More weather

Well, what else?

Today, the sun is shining, the temperatures have soared and there was far too much flabby flesh on show in Cheltenham today.  Indeed, it could be that the English Summer has arrived.

A shame it didn’t arrive a couple of days ago, though.  There were so many plans for last Saturday; everywhere we went, it seemed there was yet another sign for a fete, a school fair or village revels.  We’d arranged to meet friends at Daylesford, for their Summer Festival but eyeing the weather forecast, we went well equipped with coats, umbrellas, hats, sensible shoes…the lot.

Arranging an event in California must be so easy.  Decide on a date and time and Bob’s your uncle, the sun will shine.  (Though maybe not necessarily in January….)  Pity all event organisers last weekend, then, who had spent months putting all their ideas into action, only to find the day dawning overcast and threatening rain.  Oh well, we are English.  We make the most of it, don’t we?  So, with map in hand, we sallied forth to find the fun.

It didn’t take us long to find it, for the whole place was full of things to try and yes, things to buy, too.  In the courtyard was a gazebo with Seedlip flavours to try.  Delicious!  (Yes, of course we did…try *and* buy!)

I must say, everything was looking beautiful, even without the sunshine.  Every time we go to Daylesford, there is something new, some new addition or extension and this time was no exception.

The extension to the farm shop had been built last Christmas, for I’d taken a photograph of the amazing advent calendar in there.  But further development has brought an indoor link along the front of the building, and on such a chilly morning, we were glad to minimise our time outside!  With all doors open and the whole place at our disposal, we took the opportunity to take a look in the corners we don’t usually explore

such as the Cookery School.

The barns were also open, cleared of livestock and filled with interesting things.

Plenty of goings on to discover and to talk about.

Since we arrived early, we had the time and the space to chat too.  I didn’t take a photograph of the vinegar makers and we really enjoyed chatting to the knife makers (whose name, sadly, we also neglected to note)  But I did enjoy finding out a little more about the basket maker from Barbados!

Thinking that it’d be a good idea to capitalise on the outdoor activities before the heavens opened, we took a look around the car park.

The Daylesford car park is usually a pretty interesting place with a smarter-than-average class of car parked there (!) but today, there was a rather older style to the area

The usual, glorious selection of vegetables were on offer – but at those prices, we’ll take the Waitrose route home.

But who can resist the bread?  Not me!

And there’s more!  Such a shame it’s not picnic weather – we’d have had a feast!

Instead, there were yummy pizzas baking in the wood fired oven, pink frizzante sparkling in the glasses and a rather fine fire pit to sit by.  No, of course it’s not going to rain, we said…(with our hoods up)

Well, we did stay dry (ish), had time to make a paper flower in the workshop, too.

A little smaller than those adorning the light fittings, but sweetly scented with organic flower oils and all made from recycled paper too.

Eventually, we made it outside again, just to see what we’d missed.  But looking at those clouds rolling in, we thought it time to do a last circuit of the farmers market and head off home.

It was a great event, plenty to enjoy and apart from any purchases made (!) more or less free of charge too.  The organisation was fantastic and clearly a great deal of time had been spent in getting everything shipshape, ready for the big day.  Of course, knowing Daylesford as we do, it was bound to be pretty grand.

After all, when the site plan comes in the form of a Turkish map fold, how could it be anything less than splendid?!

(in seeking a link for that last sentence, I’ve discovered a variation and fresh challenge.  Hungarian map fold, anyone?)

Close to home

I know from experience that it’s possible to see the wonders of the world and yet miss equally interesting things rather closer to home.  But normal, not on holiday, life involves responsible grown up activity like supermarket shopping, laundry, cooking and cleaning and the idea of a morning “out” needs to be scheduled for some reason, however easy it might be to drop in somewhere on the way home from somewhere else.

So I’ll admit, it was earlier in the week that I made the suggestion to visit the local museum, prompted by a conversation I’d had with a friend at WI and reinforced by an email newsletter of local events I get every week (and normally just skim through before moving to the recycle bin).  That it took all of that nudging to persuade me to even consider a visit says it all, and my Hero’s response said the rest.

“too late to go Wednesday, not good on Thursday but I suppose we could go after doing the shopping on Friday”.   He didn’t actually add the phrase “if you really want to”, but it was implied.

OK.  I know, I could have gone alone but it’s better when there’s someone to mutter to, don’t you find, and it was too late to organise something with a friend.  Friday morning it was then.

Our local museum is in the park, which this morning was filled with families having fun, people playing tennis, a fun fair getting ready to open at lunchtime, a group of people on a day out and some extraordinary flowers.  The exhibition which my WI friend had recommended finishes this weekend, after which the space will be prepared and made ready for a rather larger annual event, the Select Festival.

The Scarlett Red Hare was sitting proudly outside the entrance.

Inside, we headed straight for the textile exhibition.  The work of Anglia Textile Works, celebrating their 20th birthday with work inspired by Laurie Lee’s Cider with Rosie and other pieces reflecting the red cloth made in and around Stroud. Why have textile artists from East Anglia created work on a theme based on Gloucestershire?  No idea!

 

Not everything was in tune with the theme, however, and as a result the whole exhibition lacked a bit of coherence.  For example, these panels hung side by side.  Some included clear references to the uniforms, having a line of immaculately stitched buttonholes, trims or graphical references to the process of creating the fabric with teasel motifs.  But others were on the Cider with Rosie theme and we couldn’t help but think they could have been hung to reflect this more effectively?

Pieces such as this one, by Sarah Impey and hung adjacent to those panels were a bit out on a limb, having no link with either Laurie Lee’s work nor the fabric of soldier’s uniforms.  that’s not to say we didn’t like it – it just didn’t seem to flow.

Actually, we have both seen Sarah Impey’s work before and have admired her ability to create such even lettering with a sewing machine.  All free-motion machine embroidery too – no computerised letters here (demonstrated by the slight variation in letter shapes – you knew we’d look closely, didn’t you?)

This morning, it was her work which stood out from the rest for us, including this “quilt”

which, on closer inspection, reveals more lettering.  Clearly, Sarah gets plenty of practice in using her sewing machine in this way.

For her work is instantly recognisable.

I’m glad my friend Di gave me the nudge to drop in here though.  There was some fine stitching, some really interesting pieces and whilst we were at the museum, well, we had to look around the rest, didn’t we?

The next room held a small exhibition about Halas and Batchelor, “the largest and most influential animation studio in Western Europe”.  Who knew they were in Stroud?  Not me!

Fascinating.  The best of local history, with a place to share memories too, for many people with a local connection had left their memories of working for the company and recollections of the people and their creations.

Elsewhere in the permanent exhibition, there were the familiar things we’d seen before, if some time ago.  Just as my hero commented “Wasn’t the lawn mower invented in Stroud?”, we stepped inside the room with the story of…you’ve guessed, accompanied by the unmistakeable soundtrack of the summer days of our childhood.  Whilst we were there, we witnessed one of those peculiar scenes of such places though: two women settled into a corner of one of the rooms, discussing their feet!  One of them had taken off her shoes and was describing the treatment offered by her chiropodist in detail, pointing out the variety of challenges the professional had faced.  Wonderful inspiration for the short story writer!

We carried on regardless into the next room, where we looked at one another and asked, what was that?!

Latest developments at the museum include redevelopment of the Walled Garden, which was looking beautiful.

Lovely planting, interesting walkways and beautifully sheltered too.

At the top of the steps there’s a new studio for hands-on activity and to one side, a traditional Auricula Theatre, with a small sign “the plants are not for sale and are here just for your enjoyment”

Walking back to the car park, past beautiful collections of tulips, we decided that we had enjoyed our visit very much indeed and asked ourselves the inevitable question.

“Why haven’t we been here for so long?”

A night at the opera

When we knew we were to be in St Petersburg for a few days, I consulted the Mariinsky Theatre website.  What might we go to see?  Amy had expressed an interest in seeing a ballet and I wasn’t too worried what I saw – I simply fancied going to the theatre to see a “real” show rather than some tourist compilation.  It seemed that we were in the city during the last few days of a ballet festival, but sadly none of the classics were to be performed and our choice was limited.

Prince Igor seemed a good choice though, for a real flavour of Russia!  I found a great website with seat advice – a kind of seatguru for the Mariinsky and booked the last four tickets together, which amazingly were on the front row and highly recommended.  I had a series of email confirmations in Russian, a phone call from my credit card company to check that I’d just made a transaction in Roubles and printed out the ticket pdf at home.

Though the theatre wasn’t so far from our hotel, we booked a car with Denis the concierge and so arrived in style in a black BMW 7 with Dmitry, our driver. 

“I’ll give you my card in case you want to leave early”, he said.  “You’ve chosen the long one”.

Well, yes, we had.  But our seats were fantastic and we settled in for the long haul, thanks to Amy’s little tin of fruit sweets purchased earlier in the day.  We’d hoped there would be a bar or at least some refreshment on offer, but sadly that was not the case.

The chairs were generally comfy enough, until the last hour or so!

The audience were mainly Russian, there were quite a few children in the audience and people were smartly dressed.  We felt we were part of an occasion.

The opera itself was grand – a little dated perhaps, but the spirit was there and the sentiment absolutely spot on for the moment.  Ah Russia!

Being able to see everything was key – I loved to watch the conductor (with his waist-length pony tail!) and the orchestra as well as the performers on stage.  That website was spot on advice, by the way.

But when the curtain came down after the last chorus, it was good to stand up and move!

Sure enough, Dmitry was there, right outside waiting for us and in no time at all we were back in the hotel for a nightcap in the bar named after the Tsar. 

The perfect way to spend our last night in St Petersburg, I think.

Top of the list

We couldn’t believe our luck when we looked outside this morning!  Another bright, clear day to look forward to.

Today, I remembered to look the other way from our terrace as well.  I hadn’t realised we could see St Isaacs so clearly from here.

We had only a short walk to the first place on our list: The Hermitage.  I couldn’t resist stopping in the middle of the pedestrian crossing to snap a picture of the Admiralty, shining in the sunshine though.

Just a couple of hundred yards further and we were in Palace  Square.  The Winter Palace looks super in the sunshine and hopefully, if we got it right, we should be there before the crowds.

Opening hours here are clearly posted. How long will our stamina last? (not till 8pm, I’m sure of that!)

We bought tickets from the machine – a bargain, really, at just R600 or about £8.50 each for all the Hermitage museums combined.

Pretty ticket, too

First stop the cloakroom.  If this is the small one though, how many does the large one take!?

No sooner were we through the turnstile than we were there – at the foot of the grand staircase, just as magnificent as we’d remembered from our previous visits.  We stood a while and took it all in. 

Magic.

We did need to know where we were going though, to decide what we wanted to see and how best to get there. 

Still, we can’t go wrong if we start by walking along the corridor with the paintings of the Russian Royals, can we?  I love those hats/crowns/whatever; conical with a fur band!

Each room we visited had some breathtaking feature, be it a chandelier

a beautiful floor

or just an interesting door handle.  (Before the advent of plastic/acrylic, what do you suppose that great “jewel” in the claw might have been made of?)

From time to time we gazed out over the River Neva through the rather dusty windows.

Some rooms were just too much and not to our taste at all.

Others looked like they had been brought from another part of the world altogether.

From time to time, we spotted something rather covetable.  Do you think any of the elderly women who stand guard in these rooms would miss the polar bear vase if I stuffed it under my coat?

So we went on, room after room, each one as stunning as the last, if not more so.

And as you’ll gather, we had the whole place to ourselves!

Well, not really.  Whilst standing in front of the throne to take the classic front forward shot, I was elbowed out of the way by a visitor of oriental origin; a member of a large group who were just ahead of us through this set of rooms.  Rather than stand and wait for every Mei, Wang and Lai to stand in front of it for their photograph, I just went around the side and took mine.

Further patience was required when we reached the Peacock Clock in the Pavilion room.

This is how it really was…

so we looked around the rest of the beautiful room and admired the decor and the chandeliers for a couple of minutes.

After which, we had the bird to ourselves.  Shame I didn’t compose a better picture, considering that, isn’t it!?

But you knew we’d catch up with them again, didn’t you?  In the room with a couple of major works by Leonardo da Vinci, a little more patience was needed.  Actually, taking pictures of these masterpieces wasn’t easy anyway, for the lights reflected in the glass and the end result would hardly do the work justice.

On a little further then, past a couple of storyboards with photographs and descriptions of the days leading to the Revolution.  Obvious really, but it had escaped my notice until now, that this year is the centenary of those events.

By now, we were used to waiting till the crowds had moved on before we looked around.  This corridor was especially beautiful – known as the Raphael Loggias.

It led to a kind of armoury, where a couple of exhibits stood out from the rest.  This one looked a little shiny and new.

This one just looked weird – and was causing a stir amongst that group who were a few steps ahead of us.  They were both part of an exhibition

Jan Fabre’s “Knights of Despair, Warriors of Beauty” was to be seen here and there throughout the whole museum, though in this particular area, it seemed to be particularly noticeable.  The two suits of armour were amongst the most palatable exhibits, the rest of which ranged from body parts made from beetle-wings to art involving stuffed animals, some of which were a little disturbing.

We moved right along from those, suddenly feeling rather overwhelmed by what we’d seen so far and ready for a break.

Having explored the offerings at the snack bar, it was time to move on to a different building.  First though, there was the small business of the staircase.  Heaven knows how anyone with mobility issues manages here!

Anyway, over and out from this part of the Hermitage…

through the courtyard with the snazzy bollards…

and past the poster with a reminder to the dear guests, not to forget the “other building”.

Guess where we were headed?

Though first, I just had to take a look back and capture that glorious golden dome on top of the Winter Palace.

Now, the General Staff Building had served all kinds of purposes during its life.  Today, we were hoping to see some great art in there!

Behind the original facade of the former office building, there’s a new extension and exhibition space.  Lavish architecture with many interesting details – but no public lift!  Thankfully, a  member of the security staff noticed us looking at those stairs (with no consistent handrail) and offered the use of a staff lift.  He waved over to a colleague who accompanied us to Floor 2.

Actually, we’d intended to go straight to floor 4 and work our way down, but floor 2 was all that was offered.  We got out and walked through the large, modern space – not quite what we’d come to see, but interesting nevertheless.

The main exhibit in this first room was a cloth full of scribbles.

Yes, really.  A cloth at least 6m long and 3m high, fully covered with ballpoint pen scribbles.  Opposite was a similar technique on a large wooden cupboard.

OK.

We moved into the next room where there was an extension of the Jan Fabre exhibit, including what appeared to be stuffed cats and dogs.  Not our kind of thing at all (and we are not alone it seems).  We moved right along returning to our original aim of getting to floor 4.

We walked through what seemed like miles of featureless corridors like this one, doing our best to follow our map but somehow failing!

Eventually, thank goodness, we came upon the Faberge rooms and this glorious miniature copy of the Imperial Regalia, beautifully displayed on exquisite little cushions and remarkably well lit too.

From here, having now found our bearings, it was straightforward to find our way to the rooms containing the most incredible collection of Impressionist paintings we’ve seen.  A room full of Van Gogh’s work, including the one above which was my favourite.

A similar collection of work by Cezanne, including this tree (and a few hillsides).

And there, amongst the Bonnards, the Pisarros, the Monets and the Manets was one of my favourite pictures by Renoir.  Sorry about the strange angle, taken to avoid the reflections, but I included it simply to remind myself how pretty it looked in a small corner of a room full of treasure.

Sure, there were Gauguins a plenty, there were works by Degas and just about every other Impressionist painter you can think of (with the possible exception of Berthe Morisot!?)  I think we could have possibly spent a whole day in these few rooms alone…

But oh my, were our feet complaining?  Mine certainly were!  And however many great things there are to see, there’s only so much we can take in one mouthful.  so, we bade the Hermitage farewell for this time and returned to the hotel with pictures of golden rooms, malachite pillars, wonderful paintings and the sheer extravagance of it all turning around in our heads.

Just the kind of weariness that calls for an hour in the most luxurious and relaxing spa!

What a wonderful day.

A rich textile heritage

This area of Switzerland has a long history of textile design and manufacture and the story is wonderfully recorded in the Textile Museum in St Gallen.  I’d noted what promised to be an interesting exhibition on the website and opening the curtains on a rainy Saturday morning we lost no time in making our way there.

Of course, the tickets are made of fabric.

We headed straight to the top of the building, with the intention of working our way down through the exhibits.  The first exhibition was Fast Fashion.

The term “fast fashion” denotes a corporate strategy which aims to bring new fashion into the shops at ever shorter intervals. Classic fashion segments such as haute couture, ready-to-wear and medium-priced off-the-peg clothes limit themselves to two collections a year, whereas cheap labels launch up to twelve collections within the same period of time. These companies aim to draw the media’s attention to themselves, to lure primarily young customers into the shops and to animate them to make purchases.
If consumers and commerce profit from the masses of fashion articles put on the market at bargain prices, many of those involved in the production process have to pay a high price: long working days with minimum wages determine the lives of the textile workers who produce cheap fashion under sometimes disastrous conditions. They have no social security and educational opportunities. Health problems and environmental pollution are the consequences of a corporate policy that is ruthlessly geared to profit maximisation.

It was indeed a thought provoking and rather troubling exhibition and the true cost of cheap clothing was set out clearly in no uncertain terms.  I made notes on some aspects to follow up later, in particular the role of young people using social media to post their “haul videos”.  I’d not come across such things before, but foresee an interesting if rather shocking evening’s viewing.

The contrast with my parents’ generation of thrift and make do could not have been better explained than the case of ideas for making a new dress from two old ones.  It also highlighted the high level of technical skills which have been lost in the meantime: I’m not sure I would have the confidence to create some of those alterations!

The exhibit was indeed interesting and presented some good points, but possibly overstated the general issue: we soon got the message and were ready to move on.  But as ever in such places, I was as interested in the mechanics and design of the exhibition itself, in this instance, how the information and examples were shown in two languages (English on this side, German on the other) and hung in a kind of production line setting.  Very clever.

Down one floor, there was a more general exhibit entitled “dreams and realisation”.  Here was more than half a millennium of textile heritage.

Pieces from the Middle Ages were so well preserved and began the story which continued on a kind of timeline, through the introduction of turkey red dye

to printed patterns and detailed designs.

The motifs were accurate and precise and right from these early stages, it was clear that the strengths of the Swiss textile industry were precision and quality.

The samples were so well documented and archived, creating a marvellous resource for contemporary designers.

Displayed in large glass cabinets, one could spend days here, just looking, marvelling and imagining the technical skills and tenacity that went into creating these masterpieces of hand work.

One cabinet was devoted to a single piece of exquisite whitework, approximately one metre square.

I’m not sure that I could have listed all the specific embroidery techniques which were evident in that one piece of work alone

and clearly I was not the first to marvel at and appreciate the skills involved, for the gold medals awarded to the maker were also on display in the cabinet, including three gold medals from Parisian Exhibitions of the 1870s and a mere bronze from London.

Such high quality workmanship was valued worldwide, as evidenced by account books showing exports to the USA

and bills of sale, including one for 32 embroidery designs, 32 sketches and 32 card copies of such, totalling 169.60 SFr. 

The exhibition continued to the present day, with fascinating and very typical samples from the 1960s and 70s.

Shown alongside were pattern cards and pictures of modern industrial embroidery machines creating the high tech fabrics the area specialises in today.

Metal fabrics and laser cut designs, specialist and technically precise, for whilst the industry here has capitalised on the heritage it has also moved with the times and remains a world class centre for high quality, innovative textiles.

Now, I’d already thought I could spend a whole day here, possibly just in that one exhibition alone.  To explore the next part fully, I’d need at least a week, for on the ground floor is the library.  I mentioned it in passing in my previous post when we were last here, but today I had a little more time to look around.

The open pattern books on the counter are just a clue to what lies behind those glass doors in the cabinets which line the walls of the room.

Each sample, carefully referenced and labelled, each drawing or sketch a small masterpiece in itself.

Flicking through the books, each page invites us to linger and marvel at the beauty.  Could this one really be better than the last?  Or the next?  My Hero and I were both captivated by each page in the book and couldn’t decide whether to spend longer looking at this amazing catalogue or move on to the next…

Because there were more.  Hundreds more.

Contemporary magazines too.  Every one concerning fashion and textiles you could think of, from all over the world, in every language.

Plenty to demonstrate that I’m not as au fait with British textile magazines as I thought I was, too.  PomPom was a new one for me.

I was now going to investigate around the corner, but as I passed by, I couldn’t resist another look at that catalogue of edgings.

and my Hero wanted to know the difference between this lace and this lace – a subject about which I know not very much at all!

Though I’m sure the answer isn’t far away…

Much as I’d have loved to have taken the time to research the answer to his question more fully than I could explain from my own knowledge and experience, I don’t think he was really *that* interested and anyway, there were further distractions.

Shelves and shelves of books I recognise from my own collection alongside many I don’t.

Some, I’d like to read more closely and yes, possibly chat as well,

but then I discovered the accessories section, with details of gloves, shoes and buttons.

I’m sorry, I didn’t have time to explore upstairs as well.

The library was so beautifully organised with everything in place and on each shelf was a small plan of the sections together with the advice “please don’t replace the books yourself, you can leave them here”  (ie don’t mess up our system by putting a book back somewhere that we’ll never find it again!)

We couldn’t leave the museum without a peek in the other ground floor room, but sadly, the embroidery machine wasn’t in operation today, unlike on our last visit.  Never mind, there were a few more things of interest around,

like samples of couture fabrics for the Autumn Winter 2017 collections,

one of which was rather interesting.

Further couture samples and a video of a catwalk show from AKRIS which we sat and watched, recognising that were we to sit there any longer, we might not feel much like getting up and moving again!

So we gathered up our bags and belongings from the cloakroom, leaving the cute tailcoat with the St Gallen tailor’s label hanging there.

At the end of April, the museum will stage an exhibition as part of a wider, regional textile project which looks remarkably interesting.  The fun continues here and though we will probably be back in Switzerland in the Autumn, whether we will have a chance to see it remains to be seen.  For now, I am thankful for a marvellous morning here!