A hint of spring in London

The colourful Central St Giles in Holburn, designed by Italian architect, Renzo Piano

Despite the sudden drop in temperature, a hint of spring is finally here because I saw daffodils and 2 cherry trees starting to bloom in Coram's field a few days ago! Everyone seems to be friendlier when the sun is out, it's no wonder why Londoners are so obsessed with the weather here!



Coram's field


Exhibitions

Threads of feeling (The London Foundling Hospital's textile tokens 1740-1770) @ The Foundling Museum
The biggest attraction of London is that no matter how long you have lived here, you will always discover something new or somewhere you have never visited before. I didn't know much about the Foundling Museum before, but I read a review on its current exhibition (ending today) and so I decided to pay a visit. The exhibition is small but extremely touching, it exhibits swatches of fabrics pinned to the registration documents when abandoned babies or children were first sent to the hospitals (something quite common during the 18th century Britain). Besides the fabrics/ ribbons, there are also handwritten notes written by mothers who were probably devasted by the choices they had to make. It's hard to imagine how they must have felt at the time. The museum also exhibits photographs and art collection from the demolished Foundling Hospital, as well as work related to the composer Handel, who was a Governor and benefactor of the hospital.




The Foundling Museum


Laurie Anderson, Trisha Brown, Gordon Matta-Clark. Pioneers of the downtown scene, New York 1970s @ Barbican art gallery ( until 22 May)
With a rather uninspiring and restricted layout at the Barbican art gallery, it's probably a nightmare for curators to try and turn it into something interesting and inspiring. It has been done before but I often find the split personalities within one exhibition because of the odd layouts of the upper and lower galleries. At this exhibition, again, I think some of the rooms work better than others, but it's probably not surprising given the variety of work including live performances, videos, sketches, photography and sculptures. The various live performances are definitely highlights of the exhibition, but the videos and the concepts behind their work are also intriguing. I particularly like Matta-Clark's 'Splitting' esp. the remains of the structure as well as Brown's 'walking down a building'. It must have been pretty interesting to be an artist (or film maker) in New York during the 1970s especially under the influence of Andy Warhol a decade before. Unfortunately, Soho is no longer THE place for emerging artists, the high end shops and trendy restaurants have completely changed the atmosphere of this area, so it is quite refreshing to see or imagine the rather artistic Soho before it became completely commercialised.


Cafes

The Expresso room
On Great Ormond Street, there is this tiny coffee shop with maybe 4-5 seats inside and a few outside. It's minimalist, laid back and very 'Monocle' (a descriptive term that I invented!). I didn't try their expresso but their standard coffee is not bad except for the slight acidic after taste. Having said that, it's still so much better than the chained coffee shops and I am tempted to come back again just to try their expresso...


The Expresso Room

Bill's cafe, restaurant & store
This relatively new cafe opened in the new St Martin's courtyard is interesting because it is a deli/ grocers, cafe and restaurant all combined in a 2-storey space. The decor is fun, with stacks of goods on shelves, dried chillies and colourful tissue paper hanging from the ceiling. The menu is an all day menu with lots of healthy juices to choose from. I thought the food tasted great, but the service was not so up to scratch (slow and inattentive) even though there were hardly any customers when I was there! I just can't imagine what it would be like during busy hours!



Bill's cafe

Barbican food hall
I guess the Barbican is trying to update its image, so they have come up with this new food hall concept, basically a sort of deli and canteen combined in one. However, from my observation, I am not sure if this would appeal to their members who are mostly over 55! I am not discriminating against them but while I was there, they looked and acted totally confused (actually not very surprising)! At the entrance, there is a large table full of cakes and sandwiches, but the plates are hidden away at the end, so many people were not sure what they are supposed to do! And while queuing to pay, one woman was making a fuss about the slippery bowl, then another over her wine... thanks to them, the cashier got distracted, miscalculated my bill and then dropped the change onto my plate of food!!! Despite the new decor, I don't think the staff here are well-trained (esp. when in comes to dealing with the rather difficult customers), perhaps it's best to come here for a coffee rather than a meal next time!


Shops

Near the British Museum, there are two interesting shops, one of them is the London review bookshop, an independent bookshop with a cafe overlooking a small square (with seating outside) which is probably a nice place to hang out in the summer. Next to it is the paper crafts shop, Blade rubber stamps, which sells a large selection of rubber stamps and other DIY products. A fun place to be inspired if you like stationery and paper crafts!


London review bookshop & Blade Rubber stamps


Dance

Bartabas - Ko Murobushi @ Sadlers Wells
I am a fan of Sadlers Wells and I usually love the performances shown there whether it is tango, flamenco or contemporary dances. This one, however, I failed to engage with and I could tell from the audiences' reactions (and critics' reviews) that I was not the only one! The marketers marketed this as the first-ever dance performance with real horses on stage and so it got everyone excited, well, at least until the horses finally came on stage (which was about 15 mins after the opening) and then it all went downhill again. Even for someone who meditates regularly, I found it hard to keep my patience/ focus and not let boredom slipped in and pulled my mind away from what was going on on stage! Yes, it was visually intriguing and the horses were amazing too but overall, the show was like a failed experiment! I am sure that Mr Murobushi is an accomplished dancer in his own right but his performance just didn't translate well here, plus it was not helped by the rather annoying voice over... it all felt too self-indulgent and self-conscious, way beyond the audiences' reach!


Music

BBC Symphony Orchestra / Yamada: Music by Rachmaninov, Takemitsu and Thomas Larcher (with violinist, Isabelle Faust) @ Barbican
After the disapointment earlier in the week with the show at Sadlers Wells, I was pleasantly surprised by a different kind of performance at the Barbican. Honestly, I rarely pay to watch live classical music, afterall, there are free afternoon concerts in town and live broadcasts on radio three, so why bother paying? Well, the answer I realised is that it is really interesting to watch the conductor interacts with the orchestra on stage and it is much more emotionally engaging than listening at home.
I decided to see this after watching a CNN interview with Sir Simon Rattle, unfortunately his show was sold out, but this raising Japanese conductor's debut in London caught my attention. I was so glad that I went... I am no connoisseur in classical music, but I thoroughly enjoyed the evening esp. the second part with Rachmaninov's Symphony No 2 in E minor. It brought tears to a Japanese lady next to me and I could see lovers sitting closer to each other (I was sitting upstairs). The effect of the music was profound and immediate, it was just fascinating to watch the young conductor, the orchestra as well as the audiences' body language, something that I didn't expect before the concert!