last day

we spent mum and dad's last day in london wandering through the east stopping at favourite haunts to refresh. i met them down on columbia road and we walked up to climpson's for breakfast and coffee. then we sauntered down the canal to the pavilion for more coffee and marveled at the geese in the algae. from there, we retraced our steps back to rochelle's canteen which was busy (the busiest - it was gloriously sunny) but, as always, worth the wait.

mum departed after lunch so dad and i trekked around the City (starting here at rivington place) visiting the greats and discovering the underdogs.

hello gherkin.

hello lloyd!

this building is just so incredibly detailed. imagine all those joints, all those connections that needed to be considered. it really is a fortress though. distant respect is now fully fledged puppy-love.

dad took this one. i can't claim credit.

and this is the view from mum and dad's suite (!!! - they were upgraded) at the boundary. i want to live here.

lovely london light. hopefully you know that i'm way too lazy to have altered this photo. if anything, downsizing has diminished its vibrance.

up on the roof.

ellie vs. me.

ellie vs. dad (dad won, i think).

dad and my beautiful, hilarious, darling cousin, stephanie.

new arrivals

whoops. my two favourite things, together at last. you can't see on the box, but they changed the horse (in the logo) into a zebra. genius.

the long-anticipated stella dress from richard nicoll a/w 09/10. it's true ever-lasting love.

and the darling magnus mark bradbury, the first of my second cousins! i didn't get a decent shot of him with his own mother (my cousin, emma), so here he is with mine.

misc edinburgh

mr j.

not sure who belongs to this but the gallery had a very extensive paolozzi collection, so it could be by him.

richard long.

rail bridge over the firth of the forth.

and a small town/hamlet called south queensferry.

some ducks. apparently i can't help myself.

civilization

the scottish parliament.

by enric miralles.

robbie burns... get it? it's made out of matchsticks. oh that scottish sense of humour!

castles

treated like royalty...

...in the castle we stayed in. to be more accurate, it was closer to faulty towers than any kind of regality (is that a word?).

a real castle (not for sleeping). don't recall the name because dad kept calling it the wrong thing so it has been struck from my memory.

hello

hello andy goldsworthy.

hello slightly terrifying bulls.

mum, dad and i were taken on a bush-bash (well, the scottish version of. we were in a land rover at least) over fields and heather, through the wilderness and farms and villages...

...in order to get nice and close to some of andy's work.

(this one's only a month old).

he lives in the area and has a patron in the local duke.

(click to enlarge).

oh, and mum has married me off to the next in line. this is my new home. and from now on you must refer to me as 'your grace'.

not even if you tried

this is the forth of the nith (the mouth of the river nith, near dumfries, in scotland).

impossible to take a bad photograph.