London Art Spot: Marie-Louise Agius

Marie-Louise has a challenging task at hand: She’s designing a garden for one of the biggest London events of the year: The Chelsea Flower Show. This year is the show’s 100th anniversary, so all eyes are on Chelsea with big expectations for the centenary. With her partner in design at Balston Agius, Michael Balston, she’s working to represent London’s newest neighbourhood in E20, the East Village in garden form.

Read on to hear from Marie Louise on what it’s like to design your first garden at Chelsea, a special feature in her garden that’s pretty rare to find without connections like hers (she’s the Director and Trustee of Exbury Gardens) and of course, her best food and drink recommendations in this fabulous city.

LLO: Tell us a bit about yourself and your background in garden design.
M-LA: I trained in garden design post university and immediately found myself a round peg in a round hole, I loved it. Looking back on it, given my family links in the horticultural world, with my great-grandfather (mother’s side) building Exbury Gardens and sponsoring some of the great plant hunters to bring back seed at the turn of the last century, and with my father’s passion for plants and gardening, it was probably a destiny that was greater than any one decision!

LLO: East Village, London’s newest neighbourhood, is sponsoring you and Michael Balston to create a garden for this year’s Chelsea Flower show. Give us a short summary of their brief.
M-LA: We wanted to capture the ethos of the East Village, the ‘design for living’ theme that Delancey has for combining good architecture with great external spaces. It was also important to reflect the history of Stratford and the Lea Valley where the East Village is located.

LLO: I hear this is your first time exhibiting at Chelsea? What have been the biggest challenges and rewards so far leading up to the fast-approaching exhibition date?
M-LA: The challenge has been in the preparation, trying to ensure that we had as many elements prefabricated off site for reconstruction and tweaking when we started the build on site. It’s a complex design with some of the more architectural details having challenged our fabricators, who have been stars. The preparation of the plants through a challenging winter has also been nerve-wracking. However, for me, one of the most rewarding elements of the process has been the team camaraderie, the sheer number of people who have worked tirelessly with us to help us achieve our vision.

LLO: You’ve translated building materials from the East Village into some of your garden structures. Can you give us one of the best examples of this?
M-LA: The balcony structure at the side of our garden uses timber for the deck and the canopy and has a glass balustrade at the front; it will bring the public ‘into’ our garden and allow them to feel as if they were standing on a balcony in the East Village, looking out over a landscaped green space. The curved glass, timber and steel cantilevered seat in the top corner also abstractly reflects the history of glasshouses in the Lea Valley. In the 1960s at their peak, it had the largest concentration of glass houses anywhere in the world!

LLO: East Village is all about design for living; how does your garden encompass this ethos?
M-LA: Our garden is a space which can be enjoyed when viewed from above, as it would be if you were in East Village, or from within – as you wander through, appreciating the textures and colours of the plants and when sitting on the seat at the end, looking back down the garden, picking up the curved forms of the design that references some of the architectural elements within East Village and the Queen Elizabeth Park. It’s about quality of space, quality of materials and quality of experience.

LLO: What’s your favourite East London discovery and why?
M-LA: The Thames Barrier Park. It is a great outdoor space with a mixture of different areas – contemporary structures and materials as well as some very unusual structural planting and great views out over the Thames Barrier itself.

LLO: Tell us a bit about the logistics of putting together a garden for Chelsea and some of the plants and shrubs you’re including in your design.
M-LA: We have been working closely with Willerby Landscapes, our contractor, and we both knew that the key is the preparation. We have worked through the design to the highest level – for example, drawing the pattern of the decking to even include the 2mm gaps to ensure that there are no surprises when we started on site. Logistically, the plants have come from a number of different nurseries, all around the UK, as opposed to a single source, to ensure that we get the full range of plants we hope to be able to use. This has meant a lot of travelling for me to visit both nurseries and fabricators throughout the pre-build to monitor progress and make tweaks as necessary.

LLO: Has your position as the Director and Trustee of Exbury Gardens allowed you to do anything special with your garden that you may not have been able to do without that resource at your fingertips?
M-LA: Yes, we have lifted two very large Rhododendron macabeanum’s which were grown at Exbury from wild collected seed. These plants are rare and certainly not commercially available at the size we have got in the East Village garden. They are simply spectacular, prehistoric looking plants that have extraordinarily large leaves and would be sensational planted somewhere like East Village where a sheltered courtyard environment would suit them.

LLO: Which public garden space in London would you redesign if given the opportunity and what would you most like to change about it?
M-LA: I walk my dog in Kensington Gardens & Hyde Park in the mornings which are sensational as they are; however, I’d love to introduce more interesting collections of trees around the parks, diversifying the seasonal and species interest.

LLO: Give us your best London food and drink recommendations, away from the tourist trail.
M-LA: The White Cosmopolitan at Bar Boulud is my favourite cocktail in town; the Martini’s in Dukes Hotel have to be tried once in a lifetime; for a no decisions needed, one choice on the menu only fabulous dinner, grab a steak at L’Entrecote off Marylebone high street and if you don’t want to head out anywhere, I’ll always head to The Garden Basket on Stratford Street for the best fresh fruit and veg in town.

Thanks Marie-Louise!

London Houseboat Living

Read any article about houseboat living and you’re sure to stumble upon words like “idyllic lifestyle” and “romantic abode”.

I’ve never been inside of one, but I love to walk past the narrowboats in London, lining the Regents Canal.

Jorge and I took a little walk down the canal path last weekend after our sunny, flower-filled walk through Regents Park.

Cutting off from the park near the London Mosque, we headed down the canal all the way to Little Venice.

The decor on some of the houseboats is brilliant – rusty old watering cans, tacky pink flamingos, hand carved fish and old ratty boots filled with dirt and pretty plants.

The boats are set up into little communities and I’m sure they probably have that vibe for those who live there as well.

They’re quite quirky with fun names painted across the sides, smoke stacks or rooftop gardens, some with tiny grassy patches across the pathway and the creativity that is essential for living in tiny spaces.

Some also show a good sense of humour.

There’s often a cat hanging out by the entrance.

Many times residents and their friends are sitting on the deck around a table, living the life, chatting, drinking glasses of wine or eating sandwiches, sunglasses on, floating gently, relaxing.

Other times, you see people washing their boats or doing some sort of maintenance.

Though some of the communities of houseboats are pretty private, I’m not sure I’d like to live on one that touches a busy pathway like those near Broadway Market in Hackney.

There are quite a few houseboat mooring areas in the city on the canal and the Thames from Chelsea to Canary Wharf, Hammersmith to Ladbroke Grove, Hackney to Little Venice.

There was a festival of canal boats on at Little Venice the day we walked by – the Canal Cavalcade – so I took many of these photos there.

There was silly bunting everywhere to give it a sense of festivity and most of the doors were open so it was possible to sneak a glance inside.

They are very decorative and intricate structures in most cases, full of little details and personal touches.

The residents must have a nice sense of freedom as they can just drift off down the canal whenever they like and not even leave home.

The Canal Cavalcade is an annual gathering that kicked off about 30 years ago and now attracts about 130 houseboats, morris dancers and artisans.

Though they may look similar from a distance, each of the boats has its own character.

It’s worth stopping for a little wander if you’re passing through next year.

Seeing so many houseboats up close just asking to be photographed was a treat!

But they’re just as lovely, and maybe even lovelier in their natural conditions without the celebratory atmosphere. They may not be as shiny in day to day life but they seem more authentic.

A lot of the boat owners/renters we’ve passed along the canal also seem to have bikes, or maybe it’s just more noticeable as they are attached to the outside!

It seems to me quite an eccentric lifestyle, an embrace of minimalism and a sideways step away from the expectations of the rat race society.

It must be pretty amazing to wake up to swans or ducks swimming past your window or seeing a nest being built from your bed.

I would imaging the maintenance isn’t much fun though, and with a tight living space you have to be extra tidy and organised.

I think the best part about it would be the deck, taking a cup of tea out there in the morning with a good travel magazine and waking up on the water.

I’m off to Amsterdam tomorrow night for a weekend with the girls so if it’s anything like my last few trips there, I’ll come back with plenty of houseboat photos!

They even have a houseboat museum…

Would you ever live on a houseboat? Do you? Or do you know someone who does? I’d love to do an interview with someone who has made a boat a home. Put me in touch if you know someone!

London Art Spot: David Gardener

Dave has been around the world with his camera in hand, but our lovely city of London remains one of his favourite places to photograph. Another favourite involves wild mountain gorillas! In his interview below, Dave gives us his best advice for first time visitors to London looking to photograph the city as a Londoner would see it, shares some of his favourite London restaurants and his best London discovery.

London

LLO: Tell us a bit about yourself and your background. 
DG: I was born the Brackley, Northamptonshire, but spent my childhood and teenage years in a little village called Waddesdon, in Buckinghamshire. It’ll be well-known to fans of the National Trust, as its home to the famous Waddesdon Manor, a 19^th Century stately home and farming estate still owned by the Rothschild family but administered by the NT. Both my parents and grandparents worked for the Rothschild Estate – my parents were horticulturalists growing plants, trees and flowers for the home’s public grounds, the Rothschild’s private use and commercially. My grandfather was a dairy farmer. My parents, grandfather and my sister’s family all still live in the village.

I was awarded my Honours degree in Ecology and Environmental Biology from Oxford Brookes University in 2004, but I was always local to home. I was passionate about nature as a kid and my upbringing drew me into the study of the natural world.

I always had a fascination with London; I was close enough that I was able to visit but was determined to base myself here. When I was small I had this notion of a distant, exotic metropolis and I’d get up at 4am so I could go with my Dad delivering plants in his lorry. I’ve lived just outside London in Surrey since I graduated in 2004 and I’ve had my ‘day job’ in Bloomsbury for a few years.

Niagara Falls

LLO: What was the role of photography in your family history and how did you become so interested personally?
DG: Before his job on the Estate my Dad was a Corporal in the RAF, where he was an official RAF photographer. He always explained it was a skilled job, and included active military and reconnaissance projects, engineering forensics and accident investigation, ceremonial and public relations work – basically anything that needed a camera. Although I never saw him in action (he retired from service three years before I was born) I did see some of his work. Interestingly he never really continued with photography but he always encouraged me and got me my first 35mm camera when I was eight.

My Great Uncle by marriage, Roy Sparks, began one of the first photographic processing companies in London. He established it soon after the War and ran it from his basement in Wandsworth, winding up in the late 1970s after mass commercial colour photography rendered his skills and technology obsolete. I always regretted that I never got to see the equipment, although my Dad said it was all very impressive!

My love of photography grew from a mix of ‘scientific’ observation and art. It was the form of art which I, as someone with a logical mind, could understand. The world is beautiful, and it took no stretch of the imagination to appreciate the beauty of the world around me in a simple photograph. This was independent of my family history, almost coincidental, although I was always encouraged.

Man o’ War Bay, Dorset

LLO: Are you professionally trained as a photographer or self-taught? Do you find that your degree in Ecology and Environmental Biology influences your photography at all? If so, give us an example.
DG: I’m entirely self-taught, and I think I probably have some mannerisms and techniques which would make most professionals roll their eyes! I’ve always been an observational artist, focusing on great colours and compositions, or texture and light and not necessarily attempting to ‘interpret’ an image or create something conceptual from it. I have to say though that has started to come through naturally – I was always aware of the golden rules of photography and do try to consider them a bit more proactively now I’m attempting to take particular images.

I don’t think my education really had a honing impact on my techniques or my style. I’ve always had a fascination with the natural world, but conversely that manifests itself in different ways. My love of London is partly due to the mosaic of green and concrete – how in some instances urban development can enhance the world and is not always detrimental. Studying wildlife in particular gave me a very quick eye. I don’t miss a lot of things and I’m very observant of what’s going on around me.

I never set out to specifically be a wildlife or landscape photographer, although some of my most satisfying photography experiences have been in ‘wild’ situations. I also love urban photography but each subject matter has its own benefits and challenges. I’d one day love to submit a body of work to the Royal Photographic Society in an attempt to earn an LRPS.

Dubai

LLO: You’ve been called a “postcard photographer”. What does that mean to you? Tell us a bit about your approach to your art.
DG: I never really knew whether that was meant as a compliment or a criticism, but it’s my style and I’m happy with my results. I was always open and honest about my style and my work – I’m not a conceptual or interpretive photographer. I take a picture of an object or a moment because it’s beautiful or interesting. While I think very carefully about composition and tone, I’m not trying to convey any other message.

While some may consider that to be ‘lazy’ photography, I receive appreciation from others. After all, a good image is evocative. People have looked at my work and explained that it reminded them of a memory or experience of their own – the “I wish I’d taken that” mentality, which is great. It’s connected with them in their own personal way, and that immediate unguarded reaction is better for me than someone attempting to interpret what I’m trying to express in an image.

I’m a bit of an impulsive photographer – I don’t often set out with a particular image or series in mind. I have my camera and I keep my eyes open. I don’t want to miss a thing and I’m very observant as a result. I look at clouds, shadows, shapes and forms everywhere I go. The sign of a passionate photographer is getting annoyed with yourself when you see something you know would make an amazing photograph and you don’t have your kit with you!

I’ve learned to hone that more now I am doing some work as a photographer, covering events, portraits and commissions. It requires you to focus, plan ahead and ensure you get the images established in your mind before committing to it. I find both aspects interesting, but the artistic side of my work will always been the part I’m most passionate about. I love seeing my work on peoples’ walls.

London

LLO: What’s in your camera kit?
DG: My camera kit is still fairly basic – I’ve only ever had the one digital camera, which I bought in 2008. Until then I was still using film. My last 35mm camera was a Nikon F75. I was a bit of a purist – anyone could take a decent image with a good enough digital camera, and I still think that’s true, but I also think it raises challenges by itself. You need to see things differently, think about and interpret the same image differently. Twenty people could take the same image of Big Ben for example, but what can you do with it to make it different?

My move to digital was reluctant, but practical. I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep getting the images I wanted with a film camera – not least that I wasn’t able to see what I was taking – but also I couldn’t afford the financial costs of processing all my films. Although I have to say that some of my original 35mm have been digitised and are still among my favourites!

My current kit is a CANON EOS 400D DSLR 11mp with CANON EFS 18-55, CANON 50-200 and CANON EFS 18-200mm stabiliser lenses and an EOS Speedlite 270EX II Flash Unit. I also have a VELBON 347GB lightweight tripod. I’m currently saving for a new CANON EOS body.

I also have a SAMSUNG Galaxy EK-GC 100 16mp 21x 23mm ‘street camera’ which I try and carry around with me everywhere in an attempt to improve the ‘journalistic’ side of my work – taking those images that appear out of nowhere. I actually won the camera in a competition run by Time Out London in January of this year, and probably wouldn’t have considered having a non-DSLR for everyday use, although it’s a great piece of kit and convenient to carry around.

New York City

LLO: Do you have any advice for first time visitors to London who would like to photograph the city, but approach it in the way a Londoner would? 
DG: Two simple suggestions – look up, and sit still.

While everyone wants to take pictures of landmark sites and the skyline, and you should (I still do!) it’s important to keep an eye out for the more subtle things that makes London fascinating. A prime example is Regent Street. Everyone walks along it at least once during their visit, but everyone looks down, or ahead of them. It’s all about the shopping and the crowds. But if you look up at the facades you realise you are walking down one of the most beautiful streets anywhere in the world. The colonnades and the massive sweeping layout of the street down to Piccadilly is stunning, and you can get some very good perspective shots.

Also, look for detail. Pay attention to the particulars of architecture, intricately planned gardens and squares and the meandering of the streets. London is made up of a web of little villages, and if you pay attention to that, it becomes apparent. Think of something you would like to focus on, and you’ll suddenly see it everywhere.

Iguazu Falls, Brazil

LLO: You’ve travelled quite a bit. What was your favourite destination to photograph and why? Least favourite and why? 
DG: From an urban view, nowhere beats London. The mix of historical sites with gleaming new skyscrapers, the Thames, old winding streets and a vibrant cultural scene make it the best place to take urban images in the world. We don’t know how lucky we are to be here. A close second is New York, mainly due to the grandeur of the skyline and some great street perspectives.

But my favourite places overall have been ‘wild’ destinations. I was lucky enough to visit Rwanda in 2011 and the entire country is a gem – beautiful and green, with an amazing landscape. Best of all were the gorillas – I was able to get some amazing close-up and portrait shots of wild mountain gorillas during a two day trek into the Virunga Volcanoes. As a nature-lover, those moments will stay with me forever and some of my favourite images came from that trip. Another place that will stay in my head are the Iguazu Falls, on the border of Brazil and Argentina, which I visited in 2010. A series of 275 waterfalls over various levels across 2km of river, it’s a deeply visceral, moving experience just to stand amongst it all. It’s one of those places were photographs never quite do the scale and the sensation justice, but I was very happy with the images I came away with after a few days there.

As controversial as this may sound, my least favourite places are ‘other’ major European cities. London is far and away the best for photographers – I don’t even particularly like Paris. Crowded, grubby and monotone. I’m not a big fan of Rome (although I have some good images from there) or Madrid. They all seem to blend into that ‘you could be anywhere’ cliché and very few lack distinguishing features or a ‘vibrancy’, save from one or two landmark sites. If you’re looking for good portraiture or street scenes, they are all effectively the same, for the most part. The only places that appeal to me to return as a photographer are Budapest, which is an incredibly beautiful city, and Barcelona, for it’s almost New World style optimism mixed with some quiet European corners.

Rwanda

LLO: Most inspiring place to take your camera in London? Why? 
DG: Without a doubt, Waterloo Bridge. It’s cliché I know, but the views from there are incredible, and it’s amazing how the same view can change each day, or even several times during the same day. I walk across it most days on the way to work, and it is still one of the most breathtaking urban views in the world. It’s dynamic, dramatic, busy and yet romantic – stand with your back to the traffic, facing either direction, and you can easily lose yourself in that moment.

The Thames is often overlooked I feel – ‘liquid history’ as they say, and any images which can incorporate the river always have a certain resonance to them.

I also love the heart of the City at weekends. How a bustling, vibrant place can suddenly become so quiet is fascinating. You can explore the tiny side-streets with great names, stand in the middle of the road (carefully!) and take great perspective and architectural images, and enjoy the mix of ancient and new. I’d recommend a Sunday afternoon walk from St. Paul’s, looping through Bank and Bishopsgate and then back down Fenchurch Street to Tower Bridge. Even the pubs are closed.

London

LLO: What’s your best London discovery?
DG: The ‘natural’ aspect of London fascinates me, and so I love to take the time to walk around the parks and open spaces. They’re well known to most people, but it’s always nice to find a little place all to yourself and spend time there. I also love the old London squares – my favourite is Bedford Square, tucked away between Bloomsbury and Euston.

I love walking along the Regent’s Canal too, and again although a lot of people know about it not many take the time to walk it – Little Venice is beautiful in the summer.

I’ve also recently been introduced to the beautiful residential areas around Pimlico and Victoria – it reminds me of some of the residential areas of New York or Scandinavia. My personal favourite is the ‘Checkerboard Estate’ (if you live around there you’ll know what I mean!), and I’m hoping to take my camera around there very soon!

I’m always amazed that even in the heart of a city of 9 million people you can still easily find some peace and quiet.

Richmond Park, London

LLO: Give us your favourite London food and drink recommendations, away from the tourist trail. 
DG: I am a huge foodie, as any of my friends will agree! I like a lot of the smaller venues that are scattered over town, where there are no reservations necessarily, but it’s worth the wait – my favourite of these is Spuntino, a little non-descript place on Rupert Street – amazing macaroni cheese, sliders and boiled eggs! It also has a sister Italian restaurant Polpo, on Beak Street.

On a sunny day, I love walking through Regent’s Park and stopping off at the Honest Sausage – some of the best bacon and sausage sandwiches in London!

Overall, however, my favourite restaurant in London at the moment is Duck & Waffle on the 38^th floor of the Heron Tower in the City. Great food and amazing views, and a variable 24-hour menu, so you can enjoy the sunset or the sunrise from there! There are lots of places on my list to try though, so we’ll see how long it stays at the top.

I also strongly recommend everyone visits Bourbon Coffee, on the Charing Cross Road near Leicester Square station. Bourbon was founded by a Rwandan entrepreneur in Kigali as a place for businessmen and expats to enjoy a modern coffee shop environment in Rwanda. I visited several branches during my stay and last year a branch opened here in London, one of the first examples of expansion into the UK by a (non-South African) African business. Rwandan coffee is very good!

Chamarel Falls, Mauritius

Thanks Dave!

Follow Dave on his Facebook page for more: http://www.facebook.com/davidgardenerphotography

 

An Abandoned House (Temporary Gallery) Covered in Street Art

A few weeks ago, I was invited by Griff from Street Art London to check out a secret street art project (which I’ve been holding out on blogging about until now!). The photos in this post are from my visit, which was a few weeks ago and I’m sure it has changed and developed in an incredible way by now!

After two hours on a bus that crawled over the bridge toward Vauxhall Station, three lines merging into one, and eventually onward to South East London, I arrived in an area of London almost completely unfamiliar to me: Dulwich.

I jumped off the bus and walked up to an abandoned house at 265 Lordship Lane, pressed the buzzer. The door was opened by a man covered in paint. He works in the building trade and was lending a hand with some painting. The walls were half red. Behind him, someone else walked in and I introduced myself. Turned out I was standing face to face with the fabulous Cityzen Kane! Also covered in paint, he happily agreed to show me around.

We were in a seven bedroom Victorian house that the council was ready to knock down and build new flats in its place. It was temporarily rescued by Griff along with Ingrid Beazley of the Dulwich Picture Gallery.

This is an unlikely collaboration but a successful one. Griff works with a lot of street artists and is very well connected to some great talent. Ingrid also works with talented artists, but at the other end of the spectrum – the more traditional type of creatives.

Together they have masterminded “Baroque The Streets” a festival featuring an outdoor gallery of large scale public murals inspired by works held by Dulwich Picture Gallery which is England’s oldest public gallery. The house on Lordship Lane that I was visiting is a part of this, but will then be knocked down as originally planned after the festival. But imagine being an artist with an entire house at your disposal!

Over the past month or so, quite a few of the artists participating in the festival have taken up residence in the house on Lordship Lane and have been given the entire fabric of this huge house to paint, each one in a room of their own and then more scattered throughout.

I was there several weeks ago so it was all a work in progress. The place was colourful, smelled of paint, spray paint bottles piled up in corners.

Cement structures that Cityzen Kane was working on were settled in the first room. He let me pick one up. They weigh a ton and he was just finishing up a new one that would take four people to lift it! He is also using the back garden area as a work space.

Looking up, a blue-green Christian Nagel mushroom is perched on the corner of the roof.

Mushrooms were everywhere.

There were piles of half constructed mushrooms in a room and a giant balloon in the middle that serves as a mould for the caps.

In another room, the walls completely covered in Christiaan Nagel’s foam.

And of course there were more mushrooms there already completed.

From the top floor, you could look out onto the roof and see another.

There was a room blocked off that was covered in tiny Pablo Delgado pasteups. Outside of the room, there was a bird and a small hole in the door.

Through the hole? Another bird and a window. I couldn’t aim the camera any other way but straight so I’ll leave the rest of it a secret.

There’s a surprise huge one at the foot of the steps.

There are other tiny ones hidden around the house like the one below in a door frame.

There’s more Pablo Delgado pieces along the bottoms of the walls – where you would initially expect to find them.

There were others perched on ledges a bit higher up.

Some of the artists participating in the festival (either murals or decorating the house or both) include REKA, My Dog Sighs, Christiaan Nagel, Pablo Delgado, Hitnes, Kid Acne, Ben Wilson, Liqen, Conor Harrington, ROA, Dscreet, Thierry Noir, Mad C, RUN, Malabrocca, Phlegm, Agent Provocateur, Remi Rough and System and The Rolling People.

There’s also a room painted completely black where films can be shown.

The RUN room was looking pretty fabulous.

The Rolling People had made good progress on theirs as well.

They even covered the window.

Cityzen Kane and I went back outside to survey his work. His wife and son showed up to see the house. I love being able to put faces and names and families to pieces of street art.

I won’t tell you his real name, but Cityzen Kane’s wife says his work is all over their house as well, which you could just picture. Stories like that really bring street art to life and show the human side of it and the pure talent of these artists. He’s agreed to do an interview with me for LLO toward the end of the Summer so I am very much looking forward to that!

But back to the house.

There were some random bits and piece around, scribbles on the walls.

If you have the time, head down to Dulwich to check it out. It won’t be around for long as it’s still tagged for demolition. It will be viewable for one weekend only – this coming weekend!

I unfortunately won’t make it to the event (I will be having a fabulous girly weekend in Amsterdam!) so take photos for me of the finished house if you do!

Details on the Facebook event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/181884678635226/

While you’re down there, here’s the rest of the festival events:

FESTIVAL EVENTS:

Murals
Mural sites are located all around Dulwich.

Baroque the Streets: Festival Show
265 Lordship Lane, SE22
Opening celebration of artworks by street artists involved in the Baroque the Streets with works for sale. 17 May, 8-10PM. https://www.facebook.com/events/181884678635226/

Walk
Starts at 17 Grove Vale, SE22 –> Dulwich Picture Gallery, SE21, 19 May, 2PM

Street Art Masterclass
Dog Kennel Hill Adventure Playground, 18 May, 1PM and 3PM

More about the festival from Street Art London here: http://streetartlondon.co.uk/blog/2013/04/30/baroque-the-streets-dulwich-street-art-festival-2013/

Photography Exhibition Launch Event at The Society Club

Yelp put on a lovely event last night to launch the group exhibition of 24 Soho photos that will be featured at The Society Club until the 10th of June. It’s an interesting venue and made CNN Travel’s list of 10 most interesting shops in London.

Four of my photos (below) are in the exhibition. Two (the green wall in Chinatown and the black and white alleyway shot) are blown up quite big – one upstairs, one downstairs. The other two are smaller, back to back in the front window – one facing in and one facing out.

The Society Club will be selling 25 prints of each (not sure about prices), the proceeds of which will go to the Soho School in London, so a great cause! If they run out, you can also find the black and white alleyway shot and the green Chinatown photo in my Etsy shop, Photo Larks.

There were some 250 people on the guest list, so it’s a good thing they decided to set up tents in the space next to The Society Club as well.

It filled up and spilled out on to the street.

I brought along some of my closest friends to help me celebrate.

(That’s Jorge, Lucy and Danny with me)

There was a bit of guitar playing and a guy in a bright red cape who I didn’t manage to photograph.

There were free burritos and cupcakes.

There were free drinks of many types, including a beer tasting table downstairs.

And bubble tea, which I remember fondly from my teenage years but was not quite appealing anymore. We each had one and it was fun for a while, but they were admittedly abandoned.

When it got a bit chilly outside we went back indoors for a while. Yelp balloons everywhere. Free promo stuff. Lots of people. That’s my black and white print at the top right.

They even had strawberries and cream smelling balloons…

The books usually sold by The Society Club were still around the edges.

All in all, a bit over the top with all the promotional stuff going on, but it was a fun time! If you’re in Soho between now and June 10, pop in to The Society Club, browse their book selection and check out the exhibition. A few shops down on the same street is Ginger & White, a fabulous little place for tea and cake!