One of my routes takes me from Green Park Underground station to St James's Square. There, after a spell prowling the metal floors of the London Library and perhaps retiring to a leather armchair to digest my researches (it's extraordinary how many people read with closed eyes), I retrace my steps.
Twice on Piccadilly recently, I have been confronted by a blinding light. On Saturday, it was so intense that I had, once more, to close my eyes, nearly blundering into tourists in the Ritz arcade. A Jehovah's Witness might have mistaken it for the Second Coming. You may say it was only the late-afternoon sun, but I've been puzzling about it. I don't remember having observed such an effulgence before.
If I were a Luminist-one of the school of 19th-century American painters who believed the phenomena of Nature were an expression of divine will-I would think it meant something. But what? The streets of London are hardly paved with gold, but a golden light could be taken to symbolise its wealth. Or was it like the beam of light focused by a magnifying glass, a hint that this City of the Plain is about to self-combust? Deep waters.
On a material note, after years of building work, the new Underground station has been revealed: it's much improved.
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You've almost certainly been making cups of tea wrong for yearsWe drink tea every day, but are we doing it correctly? Who decided on the rules and do they really matter? Jonathon Jones reveals all.
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Myddleton House: The place that 'will help you learn what true gardening is' is open to everyone, and just 30 minutes from central LondonE. A. Bowles created a horticultural playground in the gardens of Myddleton House that was years ahead of its time, and continues to influence even today. Isabel Bannerman takes a look.
