BF 26: A Car Art Walk

 

Even since BreyerFest I've had about four posts about it lined up in my head, shuffling their feet and rattling the gate, trying to be born.  This is the first.  I present them with two-fold intent:  to celebrate what we had, and to look forward to what, we trust, will be ours again.

This past BFest was unique with its stresses of a threatened "last one," which inspired much more picture-taking than usual, combined with the more normal (?!) stress of being cooped up in the room for longer than I should've allowed.  This all resulted in my taking extensive walks around the property, particularly early in the day, for exercise;  and it made for some great photo opportunities.  

 I don't normally decorate or shoot car windows, but this artform has grown over the years.  Some of the art I saw was so amazing I couldn't resist trying to capture it.  We will be seeing more of this truck later.

 I also, for whatever reason (though I suspect my secondary degree in industrial construction management had something to do with it), wanted to document some of the ongoing construction around the hotel.   This pic was shot on a cloudy day and then processed brighter so it wouldn't be quite so gloomy.

On Friday the 10th, I was walking around the Clarion from the south to southwest and then up north along the west front, eventually turning east at the 300/400 wing.  This car caught my eye.  I liked the typography and snowflakes but the brown wave mystified me.  (It may have had rain damage.)

The Nordic breeds, in particular the Fjord, were beautifully represented.

Before  we get to the north top of the parking lot and some of the finest examples of car art I've ever seen, I want to cover something else.  Every year, what I look for when first turning into the parking lot is people who have set out horses on their windowsills.  Somehow that sight is home;  without them, it just isn't BreyerFest.  This time, walking around the outside of the building in the cool morn, on my third morning there (July 9), I had yet another opportunity to document this phenomenon which meant so much to me.

back of the early 500/600s

 I believe I was looking for my own window, but somehow didn't catch it.

300/400s

A larger look.  The 300/400 wing was having its sidewalk replaced.

300/400s

 To my amazement there was a seriously good display of horses on a ground floor (300s) window.  I just had to catch this one:

Room 330

The art of the window display would come into its own in another hotel, and one of my remaining 3 posts will be about that.  But back to cars.  Up in the last parking area off the end of the 300/400s wing was this amazing trailer.

Definitely worth walking around!

 And that eye!  As it would happen, a particular horse with a blue eye took my heart this year.  The detail in this painted eye somehow really spoke to me.  It said:  I have seen everything. 

 You can even see my reflection with my phone,...!  Here is the car that drew this trailer. Aquavit the Mule is recognizable!

 Here's the other side of the trailer.  See what I mean about wanting to capture these!

 I said I'd get back to that black truck we saw in the beginning.  Here are a couple more views of it.  

 In fact I could not stand right next to it, so all these shots are somewhat slanted.

 My last image was so symbolic and haunting that I could hardly believe I'd gotten it on film.  I'm choosing not to brighen this one up, but leave it just as it appeared.  Surely this is the very image of this poor hotel's trials and tribulations, and a perfect measure of how many people feel about the whole experience.  

I mentioned 4 posts on the subject of  BreyerFest 2026.  The remaining 3 titles could be:  A Visit to the Embassy [hotel], A Coldstream Park Walk, and Posters.  I have the pix organized but the hangup is the processing, as always. Ye modern cell phone users could never believe the work I put myself through:  Resizing, cropping, tinkering with lighting and color saturation, fixing errors, signing and saving under a name which is evolved to indicate what who where and why, ending in size in pixels across.  (I'm reminded of the Daily Racing Form for thoroughbreds.)  That's for each and every photo that appears in these posts.  That's not the only reason my posts are so few and slow (distractions, anyone?!);  but it's the main.

Thanks for reading!