Visiting the Dolce Vita

It was half term a few weeks back. The SSF was away (on some sort of endurance test to northern climes, as it turned out) and I had unmitigated freedom to contend with. On a whim, I set about redecorating the kitchen. I like painting and I like orderliness. I was orderly. I was methodical. I wrapped my brushes in cling film every evening. Things were going surprisingly well until, after flicking through a few home design magazines, I had the brilliant notion of a ‘feature wall.’ I tried a few test pots out on designated wall, creating a Kandinsky-ish effect. The results were hideous. None of the shades I had chosen remotely resembled those advertised. This spontaneous need for colour injection had slowed my progress. Hastily I covered the mess with a calming neutral and decided an outing was required.

I have a list of Places-I’ve-Been-Meaning-To-Visit. Checking through this by now extensive directory, the thought occurred that several sites I had highlighted belong to the National Trust. So, quicker than you could spit at the mention of Michael Gove, our new Environment Secretary (latterly the destroyer of our education system as we knew it), I performed a complete moral U-turn and decided to sign up for membership. I can’t believe I’m even admitting this, so critical of this institution have I been in the past. And still am and probably still will be.

It didn’t start well.

To explain fully the signing up scenario I’ll have to confess to a recent personal event. I had a birthday. A fairly monumental one as it happens but one that comes with a few welcome perks such as free prescriptions and eye tests, a national rail card and reduced price entry to practically everywhere. Everywhere it would seem, except the National Trust.

After a lengthy drive eastwards to deepest Kent one morning, I arrived at my first planned property intending to join up there and then. However, wielding my driver’s licence as proof of age cut no ice with Miss Twinset who filled in my particulars. She very sweetly and ever so slightly smugly told me that to qualify for a Trust discount one has to have been a member previously for five consecutive years.

Unusually I held my tongue, bit my lip and whatever else most people do in situations such as this while thinking that with age must come acceptance. I imagine if I’d have had a membership of anywhere for five consecutive years then the chances are I’d have done everything on offer pretty much to death anyway: what would be the point of a monetary enticement?

I kept quiet. The new old me signed up meekly and, clutching my temporary pass in my gnarled old hand, I picked up a welcome pack which, I was horrified to discover, included an emblematic sticker for my car. I had now well and truly joined the ranks of those who frequent gift shops to buy local jam and tins of themed biscuits.

I had arrived at Sissinghurst Castle Garden, former home of poet and writer Vita Sackville-West and her diplomat and author husband, Harold Nicholson. The couple bought the place in 1930 and set about making a home for their family. Vita developed her love of gardening here and took delight in planting, designing and experimenting. She lived a fairly wild existence, had many liaisons with other women and a decade long affair with Virginia Woolf but always remained married to Harold.

 

 

When she died in 1962, Harold decided that her legacy should be preserved for us all to enjoy and left the place in the hands of the National Trust. I have to say, they’ve done a good job. The place is beautiful. It helped that the sun was shining and the day warm, but I spent two or three hours just wandering around the gardens and taking the long walk around the lake.

I even had time for a quick lunch in the ubiquitous cafe before heading off to the next place on my list. But that’ll have to wait for another day. This membership thing may well catch on.

 

Having a local light bulb moment

I went to Woking recently. It’s not far by car and I’d read that there was a Henry Moore exhibition showing there. Now, Woking isn’t a place one immediately associates with culture – it has a mediocre shopping mall, expensive parking and a horribly stressful one-way system currently exacerbated  by complicated roadworks. There is, however, a decent theatre and cinema complex but you have to wade through a phalanx of overly large folk eating their way through super-sized meals in a ‘food court’ full of fast food outlets. It always strikes me as odd that these bulky types, noshing their way through zillions of calories, tend to favour sports clothing: tracksuits, leggings and t-shirts that must surely contain a Lycra percentage, so tight are they stretched across their ample stomachs. Why is that? I’m fairly certain that the sportswear isn’t fulfilling its intended function.

Sorry, I’m straying off topic.

I was headed for the Lightbox. This is Woking’s arts venue and it occurred to me that I’d been there once before, years ago, when I took Son (aged about twelve) to an exhibition about Surrey during WW2. Why I haven’t been back since is a mystery…the place is a light and lively proactive three story area stuffed full of ever changing exhibitions and workshops for school parties with a very acceptable looking cafe area in the foyer where any suggestion of chips with Lycra is thankfully absent.

I was amazed that entry to the Henry Moore cost me just £3 – which also allows me entry into any exhibitions at the Lightbox FOR A WHOLE YEAR. While I couldn’t believe this my gob was even more smacked when the young lady behind the till mentioned apologetically that if I lost the entry card she had just given me, I’d have to pay £5 to replace it. This must be the best value exhibition centre IN THE WORLD.

The Henry Moore show ‘Sculpting from Nature’ concentrated on inspiration he drew from his surroundings– studies of shells, feathers and bones. The collection included drawings, maquettes, studio materials and working models plus three or four of his monumental sculptures, all loaned by the Henry Moore Foundation.

From a very young age, Henry Moore was an avid collector of natural things and at the Lightbox show there is a central cabinet filled with some of his precious finds. It’s easy to spot how these organic shapes – from driftwood and shells to shards of flint – were transformed into his iconic work that is so distinguishable today.

An informative archive black and white film, playing on a loop looks into the work of one of Britain’s most famous contemporary sculptors and there are shots of Henry walking around his garden at Perry Green – a place I visited several years ago with WF1 and which I think now requires a return.

But my tour of Woking’s Lightbox was far from over, for on the third floor was another fascinating exhibition. The Ingram Collection of Modern British Art was commemorating the one hundredth anniversary of the artist John Minton (a new name to me) who was inspired by the British Neo-Romanticism movement of which John Piper and Graham Sutherland were major figureheads. Alongside Minton’s works were those of his contemporaries, John Craxton, Julian Trevelyan and Alan Reynolds, none of which I was familiar. I love discovering new things.

Two Fishermen, 1949 by John Minton (1917-1957)

Thames Houseboats, The Weir 1963, by Julian Trevelyan (1910-1988)

I am With Child, 2008, by John Craxton (1922-2009)

According to Art Fund’s director, Stephen Deuchar, Chris Ingram is one of the most active and thoughtful collectors of modern British art today. Well, I’ll agree with that – I had a bonus hour wandering around a virtually empty gallery, enjoying the work of many painters I’d never heard of. Thanks to Chris Ingram, I say.

And thank you, Lightbox. As I left, I snapped this statue outside the main entrance. It shows author HG Wells, who moved to Woking in 1895 and wrote his most famous novel ‘War of the Worlds’ while living in a house on Maybury Road.

On the journey home I cogitated over other famous Woking residents and it came to me that the Modfather, Paul Weller, hails from here. If you’re in the dark as to who I’m talking about – remember The Jam from the early eighties? Remember one of their hit singles,  Town Called Malice? Paul Weller wrote that song about Woking, his childhood home.

Just how diverse can one town be?

 

Henry Moore Sculpting from Nature runs until 7 May

Ingram Collection runs until 26 March

Lightbox, Woking.

 

 

 

Only in England

I’ve recently been lamenting the lack of any decent blogging fodder so I cheered up no end when presented with a little gift this morning courtesy of breakfast news: the urge to share proved irresistible.

Steve Bloom, an independent second-hand bookseller from Hawes, a tiny village in the Yorkshire Dales, hit national headlines this week because he dares to charge people 50p to browse in his shop, Bloomindales. (Get it? Bloom–in–Dales? The story gets better).

Steve generously offers to refund the browsing fee should a purchase ensue but the local parish council are up in arms because, according to various media reports, they have had twenty complaints in four years (good grief, how do they cope?) about Mr Bloom’s rudeness when customers refuse to cough up. He even called one man ‘a pain in the arse.’ Amazingly, opinion on this earth shattering news is divided. Some folk seem outraged that a nominal fee is required – haven’t they ever been to a craft fair? Here in Surrey it’s quite usual for a £10 entry fee to be charged – and there’s no refund under any circumstances, not even if you clear the knitted animal stall right out.

Now dubbed the Basil Fawlty of booksellers and the rudest shopkeeper in Britain, Mr Bloom can probably look forward to celebrity status and a long line of customers just waiting to be insulted. After all, there are now Fawlty Towers themed events which command top dollar. Why not Bloomin’ Bad-tempered Books?

Should we be expected to pay-to-browse? Mr Bloom has conceded to a sign on his door detailing his 50p eccentricity. Is it eccentric? Perhaps he’s just brilliant at marketing and all this adverse publicity will get the punters pouring in.  I do hope so.

So – what do you think? While you’re making up your mind, here’s a bit of vintage Basil to remind us all of what it is to be British. Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

Tis the season…

I wonder why it is that, however carefully you pack away the Christmas lights each year, you end up wrestling with a tangled mass of wires before draping them over the tree to discover that they’ve decided not to work. They worked fine during the plug-in test in their jumbled state. This is one of life’s many little irritations and reasonably resolvable after checking the efficacy of each individual bulb but it is a seasonal time-waster.

I managed to avoid one of the stressful Christmas traditions this year – that of actually going out and buying the tree in the first place. For once, last year’s tree has been flourishing, potted up in the back garden, requiring very little maintenance other than the occasional watering. Because I have to have a real tree – and I’m very determined about this – nothing will incite me to unfold a fake tree from my attic – the task of selection and carriage falls to me. Many a year I have suffered scratches to face and arms as I force the shapeliest spruce I can find into my modest hatch-back.

So with the tree decorated, all presents wrapped and cards written, unusually I had time on my hands so, as you do, I hemmed a pair of curtains. Now, this might not sound like much but let me tell you, my sewing box and I are distant acquaintances. It sees the light of day occasionally if a button goes astray but coming out as part of some sort of enjoyable leisure activity is, frankly, risible.

I put this down to the trauma I suffered as a child in my first year at secondary school at the hands of our sewing mistress, Mrs Gorrill. She was a sour-faced little woman, always dressed in black (I think it may have been taffeta – whatever it was, it rustled) and she would rap us over our knuckles with her pinking shears if the stitching on our gingham cookery aprons wasn’t neat enough. My knuckles that term were red raw and I spent much of the time in that sewing room unpicking my sub-standard effort gazing across to the adjacent hut where the boys were doing technical drawing, wondering why girls were excluded from learning about perspective.

We were relegated to ‘domestic science’ which I reckon was only a generation away from ‘housewifery.’ I wasn’t much better in the cookery room, either. I remember my Swiss roll unravelling and ending up on the floor and being told off for pointing a saucepan handle over a hot ring when, in my defence, I’d been taught at home to angle handles away from the edge so that smaller siblings wouldn’t reach up and tip molten liquid over themselves. I think the teacher burned her hand on that handle as she was reprimanding me…hadn’t she heard of oven gloves?

These days cookery is called ‘Food Technology’ and anyone is allowed to take it as a subject, although its current status has gone the way of many of the more useful subjects on the national curriculum and has been savagely down-graded in favour of the academic subjects. While students are still required to make (in my opinion) unnecessary culinary items – fresh pasta, for instance, whoever is going to make their own pasta in halls of residence? – for some pupils, creating dishes in the kitchen is what they excel at and should be given as much kudos as an A star in English or Maths.

Little Mai from the Moomins looks just like my old sewing teacher

But what am I thinking? This wasn’t meant to turn into an education based rant. I simply wanted to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Have fun, enjoy yourselves – and cheers to another blogging year!

 

 

Funny Shorts

No, the title doesn’t refer to the wearing of hideously patterned Bermudas: just a couple of moments that amused me recently and which I thought were worth sharing.

I was on my way to lunch with WF1 when I spotted this. Other road users must’ve thought I was some sort of mad woman as I laughed away to myself, veering off the road when I could safely park up, walk back and take a snap.

It’s great, isn’t it? There are definitely some cases where the absence of proof reading or checking is vital to our well-being. It certainly made me feel better. Thank goodness for illiteracy.

I was obviously in frivolous frame of mind that day because not much further on I saw a homemade poster taped to a road sign advertising a
‘Massive Rug Sale‘.
And I wondered how large a rug has to be before it’s a carpet.

At home with Geffrye

How could anyone not like a museum called Geffrye? (Pronounce as Geoffrey or Jeffrey, depending on your spelling preference). I’d never heard of this place until recently whilst trawling my Art Pass guide. (Quite frankly, I’m beginning to think the Art Fund should be paying me commission, the amount of times I mention the organisation favourably on this blog). Situated right by the railway station at Hoxton – an area of London I’d not visited since the early seventies -The Geffrye Museum is now in one of the most sought after postcodes for young moneyed Londoners – especially the ones with the lumberjack shirts and beards, apparently. (I don’t know what constitutes a female hipster but I’m guessing facial hair isn’t a requirement).

Hoxton lies just north-east of the city between Bethnal Green and Shoreditch. In my student days we had to travel to Shoreditch once a week to the college annex which was housed in a building that wouldn’t have been out of place in a Dickens novel. It had one of those cage lifts with the metal fretwork doors. We used to pile into this rickety structure, overload and get it stuck on purpose every Friday just to abbreviate and alleviate the tedium of Mr. Goldstein’s Cosmetic Science classes.

Anyway, back to Geffrye. When I saw that this is a Museum of the Home, I knew that WF1 (Work Friend 1) would be my ideal companion for the day. She likes anything home design related and of course shares the same days off as me. We discovered that it’s easy to get to from Waterloo and arrived as early as our off peak train cards would allow.

The spacious front lawns at the Geffrye

I picked up a comprehensive guide book which explains that ‘the museum is set in the former almshouses of the Ironmongers’ Company, built in 1714 to provide homes for the elderly poor. They were founded with a bequest made by Sir Robert Geffrye, a wealthy merchant who became Master of the Ironmongers’ Company (one of the London guilds) and Lord Mayor of the City of London.’

The buildings were converted into a museum of furniture and opened in 1914. The surrounding gardens were – and still are – a free space for local people to enjoy.

Conservatory overlooking the rear gardens

The museum has arranged its collection into a series of living-rooms through the ages, depicting the way the middle classes have lived since 1630. There is plenty for the visitor to read by way of storyboards and there are ‘feeling’ samples of the textiles used in each set which enhances the whole sensory experience. We were very impressed – the curating here has been done with meticulous attention to detail.

An 1830 drawing room

An 1870 drawing room

At home in 1890

How we lived in 1910

The height of modern living in 1935

One of the almshouses – Number 14 – has been restored so that visitors to two of the rooms can glimpse life as it would have been in the 1780’s and the 1880’s. A very knowledgeable and enthusiastic guide spends around half an hour explaining the history and restoration process which we found fascinating.

A simply furnished bed-sit, circa 1780

Same room, updated 100 years to 1880.

With the help of lottery funding and the work of the Geffrye Museum Trust (funded by the government) the resources available here are just wonderful. A full range of educational programmes is offered throughout the year for schools, families, youth groups and adults. WF1 and I visited during the half-term break so it was crowded with children busily finding out about how their ancestors lived. There is a delightful café on site where you have to wait to be seated. While waiting, you stand beside a delicious array of home-made cakes and pastries and when you are finally seated overlooking the gardens and bee hives, a waitress takes your order. I had home-made soup and sour dough while WF1 had a tasty looking sandwich on home-made bread. There is an option to have a full cooked meal with wine…maybe next time.

The gift shop’s not bad either: tasteful merchandise with relevance to home and garden and a good selection of books. Any trashy logo-imprinted tat was thankfully conspicuous by its absence.

A view through the garden ‘rooms’

Outside, between the museum and the station, the gardens are divided into a series of period garden rooms reflecting the rooms inside. There is a Knot Garden; a Herb Garden, a Town Garden and so on. Going in late October doesn’t show the gardens at their best so WF1 and I have already pledged to return next spring.

Entry to the museum is free (donations obviously welcome) and there is a charge of £3 for the almshouse tour which must be booked on the day in advance.

What’s not to like? I’d have no qualms about awarding the Geffrye five stars.

 

 

 

Two households in fair Hampstead where I lay my scene…

The short half-term break shot past in a flash even though I managed to pretty much fill it up with taking various jaunts to places I’d been meaning to visit. So with the SSF otherwise engaged entertaining antipodean amigos, I took myself off to Hampstead. (As you do).

I had a reason to choose Hampstead for my solitary outing. Two, actually. I’d been scouring my Art Pass guide book for ideas and discovered that there were two properties in Hampstead within a quarter of a mile of each other that sounded well worth a look.

I’d never been to Hampstead – at least I have no memory of ever having visited the place – which is mad really as it’s only a few tube stops northwards from central London. I emerged from the station on one of those crisp autumn days where the skies are forever blue, there’s a healthy nip in the air and the trees are beginning to emulate Joseph’s coat of many colours.

Passing and noting for later a promising looking coffee shop (SSF would be proud) I made my way to my first stop – the house of poet John Keats. Originally known as Wentworth Place, the house was built around 1815. From the outside it looked like one beautifully proportioned villa but the interior was originally divided into two separate homes and it was in one of these that, in 1818, Keats went to lodge with his friend, Charles Brown.

Most of the rooms in the house are accessible to the visitor and on arrival I was presented with an informative leaflet detailing the route I should take. Each room has plenty of information about the poet printed clearly onto boards.

The furnishings are sparse but give a flavour of the time. In one of the basement rooms a ten minute video plays on a loop, giving us a brief history of the poet’s life.

To say that Keats had a tragic life would be an understatement. His father died in a riding accident when Keats was eight, his widowed mother quickly married a man who proved completely unsuitable. Keats was sent to a boarding school in Enfield, north London where he stayed until he was fourteen and where he fostered a love of poetry and literature. His mother died of consumption so Keats and his brothers were looked after by their grandparents. Keats left school, took up an apprenticeship as an apothecary surgeon and began to write poetry which provided solace in his unhappy world. Around this time, both his brothers died and Keats went to live with Charles Brown where he met the love of his life, Fanny Brawne, who lived next door. With no family wealth behind him (that he knew about) Keats gave up his medical aspirations to concentrate on poetry and it was while living at Wentworth Place that he produced the abundant volume of work we are familiar with today. With his own health in decline (he too contracted consumption) he died aged twenty-five in Rome where he had gone to recuperate.

The gardens around Wentworth House are modest and well tended and are free for the public to wander in, sit a while and ponder. There is a small gift shop selling poetry books, tasteful cards and soap of a natural quality. Had there not been a noxious smell of evil boiled vegetables emanating from the bowels of the house while I was wandering around, I’d have given Keats’ House full marks.

My visit lasted around an hour and a half after which caffeine was definitely required so I wended back to the coffee shop I’d espied earlier and took my Americano across the road to the Heath and sat by the pond in gorgeous autumnal sunshine, watching the ducks.

A little way from here, just up the hill and facing the Heath was my next port of call. Number 2, Willow Road is part of a terrace of three Modernist houses designed and built by architect and designer Ernö Goldfinger. He and his family lived at Number 2, the middle house, from 1939 until his death in 1987.

Goldfinger is remembered for designing residential tower blocks, some of which are now listed buildings but at the time of their construction were controversial. Willow Road is built of concrete with brick facings and just scraped past the fastidious Hampstead planning department, causing outrage amongst the preciously exclusive locals.

Entry into the house is by timed tickets and for only ten people at a time. Thankfully I had had the foresight to book my place before buying coffee so when I returned at my allotted hour, nine other folk were hovering around outside waiting for the off. The National Trust is the custodian of 2 Willow Road and I have to say that this was one of the times that this fusty old institution got it right. It was bequeathed to the Trust by Goldfinger’s children and the furniture, fittings and artwork are all authentic. The house is stuffed full of modern art – Goldfinger was a collector.

Our guide was well informed and interesting. We were ushered into what had been the garage to watch a short video about the life and times of Ernö Goldfinger before entering the downstairs lobby where an extraordinary spiral staircase gave us access to the rest of the house.

Goldfinger also designed furniture – in particular chairs – and there are examples of his work here. The house would have been ultra modern for its time, with interior partition walls that could create different spaces by being pulled back or closed. The kitchen, however, is tiny and one wonders how his poor wife coped to entertain all the friends and celebrities who frequented the place. Everywhere you look there is art by someone notable: Henry Moore…Bridget Riley…Barbara Hepworth. The bookshelves are full of arty books and there are myriad miscellaneous collections on windowsills and tables. I loved it and didn’t know where to start and stop looking. Sadly, photographs of the interior are forbidden so I can’t share this cornucopia with you but if you ever find yourself in Hampstead, make a bee-line for this place – it’s wonderful!