tantramar

More Please

I saw this in Williamsburg. More social comment on the actual ads please, no simply around then. Fantastic.

Greenhouse

I saw this in Berlin recently. I love houses with 'greenery'. Then I noticed the graffiti and how the plants were beginning to cover it.

I thought that was somehow charming, as if nature was slowly reclaiming what was once hers. Ivy is a bit like an ultimate slow graffiti but obviously has only one message, repeated again and again and again.

Fire Square

It's funny the stuff you find inexplicably pleasing. I see this little pavement stencil every time I go to Macondo for coffee. I really like it. I have no idea who did it or what it means. I just like it. Sometimes it is that simple.

One Sided Gap

I don't know about you, but I'm really quite relieved the there is a only a gap when getting off the train, not one when you're getting onto it! Perhaps railway stations get more law suits from people falling off trains than people falling onto them.

Usually you can't get on the train anyway...Maybe that's why...

Out Of Harms Way

Loving that.

Treading On Toes

This is pretty funny. In Hackney (as I wrote about here) they are really cutting down (or trying to) on fly posting. On Kingsland Road at least it's worked, well sort of. As you can see people are just pasting up onto existing advertising hoardings. I'm sure this is pissing off the people who are running the Golden Compass campaign!

The pasting posters industry in London used to be controlled in an almost mafia style way. I found this out when doing some guerrilla pr work years ago. You had to be pretty careful where you were active. It may be different now but I can't believe this is a good idea.

I would rather see Modular party information that a poster for the Golden Compass though...

Bishi

Ok, I've not seen this done to a church before... Bishi was performing at Shoreditch church for a few days over the weekend. Bishi is a musician, she does a kinda Indian, folk pop hybrid with a some dance in there and other bits too.

I didn't go, not really my kinda thing but I did like the decoration, well ok I didn't really like it but I thought it was intriguing. Stopping now.

Proud To Be...

I saw this the other night walking around Soho with Fosta. We weren't looking for it... but then why do I feel I have to write that, damn, hole getting deeper.

Anyway I thought it was funny the way they emphasized the Britishness of it. People know they're in London, well most of them. Are we so repressed that our sex shops are more extreme, or is it the opposite?

Any takers? I bet Mr Frith has thoughts on this...

Trampled Underfoot

I saw this last night, on a pavement in Shoreditch (where else). I love Led Zeppelin, who doesn't! The best rock band of all time? Quite possibly, so to see the symbols on the pavement was nice.

It's good to be reminded of what 'good' is, so that bad is more obvious and so we don't settle for 'OK', you know, like Honda tells us we shouldn't.
Whoever produced this, did it with the 'cleaning the ground' technique that I first saw last year. I like it. I'm waiting to see it on some walls.

The Best Shop Front Ever

I don't go down Bond Street much, the place makes me feel a bit ill. But on my way somewhere nicer I passed through and saw this crazy shop front for a jewelery shop. It was of course a temporary one while a re-furb was taking place. While it's impractical for so many reasons I'd love to see more actual shop fronts like this. More like a mystery shopping experience. I'd definitely go in somewhere like this just out of curiosity. Surely there are more interesting ideas in the shopping experience arena to be explored.

Do What I Do

I just saw this Tai Chi action on Wardour Street by the church. I've not seen people doing Tai Chi there before. I think it's great that anyone can go along for free and take part. There's something warming about the idea of total strangers being in complete unity. Made me smile.

Soho Is Being Shafted

There's something going on in Soho. I wrote some time back about the Intrepid Fox which got closed so fast the landlord barely had time to pull a final beer. Back then there were rumours about Paul Raymond building some big fancy street-long club. While there are no more confirmations of this story you can clearly see Raymond has kicked out quite a few people here. There is something going on. Now, if he wants to build a massive strip club I have no problem with that. The sex shops can all close I'm not interested in them. It's all free on the internet, hang on did I say that out loud?

Anyway, the thing that has got me madder than Phil Spector is the fact that the Beach Burrito Cafe has closed. I ate there twice a week, and damn it, I miss it. Finding good Mexican food in London is like finding a cute girl that likes Metallica and Bonnie Prince Billy. Yeah right.

So if you're reading this My Raymond, get in the ring, bring it on, I want My Mexican back and I mean business. Ok... I didn't really mean that, no honestly I didn't. I know who you are and I hear you're very nice. And I'm sure the Mexican was just making me fat anyway. Very sorry Mr Raymond, I don't know what came over me, must have been a silly phase. Do have a nice day.

Hell Hole

I saw this today on a bus stop up the Kingsland Road. Isn't London great!

28 Weeks Later, I Wish It Was Much Later

Here we go again. Since I started a category called Rant (inspired by Sleeping In My Head) I’m really starting to see a lot of things to bitch about. 28 Days Later, I thought, was a good film. One of the things that made it good was the fact that it was a zombie film without too many zombies; this is quite a hard thing to pull off, which Danny Boyle succeeded in doing. It’s more about the social elements, having to get on with people that you wouldn’t normally, and how to cope with life when it’s not as you expect it to be. Anyway blah blah, they’ve made another one called 28 Weeks Later which is after the infection has (supposedly) been contained and everyone goes back into London. Carnage, naturally ensues. It made me sad that someone felt this film needed to be made. I feel like this has completed destroyed the subtlety of the first film, if a zombie film can be subtle…

That, was rant one, this is rant two. These signs have been cropping up everywhere. It’s a guerrilla campaign for 28 Weeks Later and it’s rubbish. I presume, since it’s for a big company and they have sprayed the website on there that they have permission and the paint will come off all the pavements soon. But in the meantime this corporate grafetti is deplorable. Plus it’s a really lame campaign. It’s about Zombies right, so they should have had some of those blue and yellow police incident signs. For example: last night at approximately 2:30am four zombies were seen eating a young man. Did you see anything? Or were you running for your life? Sheesh, I should work in advertising.

Wonderful Wayne

I saw this thing last night. I can’t decide if it’s the worst van I’ve ever seen, or the best. Thank you Wayne Wonder for putting this dilemma in front of me!