Bergen & Street Art

Happy Monday-ing (and thank goodness it’s over!) To start the week I thought I’d post some street art – always puts a smile on my face, and makes me keep an eye out for more in the rest of the week!

One of the things I always keep an eye out for (aside from bookshops and libraries!) when I’m in another country is street art, because it’s such a beautiful universal thing which you don’t need to know the language for. Below is some street art which my husband and I found while we were in Bergen, Norway last year, which caught my eye because of some of the messages in the pictures – I think my favourite is the one with a panda and it’s mobile phone though!

Plaistow Street Art by Mr Cenzone

I love living in east London, because of all the colourful corners and walls I always come across. I’m a huge fan of street art (as I’m sure you’ve noticed) and can never go past any without stopping to have a good stare.

This is some artwork by Mr Cenz, a London-based street-artist, whose work I found in Plaistow, east London. They were both slightly hidden away and I managed to see both going past by accident (I saw one while was on a bus and came back later after remembering where it was!)

Apparently this one is called ‘The Wish’, and it’s a beautiful dreamy piece which covers the bottom length of a whole building block (took me a while to get the whole piece in one phoyo!). I love the whirls and contouring in this, as well as the black, grey and white tones on top of the colourful, magical background.

Not far from the above piece is this more sultry looking portrait, a beautiful mix of blues, greens and purples on the side of a shop wall. Again, there’s a beautiful mix of shapes on top of colours, with a very dreamy look to the whole piece that I love.

 

I’ll be keeping an eye out for more pieces around east London, especially some from this artist!

You can also check the artist out on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Etsy pages.

Hackney Wick Street Art Galore

I recently had to visit Hackney Wick and was delighted to find myself surrounded by walls and walls of street art in the area. I love that there are so many artist’s works in the area, and that there are so many humorous, satirical and beautiful pieces all over the place. So of course I got a little snap-happy and got to know the area. I spent quite a while wandering around and still don’t think I saw all of the pieces, but I did enjoy exploring!

I’ll let the images speak for themselves below – I love that this is such a colourful area, with plenty of art studios and projects nearby, which is perfect inspiration for any artist : )

Tiger in London Street Art by Otto Schade & Dan Kitchener

So this caught my eye while I was out at work a few days ago, and I just had to stop to take some pictures because of how beautiful and vibrant this looked. The artwork looked pretty familiar – and I realised it was a colloboration of Dan Kitchener (whose intense work I’m in love with) and Otto Schade (I have seen a lot of his ‘ribbon effect’ work around Camden).

It was certainly a beautiful highlight of my day to spot this, and I’ll be keeping an eye out for more vibrant pieces like this!

The BFG Dream Jars Trail

I love it London has an art-themed ‘hunt’ over each summer for people to find an follow – one summer it was giant eggs, another it was giant elephants, and another year we had rickshaws designed by fashion designers – not to mention many more things to find!

This summer we had the BFG Dream Jar Trail – based on the BFG film which was released last month, where ‘dream jars’ designed by celebrities all over put their childhood dreams into manifestation inside giant jars, which were then placed all over London, as well as other major cities in the UK like Glasgow, Cardiff and Birmingham.

My sister and I thought we’d try our hand at finding some, and decided to follow one of the six Dream Trails to find jars – nearly six hours later and with very tired feet, we managed to find around 12 (it would have been 13 but one got removed from it’s spot due to vandalism, leading to me and my sister wandering around in a park in a daze looking for it). We started at Bond Street and the edge of Hyde Park, worked our way up to Leicester Square and China Town, and walked up to Embankment and Victoria before we stopped.

I loved the creativity of these, and thought they were a great idea, and they were very popular with the tourists and the kids!

Here’s the Dream Jars we found – but you can see all of them here – a great tribute to the genius writer that is Roald Dahl : )

Quirky Bookstores & Libraries: Sokol Boosktore in Chelsea

I have always loved looking for quirky buildings which add a little character to London – and Sokol Bookshop does just that. This is a bright red bookshop I found while wandering past in Chelsea which looks more like a giant, old-school Toy Store, adding a splash of colour to the area. Interestingly enough, this bookshop specialises in medieval texts and manuscipts, which I saw a glimpse of in the window display.

Is it me, or does this book-store seem like something found in the middle of a traditional European village?

Camden Town’s Colourful Street Art

I love wandering around London and looking for art-work – street art, sculptures and giant landmarks – so Camden is a beautiful treasure trove for all of the beautiful art work scattered around the town. I won’t write too much, as the pictures really do speak for themselves – dreamy landscapes, satirical cartoons, and bright, rainbow colours pieces covering the whole wall of buildings.

I had a really lovely afternoon discovering these, and will be re-visiting soon enough to look for more – the ones below aren’t even all of the photos I took!

Norway’s Beautiful Doorways

One of the things I really loved about Norway when travelling to the different towns was how beautiful the architecture was, particularly the doorways in the buildings. I managed to snap a few pictures of each doorway which stood out to me, and there were plenty! Each door had it’s own memorable decor and embellishment which looked gorgeous, and each seemed to have a story of it’s own : )

 

Beautiful Rainy Street Art by Dan Kitchener

I saw this a couple of days ago while wandering around Camden Town, which is rich with beautiful, quirky and huge street art scenes all over the town.

I fell in love with this rainy scene by artist Dan Kitchener, whose work is all over London (and also parts of Europe!) – the bright lights (which reminded me of Tokyo!), rainy reflections on the floor, slick vehicles and plenty of umbrellas – there’s something to stare at in every corner. This piece covers a whole wall along the side of a restaurant in the centre of Camden Town, and looks stunning with its mix of bright colours against a black dark background. Something about all the pedestrians hiding under umbrellas seems like it should be lonely, but instead it is haunting, beautiful and gives a sense of solidarity – there’s plenty of rain and umbrellas in London but we’re all together, perhaps.

I’ll be looking for more of these, but what a beautiful way to enjoy the weekend, hey?

Pretty Mosaic Giraffes

I saw this recently and loved it, a mosaic rainbow pair of giraffes created by local charity Headway East London, by survivers of brain injury, using art as a means of expression and communication, as well as helping the survivers in their rehabilitation. I though this was a beautiful, gentle piece of art which used pretty rainbow colours and mirrors to create something which looked pretty joyful – a family of giraffes which is simple yet very endearing : )st