An art round up

The last few days have been filled with painting and sewing. I've embarked on several projects. Here is the evidence!
1, 2 & 3. The Gremlins and their pets sat for their portrait
4 & 5. The beginnings of a Frida shrine
6. A fat parrot embroidery
7. Me with a chicken embroidery in progress

All these items are going towards projects; the painting as part of my couples series and the embroidery and Frida shrine as part of The Frida Experiment, a project in collaboration with my mum (Penny MacBeth), Susie Chaikin, Rose Tydeman and myself. More about it soon!

Lally x

The ghost of Lanhydrock

Hello from the depths of Cornwall. I have spent the last week at home having a lovely break from my thesis! On Sunday we took a little trip to Lanhydrock, a lovely National Trust house just outside Bodmin. I have great memories of trips there when I was small but haven't visited in years so it was quite delightful to see it all again. I dressed accordingly (of course) in a 1920s theatre costume, ditsy pink bed jacket and a hat stolen from my ma! The minty green and peachy combination turned out to blend perfectly with the interiors of the house and I think I ended up looking a bit like a ghost of times past.

 Lanhydrock is a wonderful house, particularly fascinating for its upstairs/downstairs layout. The house was rebuilt following a fire in the 1880s and was designed to house all the mode cons of the day. The kitchens are particularly unique in their layout with a dry pantry, bakery, creamery, dairy and butchery amongst many others! I was particularly happy to see how thoughtfully put together the scenes and rooms were, with real attention to detail, the items displayed really enhanced the experience. They have been trialling the use of smells and sounds too which I always think works wonderfully and is so much better than complete reenactments as it allows a little mystery. We had a lovely time wandering about inspecting the rooms and came away with renewed fascination for Victorian England! My mum purchased me a book on Victorian servants and I have been reading it intently; its been a great interest of mine since making a Victorian dolls house as child (complete with a family named the snootypoos hehe!)

Lally x x