Just realised I have never written about a very good day we had visiting the V & A East Storehouse in the Olympic Park, Stratford, East London, in late September. You may remember that Battleaxe and Philosopher had unexpected freedom as a result of the lost first week of our Sicily holiday. We resolved to give ourselves a week of interesting and pleasant events, and the day in London was just one of them. For anyone who likes Things, as we do, the Storehouse is ideal… And the surroundings are very interesting. The developments on and around the Olympic Park gave us a quick flash of positivity – a view of what modernity could be about…
We caught the high speed train up to Stratford International – quite a futuristic experience in itself, given the normal state of UK trains, passed the Westfield Shopping centre, and then walked about a mile through Stratford and the Park to get to the Storehouse. The architecture is astonishing – mostly apartment blocks ranging from impressive towers to smaller, brick-faced blocks on a more domestic scale, all set amongst leafy green walkways etc. We agreed we could see ourselves living there! Now, don’t get me wrong, this was pure fantasy, you are talking seriously up-market here. The sort of apartment we would consider would cost way more than our current house. All so clean, so peaceful, mostly traffic-free. Here are a few pictures from the internet – showing some monumental architecture, some more domestic.
At the centre of all this is the River Lea, now transformed from foul sewer into pleasant river walkways, and a large area called the Wetlands – I think that is largely re-wilded artificial filter beds to clean the river – now, it looks like a wild natural area, full of walking and cycle tracks.
Anyway, the Storehouse is pretty remarkable. A very spectacular building on several floors, chock full of absolutely everything. You could spend time finding out about every single object, but typical Philosopher and Battleaxe, we just wandered around gawping. At several points you could look though glass floors/walls to see the conservators working on different categories of object – very interesting. Battleaxe would recommend the V & A Storehouse.
The only downside was the catering – the cafe was very expensive, uncomfortable and the food was not nice at all. It is run by some artisan sourdough bakery – I guess Battleaxe is, in general, fed up with breaking her teeth on sourdough…
So that was a good day.
This morning, Battleaxe’s mood was further improved by the fact that our travel insurance company have coughed up some money for our lost week, and quite quickly, with remarkably little grief. In fact, they paid me an extra lost night in the hotel in Giardini Naxos which I hadn’t even claimed for, telling me that Catania Airport was closed for three days. Not all the money we lost, but a good chunk. Battleaxe would recommend the company – Freedom Travel Insurance.
There will be another blog post quite shortly – on Thursday I am going to London with the WI Book Group to see the Bayeux Tapestry. Have seen it before, in France, with Philosopher, but thought I needed the full British Museum experience. Watch this space.
Incidentally, Philosopher’s in-growing toenail operation passed without incident. He said he scarcely felt the injections, which I had heard were the worst part. He still isn’t wearing shoes. However, I believe the socks with sandals look, which was sartorial suicide, is currently fashionable… yes! Whoa, read this Philosopher!
