culture

On “Mid” creativity, wild sincerity and the curse of the algorithm



Eric - Benedict Cumberbatch
I’m halfway through watching Eric on Netflix thanks to a few gushing Facebook recommendations.

I don’t watch many streamed series. A combination of shattered attention span and a default anti-hype setting means I prefer to wait till the fuss dies down and then I… don’t get round to it.

Anyway, I’m liking Eric (above), the 80s crime drama about a dysfunctional puppeteer whose son goes missing and the various sub-plots woven within. I’m particularly enjoying the early-80s New York setting, cultural references, cinematic colour grading and ace music score, along with the suspenseful pace of the storytelling.

Is it blowing my mind? Not quite. But it’s good enough. The New York Times has a coincidental opinion piece pondering the “mid”-ness of current TV. (more…)

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The culture of fashion: kilty pleasures



Le Kilt

It’s 30 years since Marc Jacobs’ fateful Perry Ellis grunge collection, so a good time for one revival in particular. This autumn I’m excited for the return of the kilt, the old money staple that straddles childhood nostalgia and tradition (think school uniforms and the Queen off-duty) and pop culture subversion (70s punk, 90s grunge, Cher from Clueless).

This season, Burberry has cleverly revived it as a youthful house code in an effort to ramp up Daniel Lee’s modern Brit vision. (more…)

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Can Ladbroke Hall turn Notting Hill into an art destination?



Michele Lamy and Loïc Le Gaillard at Ladbroke Hall by Tom Jamieson for FT

“We want to use the language of a foundation or a museum; moving away from the idea of being a gallery. I want everybody to feel they can come in and educate themselves about design. We want diversity, not only in the artists that we work with but the people that visit us, whether that’s a local school or someone from fashion, the arts or design. We’ve been very successful as a business and now want to give back. We’re seeding things here – we’re not sure what, but we know something beautiful will grow.”
Loïc Le Gaillard, Financial Times

News just in: Ladbroke Grove is getting a very zhuzhy arts hub for SS23. (more…)

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In praise of the cultural oral history



oral history

Never met an oral history I didn’t love.

Oral histories are the perfect format book for the time poor. You can open at any page and learn something or entertain yourself in five minutes flat. I first got hooked in the early 90s, starting with Days in the Life* (Jonathon Green’s seminal deep dive into London’s 60s counterculture), swiftly followed by his equally brilliant It: Sex Since the Sixties* (more 60s rompage) and later, Them: Voices from the Immigrant Community in Contemporary Britain*, a fascinating investigation into British immigrant life (Green mentioned recently that he’s planning an update, which is amazing news). (more…)

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