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Tag: London

  • London – Shoreditch – Goose Island Brewpub

    London – Shoreditch – Goose Island Brewpub

    This one was Nathan’s recommendation (he’ll be here next week to buy an expensive bottle, more on which later on in this post) which was the Goose Island Brewpub, located a short walk from London Liverpool Street railway station.

    All on-trend and modern, there was a relaxed atmosphere and the staff member at the bar was friendly and helpful. Actually, the staff were always engaging and welcoming, the service style was all quite American.

    The beer selection is chalked up on the board and it’s also printed out and available on-line. Goose is an American company and they have a few brewpubs there, so that’s somewhere else that I have to go when I return to the United States. Their main operation is in Chicago, which I visit most years (well, those when there’s not a pandemic on), so I shall make sure I go there for the real deal (that sounds a dreadful phrase, but let’s live with it). They also have international outlets in Seoul, Shanghai, San Paulo and Toronto, as well as this one in London.

    There were no shortage of tables when I went, and it remained relatively quiet during the entire time that I was in there.

    The downstairs brewing area.

    On the left is the Eire of the Dog, a rather luxurious little beer which has caramel and chocolate flavours, very decadent after my meal. On the left, which was my starter before the food (and during it) is the Ruby which is a rhubarb sour. There was a suitable sharpness from the rhubarb, but it remained drinkable and I liked the flavour, although the aftertaste wasn’t particularly rich.

    As it was a Wednesday when I went, the food was half price as part of the Government’s ‘eat out to help out’ campaign. So, this pizza was around £6 and was larger than I had expected, even though they said it was 12 inches on the menu. All filling and the Italian sausage was excellent, very sausagey. I liked the serving style as well which wasn’t on a plate, it made it easy to plough on with work whilst sitting in a bar. I say this, I spend most of my time doing work in bars, restaurants and pubs, but I must admit a little bit of that time is used faffing around on WhatsApp. Perhaps I need to get out more….

    The payment process was swift and I was pleased to see that, unexpectedly, the Amex Shop Small kicked in, which meant that I got £5 off the bill. So, all of this meant that I was able to get two drinks and a pizza for £7.50. How very lovely. I await to hear how much Nathan spends next week when he cracks open the bottle of Bourbon County Brand Stout, which I must admit sounds rather delicious.

  • London – Lambeth – Imperial War Museum (Still Smiling After Air Raid)

    London – Lambeth – Imperial War Museum (Still Smiling After Air Raid)

    I’m still rummaging through the Imperial War Museum’s on-line collection of photos (© IWM HU 36206) and this is very much smiling in the face of adversity. Perhaps it’s a little stage-managed, but maybe the home-owner is pleased to be at least able to save their plant and clock. The exact location was never noted, but the photograph was taken in London in 1940.

  • London – Kensington – Natural History Museum (Snake…..)

    London – Kensington – Natural History Museum (Snake…..)

    I’m sure I saw a snake just like this last year when walking near to Hoveton….. They’re everywhere….

  • London – Westminster – Tate Britain (Captain Thomas Lee by Marcus Gheeraerts)

    London – Westminster – Tate Britain (Captain Thomas Lee by Marcus Gheeraerts)

    I like the sign to the left of this painting by Marcus Gheeraerts (1561/2-1636) which reads “what would you wear in a photo if you really wanted to impress someone?” as this certainly looks like some sort of dare. But, it’s not, it’s very serious and it was the uniform of an Irish soldier, who kept their legs bare for reasons that I’m not sure that I can understand (but is probably related to the need to fight in Irish bogs). The embroidered top isn’t quite part of the uniform, that’s just an indication of how wealthy Captain Thomas Lee (1551-1601) was. The painting is also seen as an attempt by Lee to impress Queen Elizabeth I, although his life plan didn’t quite work out as he was executed at Tyburn in 1601 and the Queen didn’t stop it.

    The artwork was painted in 1594, which was the prime of the artist’s career as he fell a little out of favour after this. The museum holds a few paintings by Gheeraerts, but I’d say that this one is the most spectacular looking and the gallery was able to acquire this painting in 1980.

  • London – Westminster – Tate Britain (Lady Kytson by George Gower)

    London – Westminster – Tate Britain (Lady Kytson by George Gower)

    This artwork doesn’t make Lady Kytson (1547-1628) look the most glamorous, but it wasn’t the done thing at this time to smile for portraits. She was a brave lady and remained a Catholic at a time when this wasn’t perhaps entirely wise under the Protestant rule of Queen Elizabeth I, meaning that Kytson was arrested and her activities were monitored.

    The artist was George Gower (1540-1596) who was a popular portrait painter of the period (there were more P’s there than I initially intended). This artwork was acquired by the Tate in 1952 and is the oldest surviving work by Gower, along with the portrait of her husband, Sir Thomas Kytson. By 1581, Gower had become the Serjeant Painter to Queen Elizabeth, meaning that he had become something of a court favourite. As an aside, the gallery only worked out what the hat she was wearing was meant to look like when the painting was thoroughly cleaned in 1995.

  • London – Lambeth – Imperial War Museum (Blitz Attack on Queen Victoria Street)

    London – Lambeth – Imperial War Museum (Blitz Attack on Queen Victoria Street)

    This is Queen Victoria Street in London following an air raid that took place on 11 May 1941. This is another photo from the Imperial War Museum archive (© IWM HU 1129) and it was taken by the London Fire Brigade to record the moment. The lighting makes it quite an evocative photograph on what transpired to be the last night of heavy bombing during the London Blitz, although no-one in the image would have realised that. The Blitz had wrecked large chunks of the capital and this is evident at the bomb map at http://bombsight.org/.

  • London – Kensington – Natural History Museum (Megatherium)

    London – Kensington – Natural History Museum (Megatherium)

    A plaster cast of Megatherium, one of the largest mammals that has lived, and it’s effectively just a giant ground sloth. This cast was made in 1848 from two different skeletons and it’s been on display in the museum since 1850. I’m sure that, even at this large size, it still looked quite adorable and the animal could be as long as six metres in length from head to tail. They were found in the Americas and one of the reasons thought for their extinction around 12,000 years ago is human movement into the areas where they lived.

  • London – Lambeth – Imperial War Museum (War Shelters at London Liverpool Street)

    London – Lambeth – Imperial War Museum (War Shelters at London Liverpool Street)

    Rummaging through the on-line collections of the Imperial War Museum (© IWM D 1574), I rather liked this photo taken by Bill Brandt in 1940. Brandt was born in Hamburg in 1904, but he renounced his German origins and moved to live and work in London in 1933. This photo is of Londoners packed into the underground station of London Liverpool Street and for some reason, I hadn’t realised that they were quite so packed in. Some of the photographs that Brandt took at this time were sent to the President of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, to show him the fortitude of the London population. Very much a snapshot of a different time.

    And another (© IWM D 1573), from the same station.

  • London – Kensington – Albert Memorial

    London – Kensington – Albert Memorial

    This is the subtle little memorial that was constructed in Kensington Gardens to honour Prince Albert, following his death in 1861. I’m not sure that many people have had a monument that took ten years to build and cost the modern equivalent of £10 million, although at least that was partly paid for by public subscription. The monument was unveiled by Queen Victoria in July 1872 and it was influenced by the thirteenth century Eleanor Crosses (here’s the one I visited in Waltham Cross).

    The statue was originally covered in gold, but this had worn off by the early twentieth century. It wasn’t replaced until relatively recently, in the late 1990s when the regilding was completed. I think it’s all a bit much, but it is a hugely impressive monument. The frieze at the base of the monument has 187 carved figures of various painters, poets, musicians and architects, although the public aren’t allowed that near to it to look at it properly.

  • London – Kensington – Natural History Museum

    London – Kensington – Natural History Museum

    This is primarily just a post with photos of the Natural History Museum, the quietest that I’ve ever seen it. I was able to get an advance ticket, which are free but require pre-booking on-line, for the museum and they’ve limiting entries to keep it safe inside. The whole process was well-managed, and they were sending back people to the end of the queue who tried to get in early (I secretly really applauded this, as I don’t like it when people break sensible rules). This was also the first museum I’ve seen where the staff were actively enforcing the rule of people wearing masks inside, which meant they had to warn a handful of visitors who had taken theirs off.

    There were no busy areas of the museum, there was plenty of space and almost endless amounts of hand sanitiser stations everywhere. Some areas of the museum were closed off, but there was still a sufficient amount to see. What the financial impact on the museum is I can’t say, but these must be challenging times.