Never mind the exhibits, what about the gift shop?
The Museum and Heritage awards shortlist was released this week, celebrating the best museums around the country in all sorts of categories, from ‘visitor welcome’ category to sustainability, innovation and more. All very good, but we couldn’t but help take a second look at the award celebrating the one bit of every museum that every visitor sees: the all-important gift shop. Here are the nominees; winners will be announced on May 15.
• Dundee Contemporary Arts — DCA Shop
• Portsmouth City Council’s The D-Day Story — D-Day 80 Shop Refit
• The National Gallery, London — Bicentenary Year Retail
• National Football Museum, Manchester — Shop of the Year
• The Real Mary King’s Close, Edinburgh — Gift shop
The curious incident of the Beech in winter
Beech trees, like most of Britain's deciduous trees, lose almost all their leaves in the winter. Yet the beech has a curious twist on this behaviour: train it in to a hedge and it hangs on to many of its leaves until the replacements come through in Spring. This and more you'll learn in our complete guide to beech trees.
A rail replacement service you won’t mind getting
The Great Central Railway — stretching across Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire, and connecting Sheffield to London — originally opened in 1899, only to be closed less than 70 years later in the reforms of the 1960s. In the decades since then it’s become a popular heritage railway, with one problem: a 500-metre stretch between the two sections of track was demolished after the line was closed.
The Great Central Railway ran for less than 70 years
Efforts to rebuild the missing section have been ongoing for a while, and to help raise funds a ‘reunification’ weekend special will run on April 5 and 6, with vintage 1960s buses on hand to bridge the missing section of rail for the two days. Finally a bus replacement service that you won’t mind getting; tickets are on sale at tickets.gcrailway.co.uk.
'It's everything we need for hurleys'
Ash tree dieback has exacted an awful toll on the landscape of Britain. Over in Ireland it’s been just as devastating, but as well as ridding the land of many trees it’s also threatened one of the Emerald Isle’s most popular sports: hurling. The sticks used — called hurleys — have long been made from ash since, as hurley maker Richard McCarthy explains, it’s ‘strong, flexible and lightweight — everything we need for hurleys’.
Hurleys have long been made by hand, from ash.
Help is at hand for McCarthy and his fellow makers thanks to the Blenheim Estate, which is supplying around 1,000 ash tree ‘butts’ harvested from the Estate as part of the programme to manage dying trees while looking to preserve all those that are showing signs of natural resistance to ash dieback. ‘Whilst the majority of the timber will go for firewood, it’s great to see some value being realised,’ says James Hunter, Blenheim’s Rural Property Manager.
We might be nearing the point where the only sane reaction is to throw your hands up in the air and wonder out loud where it will all end
Back in the 1990s, when IBM’s supercomputer first beat Garry Kasparov at chess, writers breathed a sigh of relief and gave thanks that while a terrifyingly powerful mathematical algorithm might be able to master a game with strict rules and tactics, at least those machines would never surpass human creativity. Seems like that confidence might have been misplaced, as ChatGPT is now writing fiction... and is apparently worryingly good at it, as our colleagues over at TechRadar report.
He shoots, he misses
Country Life's James Fisher went to Cheltenham on Wednesday; so did Getty photographer Chris Jackson. Poor old Chris seemingly missed the chance to get a picture of James, and instead had to console himself with capturing this familiar-looking lady in the crowd...
That's it for this week — Dawn Chorus will be back on Monday
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‘To this day, it is as attractive as when Hercules first laid eyes on it’: How to escape the crowds on the Amalfi Coast, according to those in the knowThe Amalfi Coast is one of the world’s most famed holiday destinations, but, in recent years, mass tourism has made parts of it unbearable. Here’s our guide to making the most of it — in peace and in style.
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The garden created by a forgotten genius of the 1920s, rescued from 'a sorry state of neglect to a level of quality it has not known for over 50 years'George Dillistone’s original Arts-and-Crafts design at Knowle House, East Sussex, has been lovingly restored and updated with contemporary planting. George Plumptre tells more; photography by Clive Nichols.
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The red kite is a soaraway success story, having escaped extinction to become a familiar sight in our skies againUnhurried in flight and with a sideline in stolen goods, the handsome red kite is the gentleman thief of the raptor world, writes Mark Cocker.
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Brideshead Revisited (again): The 10 scene-stealing British country homes from film and televisionWhat do an enigmatic Caped Crusader, a sopping-wet Mr Darcy and Lord Eddard Stark of Winterfell have in common? Believe it or not, British country houses.
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Sophia Money-Coutts: Is it ever okay to throw your dog a birthday party?Sir Lewis Hamilton did it, so why not throw a birthday party for your canine companion, Sophia Money-Coutts asks.
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Tuning in with the past: Monk music will ring out for the first time since the Dissolution after medieval manuscript is rediscoveredBuckland Abbey once thronged with monks who sang for hours every day. Now, some of their newly rediscovered medieval music will ring out once more.
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'Never willing to pardon where I had a power to revenge’: The history of the duelling classSettling a dispute with swords, pistols and, if legend is to be believed, sausages and guitars, has long been a matter of honour even among modern-day rock stars, discovers John F. Mueller.
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What everyone is talking about this week: 'People who tended to be more obedient about lockdown are now its fiercest critics'Week in, week out, Will Hosie rounds up the hottest topics on everyone's lips, in London and beyond.
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Canine muses: Lucian Freud's etchings of Pluto the whippet are among his most popular and expensive workIn the third edition of our limited series, we meet the dogs who've inspired some of our greatest artists.
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Water you're waiting for? Britain's best heritage lidos were built to save swimmers from polluted seas full of potato peelings, oil and coal — and they're still in action todayThe seaside lido continues to offer safe swimming for holidaymakers irrespective of the tide, but they're also architectural gems worthy of our admiration.
