Inspiration

It was a weekend where one thing morphed into another. Rob, one of my colleagues, and I got back from one our of projects in Scotland late on Friday evening. On Saturday I visited a rather handsome house, in an architectural square in Islington, which a client is potentially thinking of buying—well it’s always fun looking around houses. I pottered around Islington and wandered home. The afternoon merged into early evening; I lit a fire and snoozed and dealt with emails and then had an evening catching up with back episodes of Mad Men. Quadruple billing. Perfect.

On Sunday morning, my friend Will and I went to look at the Conran exhibition at the Design Museum, and then we zoomed on down to the Dulwich Picture Gallery.  Now the thing is, the Dulwich Picture Gallery is one of those places I should have visited for ever. Designed by Soane, it always the building that every architect in London always names as ‘their most inspirational building in London’. Just for instance. The problem is, it’s in Dulwich (sorry, readers of Dulwich); and it’s always felt like a little bit too much of a trek. Really? Well, finally, we made it. Very fine—and Dulwich was very beautiful too (okay?).

And then we drove back and the afternoon morphed into evening and a bonkers party at the Art Workers Guild which involved tea and cakes and making Christmas hats from old musical scores; and a hilarious evening in the pub with the young Fox & Flytes and friends. Fox & Flyte have been installing an extraordinary Christmas tree in the back of the shop. More on that soon.

My point being, that if I had been a clever person my camera would have been with me throughout and this would have  been a very illustrated blog.  But it was not. The thing about a weekend that morphs is that you never quite know what you’re doing at the time, or next. And the thought of illustrating it would be, well, a bit… beyond good taste.

And I was thinking about morphing, and deep in my brain, a little memory spark went off which might ring a bell for all of us who were about 6 or 7 in 1977 and watching Childrens’ BBC. Tony Hart? Who probably got me more excited about drawing than anyone else. And his little plasticine friend Morph, who used to climb out of his pencil box? For all nostalgia seekers, look no further, and have a very happy morning.