(no, not the Integrated Woz Machine of Apple fame, but: ) the Imperial War Museum. Which I visited with Paul, and is a grand collection of tanks, guns, mines, chunks of aircraft and the like, from 1914 onwards. It’s not as interesting (for me) as Duxford, where they keep the big aircraft, but it’s free [...]
Also tagged warThe rebuilt (mostly, work still on-going) Camden Market seems pretty good to me, post-fire. Fewer places selling ‘I love London’ tat, and more selling interesting clothes and stuff – as well as some trendy boutiques for those who wish to spend sixty pounds on a t-shirt. It still has the rabbit-warren feeling, but not in [...]
Also tagged camden, cyberdogWhilst browsing all the things I can’t afford in Heal’s, found this beautiful spiral1 staircase. Lovely. I know it’s a helix, but if you call them helical staircases in public, you get odd looks. Odder than usual, I mean. [↩]
Also tagged architectureAs an epilogue to my Egyptian trip, spent a few hours at the British Museum today. This was motivated by every second description of an antiquity in Egypt being followed by ‘but you can’t see it, because it’s in the British Museum collection’. Yes, for God, Queen and country, we crated up everything that wasn’t [...]
Also tagged architecture, museumFinally finished Lisa Jardine’s biography of Robert Hooke, which I was pointed at courtesy of the copious notes at the end of the Baroque Cycle. It was enjoyable, but in part due to knowing the general outlines thanks to Neal Stephenson’s groundwork; I’m not sure how readable it would be in isolation. Even with the [...]
Also taggedWent to visit the Museum of London at the end of my last London trip, it’s pretty interesting, though currently undergoing some major refurbishment, so will require another visit. One interesting aspect of the museum is that at this point I’ve encountered various somewhat-related fragments of London history: Roman pieces from TimeTeam, Saxon from Bernard [...]
Also tagged museum, tateSaw Wicked for the third time last night; this time from the circle, which others have recommended. Once again, this changes the experience in ways I hadn’t expected – most notably, the visual effects are much more noticeable, both the front/back projection and some clever fixtures directly above the stage which produces assorted dynamic gobo effects [...]
Also tagged musicals, wicked…is stunning. The Barlow train-shed is breathtaking, with the brick cleaned and bright red, the metalwork in a sky blue, and the glass letting in huge amounts of light on a clear winter day. Even better, the conversion of the undercroft has worked well, creating lots of usable space without losing the character of the [...]
Also tagged architecture, railway