Tuesday 29th August - London Again

London again today, for a routine appointment at the chest clinic. It was as early start this time - for an early appointment.

I have to say I was a bit apprehensive as the lung function results had been lower than usual, but a very brisk consultant went through the figures in some detail and and reassured me that, taken over time, he still considered me to be about the same as I had been for the past three years. We left the hospital much earlier than I expected (they can run several hours late!) and with a light heart.

So, what to do next?

The last software updates on our phones have had a bad effect on the battery consumption. So, first stop, in order to save the battery, we headed to Daunt's bookshop and bought a small pocket map of Central London. The scale makes the new location of The Design Centre, in what was the Commonwealth Institute Building in Holland Park, look reasonably close. So we walked over that way, the The Boltons and past other Very Des Res Areas of Great Beauty and Huge Expense.

Not every historical house is in good condition; Alfred Hitchcock's old house looks to be in considerable disrepair, as though about to be a set for the next film.

English Heritage Blue plaque in 153 Cromwell Road, London, SW5 commemorating Hitchcock
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Hitchcock

 And the house where Beatrix Potter grew up is now a very modern primary school. That's the great joy of walking around London - all the accidental discoveries along the way.

Now, the Design Centre. I have only the faintest memories of the old Commonwealth Institute; all those flagpoles at the front, and a building that looked as if it was trying to fly;

The Building suffered from water ingress nearly all of its life as the Commonwealth Institute, but fortunately it is been repaired and given a new use as the latest home of the Design Museum. This website   is well worth visiting as you can see the structure of the building when it was empty awaiting repair. And this link has pictures which date from the sort of time that I went to see it on a school trip back in the 1960s. (This website is a bit of a 'find', and I'm going to add it to my feedly.)

Aplogies for all these links - but the pictures and information on them are better than I could type in.

The Design Museum is A-mazing! And free to enter the main exhibition! I'm sure I remember an original Design Centre somewhere near Regent Street back in the 1980s, and then we visited it a couple of times when it was neat Tower Bridge. This new venue is brilliant - the design of the building matches the idea of the museum. Just look at these photographs here... 

The exhibits are interesting too, particularly a great wall of objects at the entrance.

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A crowd sourced wall at the Design Museum displays around 200 objects which form an integral part of our daily life.