Tagged: National Trust
575 Wandsworth Road
It won’t be this year I get to see this house – visits are limited in numbers and duration and this years slots are already full – but it’s on the bucket list.
The house is the work of Khdambi Asalache, a poet and writer of Kenyan descent who also worked for the BBC and the Treasury. He started making fretwork to cover up the damp coming from the next door launderette, beginning a project that would last another twenty years. He would use abandoned wood, doors and boxes first cut to size then carved using a single knife.
(More details from National Trust and pics from Pinterest)
An extraordinary testament to patience, human endeavour, love and creativity.
Laters, Kate x
Bank Holiday x
Every May Bank Holiday we try to go to the May Fayre at Morden Hall Park, a National Trust property at the end of the Northern Line. It’s a old fashioned cocktail of traditional family delights far removed from it’s urban setting. Apart from the display above..bikers doing their thing..
Except afterwards you could have a free go over an obstacle course yourself..and that’s what makes it’s so special. People are there because they love what they do and want to share it.
In amongst the stalls are little gems like this one for rescued reptiles, where the owners are happy to talk and answer questions.
These two had been inspired by watching too much Harry Potter..
You never know what you’ll see next.
Wholesome, good family fun. Until next year.
Laters, Kate x
Morden Hall Park x
My book club book (due for discussion next week) is H for Hawk, a memoir by author Helen Macdonald about raising a Goshawk in a time of grief. So it was pretty thrilling to go to the Morden Hall Park Country Fayre on Bank Holiday monday to see live birds in action.
Morden Hall Park is a National Trust property right at the end of the Northern line where the river Wandle, the river used by William Morris to power his factory, flows powerfully through.
It’s a place that manages to marry urban and country in seamless unity..and this Fayre was no exception.
A barn owl flying over one of Charlie’s class mates.
Full of people but still far from the Madding crowds, there were salt of the earth stalls like this man, quietly making the most beautiful and realistic flys for fishing.
In the grounds blacksmiths and basket weavers were practising their fine arts.
There was even time to catch bubbles..
With miniature steam trains, ferret racing, dog shows, lots of animals as well as traditional stalls..and not so traditional ones…it was a genuinely great and unexpected day out.
But that’s the nature of Morden Hall Park – they really like to embrace the wild. In July they’re holding a Big Camp weekend with the opportunity to set up an overnight camp in the same field that Lord Nelson tethered his horse whilst he fished in the River Wandle and two days of ranger led activities with dinner cooked on a camp fire and story telling. Just gutted we’ll be away…next time Rodders, next time..
Laters, Kate x
Maison Bentley Style 