Taipei 101

Today was an overcast and rainy day. We spent most of the time indoors at the Taipei 101 building and the surrounding exhibition areas. Taipei 101 is the current world's tallest occupied building at 1,667 feet. It's so tall that it's hard to get it all in one photo and still be able to see any of the architectural details. The main draw to the average person is the six-level mall at it's base and the associated exhibition spaces.

Most of Taipei 101 Tower

The tower's top shrouded in clouds.

The atrium in the mall. The first level is below ground level and we're standing on the sixth level.

Everything about the mall area is oversized. This is the upper atrium. We're standing on the sixth level and the fifth level is the floor. You can just see some tiny people at the base of the column. The upper skylights show the tower soaring above and the exposed roof structures are supposed to be reminiscent of the inside of a dragon's skeleton.

We browsed the mall and picked up some souvenirs then went to the sandalwood carvings exhibit. There are two main pieces of "miniature" buildings. I put that in quotes because the only thing miniature about them is that they were smaller than the originals. The first was a reconstruction of a traditional Chinese manor house. It is a double courtyard "castle" of sorts, with the inner areas for living and the outer areas for defense. The detail in this hand-carved replica is amazing, right down to the furniture and statuary inside.

The actual inner courtyard would not have been a "pit" as shown here, but a flat garden and work area.

All of the doors move as do many of the window shutters.

See the furniture inside the building?

The detail in the latticework are really amazing.

There was also a recreation of one of the corner building from the Forbidden City in Beijing. The red n the sandalwood really comes out in the flash photos.

This "model" was small enough to fit in only one photo but is was not "small".

Chunnan and on doorway are shown here for scale.

See how red the sandalwood is in full light? Even to the eye the red was muted and muddy; it takes full light to really appreciate the color.

This is a silk tapestry from the Emperor's wedding bed. The dragon and phoenix symbolize male and female.

I have lots more pictures from this exhibit. It also included a lot of decorative and furniture pieces. Some small items were for sale, but the price tags (250,000 Taiwanese dollars and up) were a little out of our price range. Still, as we were leaving, I overheard an Austrian talking to one of the hosts and saying that he was very interested in acquiring at least one piece. Ah, to be rich.

After this we went to the nearby Noodle Festival and a Taiwanese Trade Show. More about those in another post...but for now it's breakfast time.