Boston during my junior and senior high school years. The Schrafft’s candy factory was – and still is – visible along one of the major traffic arteries.

I saw the factory last week. I was in Boston for a workshop. In my attempts to save my organization some money, I elected to stay in a suburban hotel rather than a pricey one downtown. I figured that since I had navigated Boston’s public transport system as a high schooler (and enjoyed doing so), I would have no problem getting from point A to point B.

Not true.

By the second and final day of the workshop, I figured it out. But the figuring out was painful. The first night I went from the airport to the hotel. I discovered that the bus route that Google Maps showed me (while in Denver) referred to a route that was only run during mid-days. The second night, I went on a long slow bus loop that was completely unnecessary.

Ah well, it was an adventure.

Anyhow, Schrafft’s no longer makes candy there. The building contains offices. Not-for-candy offices.

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