Headington Hall is a pretty nice place compared to the towers I spent my freshman year in. As an RA in Headington, I’ve gotten the opportunity to make it my home and gain a few thousand more steps from the immense amount of walking I do to get to the edge of campus where Headington is located. The building though is appealing to look at and live in. The exterior looks like it’ll age much nicer than the towers, but I could be wrong. The interior is classy as hell. Complete with a lobby fireplace that is always on and a statue designed by a master class artist. Everywhere you go in the building, you’ll find high ceilings that give the building a spacious feel. The theatre and game rooms are a little too nice for how little people use them, but tour groups love to look at them. The rooms are spacious and complete with large windows that let in plenty of sunlight and wide views. Basically, if you live in Headington first, you’ll never want to go back to the towers.

Broken Arrow High School…GO B-A! (or something like that). My Sophomore year at BAHS was the first year they had completed all the new additions and renovations to Oklahoma’s largest high school, as you can see from the picture. It was a bit unnecessary, to be honest, and I’ll explain why but, nevertheless, it sure does stand out and look pretty cool! Anyway, the big addition to the front of the school really catches your attention from the outside but on the inside, it was mostly useless space. Long hallways and high ceilings are what millions of dollars paid for, not to mention a varsity shop to buy overpriced clothing and a coffee shop to buy overpriced coffee. Don’t get me wrong, I love BA and I loved my high school years but lately, I feel like BA is spending more money on flash than on substance and the students are the ones paying for it (not literally but figuratively) what do we get out of the renovations? We park in the back, so we don’t even get to see the front of the building most days and those big long hallways are perfect for bowling in between classes. But Let’s take it back though, if we are looking solely from an architectural standpoint, it’s a very cool addition that takes you far away from the old contemporary prison cell looking High School design and I thank the architects for making high school almost look like a glimmer of hope.

The new-ish Tulsa City Hall building is probably one of the nicest in Downtown Tulsa. That’s from the perspective of my architecturally untrained eye. Nonetheless, it has a very modern look that stands out from the buildings around it like the Williams Tower there in the background that was built, what looks like, a few centuries before I was born (no graceful design to it at all). I got the opportunity to take a look at the inside of City Hall when I was invited to the Mayor’s Fourth of July party on the top floor. The elegant design and modern touch of the exterior carries on through the interior as you realize that every part of the building has a great view (except for the side facing the Williams Tower). The layout was a bit confusing but I’m sure it was no more confusing than Price College of Business was the first few times I walked through there. Tulsa has come a long way and I love to see buildings like the new and improved City Hall taking on a newly updated look.

I was 11 years old when I first fully visited Chicago instead of just passing through like my family always did on our way to Michigan. We walked the streets and saw the sights and it was exciting. Then my uncle said we had to see the Willis Tower and since I was 11 and in a strange city with an upsettingly large crime rate, I didn’t object. We got to the building and I could instantly tell it was the tallest of any other in Chicago. The building looked like it was stacked on top of itself like Legos as far up as the eye can see. I assume the interior lobby was underwhelming because I don’t remember it in the slightest, however that wasn’t the memorable part. We took an elevator that climbed to the 103rd floor as my ears popped from the changing pressure as I reached higher and higher elevations. Then the doors opened and there I was. A room of glass that clearly emphasized just how elevated I really was. I could see the entirety of the city from the other side of Lake Michigan to the next state over (maybe a bit of an overdramatization) but the view felt infinite. As I reached the windows, I noticed one of the coolest things that still has me astonished to this day. There were these glass boxes that were attached to the edge of the building but extended beyond the building itself, this meant that when you stepped out onto the glass box, you could see not only straight out in front of you including left and right, but you could look straight up, and the best part, straight down. If you have ever been 103 stories up and been able to look straight down, you would know that it’s nerve-racking but easily the most thrilling sight you could imagine. Just a few inches of glass between you and a very very long fall. I’ll always remember that building and I especially look forward to going back someday