This week another from the archives. This is a montage of individual shots of the ten Queen’s Beasts statues outside the Palm House at Kew Gardens. They’re magnificent statues some 6 feet tall.
In fact these are replicas in Portland stone (commissioned in 1958 by Sir Henry Ross, then Chairman of the Distillers Company) of the original plaster versions. The originals were commissioned by the British Ministry of Works from sculptor James Woodford to stand in front of the temporary western annexe to Westminster Abbey for the Queen’s coronation in 1953. The originals are now in Canada.
Click the image for larger versions on Flickr Queen’s Beasts at Kew May 2010; Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
The ten heraldic beasts represent the genealogy of Queen Elizabeth II. They are (from L to R):
It’s summer, so this week’s photograph is a summer flower. This is a large ornamental allium (onion) which was growing in my mother’s garden at the bungalow, before she moved to a care home.
Click the image for larger views on Flickr Purple Allium Norwich; May 2008
This panoramic view shows the King’s Men stone circle which is a part of the Rollright Stones complex in Oxfordshire.
The photo was taken on our recent trip round the villages around Chipping Norton in search of ancestors. It was a glorious sunny early May day (with just a quick shower while we were having lunch in the pub at Broadway); England at its best.
Click the image for larger views on Flickr Rollright Stones King’s Men Stone Circle Little Rollright, May 2014
It is scary to realise that I took this week’s photograph eight years ago. It is a composite of at least half a dozen frames — well we didn’t get such good wide-angle lenses on cameras then! As the eagle-eyed will realise this is Paris. We were sitting having lunch with a friend outside her favourite bistro in Place Dauphine, a quiet square at the western end of Ile de la Cité, on a warm Friday in May. This was real non-touristy Paris, even down to the handful of Parisian corporation workers playing boules in the square.
Click the image for larger views on Flickr Place Dauphine Paris, May 2006
In this week’s photographs we bring you the world of Beatrix Potter …
We were in the village of East Carleton, just outside Norwich, the other day visiting my mother. Driving slowly through the village we came across Jemima Puddleduck with eleven quite well grown ducklings meandering slowly along the verge. We stopped the car and I took their portraits from the passenger seat.
Mother looked like a Aylesbury-Mallard cross; white like an Aylesbury but only Mallard size. There were four white and seven “tabby” ducklings. The ducklings were quite fearless, and once we stopped the car they were happy nosing around just inches from the wheels — until mother called them to come away. All the while they were making little chirping noises at each other and clearly enjoying the lovely wet day.
Here’s Jemima Puddleduck herself …
Click the images for larger views on Flickr Jemima Puddleduck 3 East Carleton, May 2014
This week a current photograph. One day last week we were in East London and driving back into the City along the Whitechapel Road I was slightly surprised to see both the Gherkin and the Cheesegrater tower blocks in front of us — an interesting juxtaposition with the trees and the Victorian buildings of Whitechapel. Not the best of shots as it was taken through the car windscreen (no I wasn’t driving) in slow-moving traffic.
Click the image for larger views on Flickr Gherkin Ahoy! Whitechapel; May 2014
Another in my occasional series documenting some of the underbelly of Britain. Britain which we wouldn’t like visitors to see and which we wish wasn’t there. The trash, abused, decaying, destitute and otherwise buggered parts of our environment. Those parts which symbolise the current economic malaise; parts which, were the country flourishing, wouldn’t be there, would be better cared for, or made less inconvenient.
This attractive emporium is in Commercial Street, in London’s East End. While the East End does contain some real gems it contains about a hundred times more absolutely decrepit squalor like this.
In celebration of the lovely summer weather we’ve had for the last few days, I thought we would have a rose from our garden. This rose isn’t in flower yet this year, but it won’t be long before it is and some of the others are already in full bloom.
Click the image for larger views on Flickr Rose: Buff Beauty Greenford, June 2010
Another photo from the archives this week.
This magnificent palm tree was the centrepiece of St George’s Gardens (behind the Grosvenor Chapel and wedged between South Street and Mount Street in London’s Mayfair) a few years back. Considering this was taken in mid-February after a particularly frozen December, the tree looked in remarkable condition. And judging by the size it has been there quite a few years. A most handsome specimen. I hope it is still there.
Click the image for larger views on Flickr Palm Tree London, February 2011
Eccentric looks at life through the thoughts of a retired working thinker
