Flying a drone is often a strangely lonely affair—high above the world, separate from it—but on this occasion, my Mini 3 Pro had a companion in this red-tailed hawk, perched on Trinity College’s chapel.
Tag: steeple
Radiates Through the Chapel
Trinity College’s chapel is a beautiful piece of twentieth-century neo-Gothic architecture, but the interaction with the sunset sky brought a whole new appreciation for the structure. The gold light of the sky comes through the open belfry, but electrical lighting elements that shine up the structure from beneath the belfry happened to also match the sunset color and the position along the horizon, producing the odd trompe l’oeil of the structure appearing to allow the viewer to see through the mountains in the distance to even more sky beyond.
Steeple Restored
Redox Steeple
The new steeple on Gunnison Memorial Chapel is installed (remember when it arrived?) and beginning to react with the atmosphere around it. This chemistry, in which copper metal transfers electrons to non-metal atoms from the air to become an ion, is called “reduction-oxidation” chemistry—abbreviated “redox.” Seeing this reaction happen on such a large scale, and produce such an awesome array of colors, is a treat.
Night Before the Steeple
In the fall of 2013 at St. Lawrence University (on Parents’ Weekend, no less!), the gorgeous old copper steeple of Gunnison Memorial Chapel burned down from an electrical fire. Renovations and repairs are finally done, and the new copper steeple was delivered yesterday. Today, it will be hoisted up and returned to the top of the repaired bell tower, but last night I paid it a visit during the blue hour to get a feeling for the scale of the structure.




