Saturday, March 29, 2025

Buildings in Granada

                                                       The Lorca House and other buildings

                                                                      In Granada

 

There’s an American children’s classic, written in the 1940s, called The Little House. It tells the story, with delightful and clever illustrations, of the eponymous dwelling, built in isolation in the countryside.


Thursday, March 20, 2025

Empty Old Towns: Rye and Cordoba

Empty Old Towns- Rye and Cordoba

 

Rye in Sussex and Cordoba in Spain don’t have much in common except that both can boast a picturesque, well preserved old centre (with many cobbled streets).

Wednesday, February 5, 2025

Dylan: A Complete Unknown

                                                                  A Complete Unknown

There were moments while watching the film A Complete Unknown when I was almost in tears. This was not because of the nostalgic revisit to Dylan’s music that I grew up with, powerfully though the film recreates its beginnings. Well, partly, of course. But mostly because of dissonance and disappointment across the decades since.

Discovering Cadiz

                                                       Cadiz

What distinguishes modern Cadiz? One thing indubitably- the magnificent, 3 plus kilometre Constitution of 1812 bridge, opened 10 years ago this year, which links the city to the north-westerly mainland. It completes a triad of ways of getting into the city without a boat: the long, thin isthmus on which Cadiz perches, and the earlier late twentieth century bridge to the east.


Sunday, January 26, 2025

Milton Keynes and Vanessa Bell

                                      Milton Keynes and Vanessa Bell

 

Between late October 2024 and early January 2025 I’ve been in two cities that boast a lengthy central road or vista: Washington DC and Milton Keynes.

The juxtaposition is unfair. The National Mall in Washington is imperial: end-stopped by the Capitol and the Washington Monument, wide and green, and flanked by large and wonderful neo-classical (for the most part) buildings.

Friday, January 3, 2025

Turning ourselves away from the inn

  There’s a pub in Kentish Town called the Crash and Fail (also known as the Bull and Gate). Owned by the once estimable Young’s Brewery, it’s a large place, with a long curving bar fronting the frontage; a vast room at the back (once a music venue) and a spacious upstairs, with another bar.


Wednesday, December 11, 2024

Timed Entry to Exhibitions: Welcome to Your Special Crowd

 Welcome to Your Special Crowd:

Timed Entry in Exhibitions

 

What is the point of timed entry to exhibitions? It cannot be to lessen crowds: experience all to clearly gives the lie to that hypothesis.