A major holiday and for the first time since arriving in London, I am not escaping the city! While part of me is definitely pining after last year's Easter break spent cruising, I'm also very excited to be spending some downtime here!
The weekly grind is hardly conducive to truly appreciating London. With warmer weather comes opportunity to extend days into the evenings and venture beyond the realms of the Seven Sisters - Highbury & Islington - Hoxton and back again commute. However, a long winter preceded by a less-than-inspiring summer (at least in terms of the weather) has found me on the brink of falling out of love.
Enter the Easter Holiday! I honestly don't think it could have come at a better time. The days ahead of me are currently empty besides for time made for loved ones, and I intend to fill some with more of those, some with days to myself and I guess a couple (but hopefully not many more) with work.
The Easter holiday is my favourite. For one, it always falls around my birthday (or my birthday falls around it; not entirely sure which) which is obviously incredibly important! But perhaps more importantly, after how crammed Christmas becomes (predominantly crammed in terms of time and my stomach), and how like a flash half terms pass by, Easter is the first real chance to rest! Often the weather becomes warmer too, so here's hoping for at least some sun!
One day in and I'd like to think I've already got the holiday off to a good start; I'm ever so impressed with myself. Somehow I was out of bed before 9 so I decided I had plenty of time to vacate the flat for a morning and head to an art exhibition I've been meaning to go to since it opened! Today was the final day of said exhibition at the Michael Hoppen Gallery, so I made it just in time! I've missed a few great-looking exhibitions (I feel like I've used that word about a million times now!) lately so I didn't want to let another pass me by. I'm not usually someone who can be found in a gallery, but I'd seen a photograph from the collection somewhere (I think it's likely it was in Vogue) and I just loved the concept and wanted to see more for myself!
Guy Bourdin's Walking Legs 'was shot in 1979 using quintessentially English landscapes [for a] backdrop'. The locations for the photographs were happened upon on a road trip taken from London to Brighton in a Cadillac. Despite the time difference, many of the scenes remain the same today which I think is why I really loved the collection, because I could imagine walking through them myself. The mannequin's legs are adorned with Charles Jourdan's shoe designs (the two were introduced through editor of French Vogue) as the photographs were taken for his high-end advertising campaign.
As well as Guy Bourdin's collection, I enjoyed Noé Sendas' The Lady Vanishes and Samantha Roddick's Hidden Within, a collection of Carlo Mollino's polaroids mounted on the most lavish backdrops made of ruby red and sapphire blue velvet embellished with metallic threads. Second to the Walking Legs, my favourite thing about this morning was that I was completely alone in the gallery. The peace, quiet and stillness was so foreign to me in London but it was magical and I could have basked in it forever!
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| Noé Sendas - The Lady Vanishes |
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| Samantha Roddick - Hidden Within |
Back on the Underground without a seat, the contrast was a bit of a shock to the system! The rest of the day has then been spent preparing for the excitement tomorrow brings when my parents descend... Lots planned for Sunday & Monday, then we'll just have to wait and see what the rest of the fortnight has to offer!
Happy Easter, all!
