Truly Ace Travels
Arts & Culture in Birmingham This Bank Holiday
This weekend I’ve been enjoying Birmingham’s arts and culture offerings and my how the city has delivered.
On Sunday I attended Swingamajig, which was outstanding – the UK’s first urban festival dedicated to electro swing, gypsy folk and vintage mayhem, taking the sounds and styles of the 20′s and bringing them up to date with dance, electro and a dash of dubstep. Read the rest of this entry »
Birmingham Artists Quarter
Today (for the first time, to my utter shame) I visited Birmingham’s creative hub; The Custard Factory. Including having a mooch in their awesome new Mr Birds Emporium which I’ve been intending to visit for months now.
What finally lured me there was their Bicycle Basket Bazaar; described as “A unique array of retailers, all cramming their wares into bike-baskets and pannier-racks. Kind of like a car boot sale, but more compact and kinder to the environment.”
Below are some images from the Bicycle Basket Bazaar area, which was in the central courtyard and surrounded by quite a number of shops, and of course, Mr Birds (which is like a indoor market of independent traders) is situated at The Custard Factory also. Read the rest of this entry »
Birmingham; City of Culture
It seems only a few short years ago Birmingham was commonly hailed as an industrial toilet, and yet suddenly we are now City of Culture.
I breezed into our fair city Sunday afternoon to enjoy it’s ‘cultural delights’, and will drop the sarcasm from my tone from here on in 
I only jest, it’s become a really lovely city of recent years – we have the Bullring shopping centre with I’m sorry to be a philistine, but one of the greatest things ever to come to the city; the ground floor of Selfridge’s, of course just turn a blind eye to ‘award winning’ architecture of the Bullring, our new monolith of a library, apparently the biggest in Europe (I’m impressed), and today I visited the very swanky Ikon Gallery, my second visit.
More about my day in our City of Culture … Read the rest of this entry »
Mr Birds Emporium of Vintage, Culture & Art
I’ve known about Mr Birds for months now but keep forgetting to visit it, I guess I’ve been a bit busy of late as I’ve been moving home. MAYHAPS this blog will remind me to finally go one Saturday.
Mr Birds Emporium is a relatively new (launched in October last year), concept put together by the teams behind Urban Village & Sutton Vintage & Arts Fair (now I have been to the Sutton Vintage & Arts Fair, as it’s on my doorstep). Read the rest of this entry »
Vintage Childhood Books
I moved home very recently and today I was lovingly unpacking my childhood books (which are over 30 years old), and placing them on top of the vintage suitcase pictured above.
The suitcase is also a childhood treasure; I’m pretty certain it is the suitcase I packed full of teddy bears and such like when ‘running away from home’ one summer afternoon in the late 70s. I believe I turned back because the hard pavement was hurting my bare feet.
Anyway, I digress. Vintage books! Read the rest of this entry »
Paul Kidby At Antiques For Everyone
On Sunday I visited Antiques For Everyone at the NEC, Birmingham. Amid all the glory of beautifully polished apothercary cabinets and Victorian barometers I came across a stand ‘arts’ relevant enough to warrant a blog about it.
What first drew me to the stand was a large scale framed illustration, that I’ve seen on the much advertised 2012 book title ‘Dodger’ by Terry Pratchett. The framed artwork (below) was of the original book cover illustration (by Paul Kidby) and available for purchase through Art Of The Imagination for just £7,500 *gasp* Read the rest of this entry »
Illustration For Leisure Industry Interiors
Well isn’t this interesting (well, to me anyway )
On Sunday I was in the Island Bar in Birmingham, listening to some bands play and admiring the general bohemian atmosphere and studying the wall illustrations dotted around and then randomly a couple of days later I happened upon this blog by Stina Jones, one of the illustrators. Read the rest of this entry »
Concertina Business Cards
On Saturday I popped into the fairly newly opened branch of Wysteria Lane in Birmingham, which is a beautiful shop filled with gorgeous products and extremely imaginative display areas.
Image courtesy of ‘Style Birmingham’
While there I picked up one of their flyers at the till so that I could online shop with them at a later date as I don’t get into the city much. Not surprisingly their flyers were far more imaginative than most also and I thought the retail business owners amongst you would find them interesting. Read the rest of this entry »
Artists & Illustrators Groups
I’ve just been complimented on my blog by the very kind owner of Devious Creations, and of course toodled across to their blog/website for a nose at what they are up to as a result.
Read the rest of this entry »
Aspex Arts Centre – Portsmouth
A couple of weeks ago whilst taking a stroll around the area of Portsmouth called ‘old Portsmouth’ I stumbled across the Aspex Gallery, which is a fantastic modern centre with an artists gallery, lovely cafe area, and also (the most impressive bit) a shop rammed with the stunning creations of local artists.
Unfortunately I only had my phone with me as it was an unplanned visit, therefore my photos aren’t of the best quality, but I’ve done what I can to dig out links to the artists website so you can view more. Read the rest of this entry »
