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Showing posts with label Lesser Spotted London. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lesser Spotted London. Show all posts

Friday 8 February 2019

Instagram Royalty at Osterley Park


Last Wednesday I got to play with Ros Atkinson (@her_dark_materials) at Osterley Park, where she hosted a fun workshop for about a dozen enthusiasts. She'd set the props up in the Osterley kitchen before we got there, and we had a couple of hours to go nuts and take photos.


Friday 1 February 2019

London Institute of Photography

Last week I shimmied over to the London Institute of Photography on Brick Lane to do their beginners' course. I've been taking photographs pretty much all of my  life,and it's been something that I've hugely enjoyed doing. I've owned a succession of fairly respectable cameras, but I've pretty much always kept them on automatic or some other-semi automatic programme that did all the thinking for me. I haven't troubled my head with the physics of how any of it worked. And I've been delighted with myself on those rare occasions when the planets have aligned and I've bagged the odd decent shot here or there.


But last week all of that changed. I explored the mysteries of the exposure triangle, learnt how to pan, investigated how to achieve shallow depth of field with good bokeh, and how to get greater depth of field for landscape or street photography. It was an eye-opener as I discovered more and more of what my respectable but not-very-fancy camera could do, and how the art of taking a decent photo actually has more to do with technique than simply being in the right place at the right time.


Friday 16 November 2018

Royal School of Needlework, Hampton Court Palace, London

On Tuesday I spent a fun day at Hampton Court Palace. Now I have to confess that it takes very little enticement to get me to spend a day in such a wonderful place. However, on Tuesday, I had a very special reason for being there: I was taking part in one of the Royal School of Needlework's sampler days, which involved a tour of the Royal School's workrooms and then a workshop in their studio.



Friday 2 November 2018

London in the Autumn

I've been really busy with work recently, which has buried me under a blizzard of paperwork and left me at the mercy of a series of unforgiving deadlines, but I'm determined to carve myself some me-time this weekend. And starting today I ignored all the other calls on my attention and headed off with the WonderDog for an early morning jaunt around the common. It was bracing; we've just had our first frost of the season here in London, but it got the air pumping in my lungs and blew away the cobwebs more effectively than a bucket of coffee could have done.

Ealing Common

Saturday 13 October 2018

Ally Pally Knitting and Stitching Fair 2018

For all of us in the stitching community there's nothing quite like the big Ally Pally Autumn Fair. There are lots of other craft fairs, but this is the big'un, and I, for one, always feel like I'm missing something if I'm not able to go.

This year I got an early ticket for Thursday morning. I rocked up 5 minutes before the official opening time, and the place was already pretty much full to capacity already. I'm a bad girl who likes to come by car so that she can transport her swag bag (day's shopping ... wicked 😈) home with minimum muscle strain. I was able to find a space in the free car park, but only just ... .

A chum, who trolleyed in on a late ticket that afternoon (after 3 p.m. entry), told me that it was fairly civilised when she was doing the rounds, but I'd have to say it was a bit too much of a push when I was there.

Still - gripes about how many of us there were apart - it was a great morning out.


Monday 18 June 2018

Lazy summer evenings ...


Sometimes in the middle of London on a balmy summer evening it's hard to believe that you're in the metropolis. Those precious pockets of green that are so liberally dispersed across the city have a way of lulling you into believing that you're somewhere else - somewhere peaceful and calm and serene. This was Ealing Common the other evening as the WonderDog and I were going for a postprandial stroll. If you closed your ears to the roar of traffic on the A406, you could almost believe you were in the countryside.

All the best,

Bonny x

Thursday 10 May 2018

Horse Chestnuts in May

Ealing Common

Right now I am in thrall to the horse chestnut trees. All across West London they are in bloom, and the air is heavy with their scent. They are life-affirmingly gorgeous - unless of course you suffer from hay fever, in which case you'd probably vote to have them all chopped down overnight.

Tuesday 1 May 2018

London in the rain ...

I had to go into town for a meeting on Friday, and it was soooo cold and grey and miserable that I almost couldn't get excited about the view from the 32nd floor.


Am I the only person feeling slightly bereaved by the disappearance of spring?

All the best for now,

Bonny x

Friday 23 February 2018

Kew Gardens Orchid Festival

The other day I toddled along to Kew Gardens with Jenny, one of my besties, to see the Kew Gardens Thai Orchid Festival. It was all her idea. Having grown up in Columbia she really knows her orchids, which is more than can be said for me. I'm more of an Ikea, bargain basement orchid grower - someone who should never be trusted with anything too precious or too delicate.


Sunday 4 February 2018

Candlemas Day ... so how did it work out for you?

Friday was Candlemas Day, the day on which the faithful traditionally celebrated the churching of the Virgin after the Holy Birth. It seems a strange thing to celebrate these days, but it was the occasion for a special mass preceded by a candlelit procession, which would have been a pretty spectacle back in the day. And, of course, snow drops were taken as Candlemas Bells, their whiteness resonating with the theme of the festival. And anything that focuses on a beautiful bloom in the grey of winter is an attractive proposition in my book.


There was also an old tradition that if the weather on Candlemas Day be bright and fair, it meant (perhaps counter-intuitively) that winter's grip had not yet weakened. If on, the other hand it was grey and cloudy, it signified that half o' winter's gone at Yule. That was to say, that the better part of the winter was spent, and spring was just around the corner.

Friday 29 September 2017

Just hanging in there ...

Happy Friday!

I'd like to share a fun shot that Mr B sent me yesterday. This was the scene outside his window whilst he was eating lunch at his desk down in Canary Wharf:


Wednesday 27 September 2017

London Bridge Sheep Drive and the Pop-up Wool Fair

I'd like to say a big thank you to all my lovely customers from Sunday past, who came along to the pop-up wool fair that popped up for the London Bridge Sheep Drive. The sun shone, the sheep were driven, and everyone had a ball.

Way back in medieval times the Grant of the Freedom of the City of London was a right allowing individuals to carry on a trade within the city. They would have taken the grant, and joined one of the trade guilds that flourished in ye olde London towne. The right to drive livestock across the bridges into the old city without paying tolls was an important privilege that came with the Freeman's grant. And it's a right that is still practised every September, but now the Freemen receive their grants as a civic honour in recognition of outstanding achievement and the event raises money for charity.



Wednesday 5 July 2017

Mid-Summer Meadow of Cornflower Blue ...


Last night I took a short-cut through Walpole Park on the way home. As I was steaming along I came across the most beautiful sight: a mid-summer meadow of cornflower blue. I was enchanted. All I needed to complete the scene was for Puck and Bottom to wander in stage left ...

Thursday 13 April 2017

Oh Bluebell ... what's in a name ...

Now I have to 'fess up to feeling a tad proprietary about the bluebell. You see I was born at the end of April, when, as my mother still likes to tell me, the bluebells were in flower. And every year I have enjoyed my birthday with a side order of beautiful, fragrant bluebells. For me birthdays and bluebells have gone together like fish and chips or Fred and Ginger. As I've watched the bluebells sprout out of their winter hibernation, unfurl their long slender leaves and swell into bud I've felt the cycle of the year come around another turn, adding another year to my own personal tally in the process. In the old days I used to get quite excited. Do you remember how we used to lie to make ourselves older? Crazy times! Nowadays I'd really rather not dwell too much on all that cycle of the year mathematics, thanks all the same.


Friday 31 March 2017

The Snuff Mills of Morden Hall Park

Once upon a very long time ago snuff was all the rage. It started with the indigenous tribes of Brazil, and was carried back to the Old World by the Spanish, who established the first European snuff mill in Seville in the early 16th century.

The French ambassador, Jean Nicot, is credited with bringing snuff to the attention of his Queen, Catherine de Medici. Poor old Catherine had been plagued with headaches, which she was persuaded to treat with snuff. Miraculously it  seemed to work! And the grateful queen promptly declared that snuff should henceforth be known as Herba Regina, the Queen's Herb. Having won the royal seal of approval it quickly became popular with the French aristocracy.

From there the fashion for snuff soon jumped the Channel to take hold amongst the great and the good here in England. Soon snuffing was all the rage, with many extolling its excellent curative properties. It was sniffed into the nose, delivering an instant nicotine hit, and leaving a lingering smell. And back in the day, when the world tended not to smell too sweet, that scent in the nose would have been a welcome relief from the everyday malodors that otherwise assaulted the senses. Often snuff was blended to secret recipes with other spices, herbs and floral essences. Famous blends such as Scotch and Welsh, English Rose (supplied free of charge to MPs in the House of Commons after smoking was forbidden in the Chamber in 1693) and Lundy Foot gained popularity. Before long there was a huge selection of blends delivering different scent sensations to appeal to just about every olfactory caprice; some were dry having been roasted and then ground very fine whilst others were more moist.

  The Snuff Mill, Morden Hall Park, London
The Snuff Mill, Morden Hall Park, London
George III's Queen Consort, Charlotte, was known as Snuffy Charolotte, thanks to her devotion to the stuff. She had a whole room at Windsor Castle devoted to her stash of snuff and her collection of snuff paraphernalia. George IV had his own exclusive blends.  Lord Nelson, the Iron Duke (of Wellington), Alexander Pope, Benjamin Disraeli and Samuel Johnson were all keen snuffers. With the growth of 18th century coffee house culture, the nation's enthusiasm for snuff grew in tandem with its addiction to caffeine fad to become a firm fixture in the daily lives of the chattering classes.


Wednesday 8 February 2017

Selfridges rocks the Granny Square ...

I'm not sure what's going on down at Selfridges on London's Oxford Street, but it looks like they're doing a homage to the Granny Square!

This gloriously colourful window caught my eye this morning as I was scampering past (late) for a meeting.


Friday 27 January 2017

January blues banished ...

I've been known to bleat on about how much I hate January. But you know it hasn't been so bad this year. I've been embracing January, enjoying its cold frosty days that have opened out into blue skies and sunshine. I've enjoyed getting the big coats out of the closet, muffling up in multiple layers of woolliness, snuggling indoors in front of the fire and tucking into winter comfort food - stews and soups and curries and cakes - with gusto.

Walpole Park, Ealing, West London
Walpole Park, Ealing, West London


Friday 2 December 2016

Oxtail soup ... the ultimate winter warmer

It's turned really chilly here in London. The days are bright and clear, with blue skies and sunshine, but once the sun goes down it gets s-o-o-o cold.

At this time of the year, as the nights draw and the cold strengthens, I turn to hearty food: soups and stews are the things I want to cook most. And there's nothing better on a cold winter's night than a steaming bowl of oxtail soup. It is the ultimate, luscious, warming, comfort food. Mine gets cooked all day in the slow cooker, filling the house with its tantalising smell. By nightfall the meat is falling off the bone, and the liquid is a rich, deep chocolatey brown ... ambrosia in a soup bowl!

Given that there are only three bears who usually sit down at my table every night, this recipe has been calculated to feed three people. You can big it up if you've got more folk to feed. Just read on for my recipe:

Oxtail soup

Tuesday 22 November 2016

Ealing's swamp cypress ...

Today I'm loving a swamp Cypress - native of a mangrove swamp in the Florida Everglades, - that's made its home in Walpole Park. Who'd have thought? A swamp cypress? In Ealing?

Walpole Park, Ealing, London, W5
Ealing's Swamp Cypress

Friday 15 July 2016

TGI Friday ...

And TGI the holidays!

Finally school's out for summer ... and we're already on the road! We're bombing up the motorway to Holyhead to catch the fast boat to Dublin. The weather doesn't look entirely congenial to sightseeing, and, as I'm incapable of not turning up 8 hours early for the ferry, we may have a soggy time exploring another epic Welsh castle. I'm really grateful to Edward I, back in the 13th century, for giving me so many stonking stop-off castles to kill the time until the Dublin Swift weighs anchor.