Cyril Power

A kickass British modernist fascinated by the technological advances brought about in the interwar years, specifically the London Underground network.
Whence and Whither (1930)
The Tube Station (1932)
The Escalator (1929)
Power's interest in speed and machinery didn't stop at the Tube - my favourite of his linocuts is one of the non-transport ones.
The Merry-Go-Round (1931)

True prosperity

(I actually thought it said "PASSION" not "COMPASSION"... I actually like it less now. But still pretty cool - the hazmat colours keep it just the right side of saccharine.)

Watch envy

I don't really wear watches, but maybe that's because I don't have a nice one. If anyone wants to buy me this, that's fine.

Raymond Weil, Tradition, £835.

Black Swan posters

Black Swan, comes out today. I am very excited about the fact that it stars Natalie Portman (fresh from her star turn in My Imaginary Midsummer Night's Dream last summer) not just once but, from what I can make out, TWICE – as a nice goodie and a sexy baddie. Absolutely fine.

And I am also very excited because of the absolutely fantastic teaser posters – bold Soviet imagery courtesy of British design studio LaBoca. Apparently not available to buy. So befriend the popcorn girl at your local cinema as quickly as possible.

Mission Workshop

Don't like the clothes, but Lord knows I like the video.

Undercurrent

Braganza's LFW Cycle Hire Bike

London Fashion Week will soon be upon us, and LFW designer Jean-Pierre Braganza has added his own little urban accessory to his SS11 collection: a limited edition Barclays Cycle Hire bike!
The frames of the chosen bikes, usually grey, navy and cyan, will be coated with this delicate, smokey and summery salmon pink print as a way of building awareness of the bike scheme.

The designer said: "As a very keen cyclist in London, Barclays Cycle Hire offers the freedom to explore the city worry-free. By customising a bike for London Fashion Week, I hope to indicate the inspiration travel has provided in my work, and highlight that everyone can, and should, explore and discover our city." More than 500,000 journeys have been made since the Cycle Hire scheme launch and over 80,000 people have registered to become members.

Braganza's show Incendiata opens day one of LFW. Queues at nearby docking stations to be expected...

London Bridge: What Could Have Been

Check out these shelved plans for Phase Two of the London Bridge City development. The Powers-That-Were sought THREE different schemes in different styles.

Ultimately unsuccessful but undeniably ambitious, John Simpson and Partners were up first. They dreamt up a sort of Venice-on-the-Thames, complete with piazzas, cloisters and a sort of belltower-type thing. As you can see, I don't know my architectural terms, but I do know OTT elegance when I see it and this has bucketloads.

Admittedly, plonked down in the middle of central London it might have felt a bit like a pre-fab "Fancy Italy!" section from the Epcot Centre, but then people probably would say the same thing about the Covent Garden piazza.

It's a bit Duloc (right) and inauthentic, but it looks OK and would have been sympathetic to Hay's Galleria.

The second offering is bland filler, so let's not talk about that.
The third, from Philip Johnson, was meant to act as a counterpoint to the Palace of Westminster upstream, but looks absolutely massive and stupid and like it was drawn by a Premiership footballer. Opposite the Tower of London and next to Tower Bridge, it would have just looked like a crude, oversized, tacky copycat. So I'm glad that that didn't win.

In the end, Simpson's Anglo-Neo-Venetian offering won, but the commercial developers apparently wanted to build their own conventional buildings and just stick his facades on, so Simpson took his blueprints and hardhat (I imagine he looked like Tom Selleck in Three Men and a Baby) and stomped off home.

And that is how we ended up with City Hall which, all things considered, is pretty cool.

It opened in 2002 and was designed by Norman Foster. It doesn't fit with the Tower of London but the mix-and-match, modern/old thing is very London, and the design is the best of the bunch. Well done, Norman.

PRINT SUCCESS

- Leaf Me Alone by Anthony Peters
- Simple - Black & White by Seb Lester
- London by Steve Forney
- Tall Bike Poster by Barrel NY

Yet again...

...looking for a print.

Stephanie Quayle

Yesterday I saw some startingly wonderful sculptures by Stephanie Quayle in Canary Wharf. Quayle spends a lot of time watching her subjects before rendering them rapidly in clay, resulting in fantastically captured impressions.

The most eyecatching were groups of foxes slinking around the lobby of One Canada Square. It felt like the animals were the underclass in a two-tier city, as suited commuters hurried past and security guards kept a wary eye on them.

Probably the best site-specific public art I have ever seen. Well done Stephanie Quayle.

My street

in cardboard.



Hat tip: Menna Jenkins.