https://www.buzzfeed.com/ailbhemalone/haunting-photos-of-the-london-fog?s=mobile
Numbers 4 & 7 are my favourites. It all looks very romantic until you scroll down to the end and read “The Clean Air Act was implemented in 1956, but the fatalities from the Great Smog are said to reach 12,000”
Today we visited the London Canal Museum. It’s a small building on a quiet road very close to madness of Kings Cross. It backs on to the Great Union Canal and is a good way to spend a hour on a grey and gloomy Sunday. The curation is informative and pretty good for kids, there is a life sized horse model to stroke and a real narrow to board.
There is a very big ‘but’…the museum has no a cafe, the only refreshments available is a hot drinks machine! The museum backs on to the Great Union Canal and is housed in an old ice house. A cafe/bar would work perfectly on the balcony viewing the canal or in the cellar where the ice used to be housed, let’s hope someone invests.
There are 41 buildings over 100m in London and over half of them were built in the 21st Century. Amazingly, there are certain views of historic London which can not be blocked. Westminster must be seen from an oak tree on Hampstead Heath and St Pauls must be viewed from a key hole in Richmond. Explains to me why the East has exploded. Not sure I want Boris approving all planning in the capital though.
The huge number of glittering jewels actually made me gasp as I turned a corner of the exhibition space at the Museum of London.
The Fort Knox style security (no bags allowed plus huge security gates) fed the feeling of excitement around this exhibition. It was cleverly curated with portraits from the time showcasing the jewellery which featured in the hoard.
The tale behind the huge stash of jewels is fascinating & the not knowing why they were buried in a cellar in Cheapside makes the whole story more compelling.
Much of the Elizabeth & her people exhibition was concerned with royalty & the upper classes. There was some focus on trade and John Gresham who developed the Royal Exchange on a model of the Bourse in Antwerp.
Interesting when viewed alongside the Cheapside hoard. The hoard has made me look more closely at Elizabethan jewellery & I now appreciate how much an individual would have worn.
Piccadilly looking towards the city – 1842
Small exhibition in the drawing room of the BM. Very interesting drawings of the building of London, mainly stations & bridges. The process of building is almost as interesting as the buildings themselves.
I Love the building & the interior space and although this isn’t really my bag I always enjoy the work when I visit.
This is a gorgeous little museum in the very heart of the West End is where Handel wrote the Messiah. It is also a great example of a Georgian house. The Handel section of the house is interesting & the guides are very well informed & friendly. The one thing I found most interesting is that Jimi Hendrix live in the flat in the 60s. Brilliant musicians from different eras.
He is now almost totally forgotten but when he was alive there were queues for days to see his altarpieces. (Like the Leonardo in 2011) He wasn’t commissioned until he was in his 30s, which gives me great hope. Not that I will ever draw anything other than a stickman but that I may achieve greatness later in life.
‘Rest on the Flight into Egypt’. Before 1573 by Federico Barocci
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-reviews/9893595/Barocci-Brilliance-and-Grace-National-Gallery-review.html
