The world observed International Women’s Day on Monday and to mark the occasion, the Museum of London has launched an original video series featuring five female comedians performing short original pieces inspired by objects in the museum’s women’s history archives. The first of the videos features comedian Thanyia Moore responding to a Henry Grant photograph of a female bus conductor from the mid-1970s when London Underground first officially employed women as bus drivers (pictured right). Further videos – which will be rolled out over Women’s History Month – feature comedians Samantha Baines, Jenny Bede, Jen Ives and Leila Navabi responding to objects ranging from a commemorative toilet roll created by First 100 Years to mark a century since the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act made it illegal to ban people from jobs based on their sex in 1919 (pictured below) to a recruitment letter from Sainsbury’s seeking female staff to work in their shops during World War I. To watch the first of the series head here.
LondonLife
LondonLife – Award-winning Thames views…
Andy Sillett’s Misty Morning was the overall winner of this year’s Thames Lens competition. The Thames Festival Trust received more than 350 entries to the competition between July last year and January this year which was held under the theme of ‘Thames Unlocked’. As well as submitting new images, photographers were encouraged to consider past photos for submission given the impact of coronavirus related restrictions. Other notable images, which were selected by representatives of the Thames Festival Trust and Port of London Authority, included Fraser Gray’s LV 21 and Royal Terrace Pier Gravesend (the runner-up – pictured below), and Sarah Gannon’s highly commended image Costa del Rotherhithe (pictured far below). For more, see https://thamesfestivaltrust.org/read-watch-listen/thames-lens-2020/.
LondonLife – Looking down Whitehall…

From the Trafalgar Square end. PICTURE: Johen Redman/Unsplash
LondonLife – Shoreditch High Street…

PICTURE: Samuel Regan-Asante/Unsplash.
LondonLife – Tower Bridge crossing…
Crossing the Thames on a cold winter’s day. PICTURE: Lubo Minar/Unsplash
LondonLife – A splash of colour in Docklands…

Cabot Square, Docklands. PICTURE: Tom Podmore/Unsplash
LondonLife – Signs of the Times (VI)…

Seen in Oxford Street. PICTURE: Samuel Regan-Asante/Unsplash
LondonLife – On the Thames Path…

LondonLife – Signs of the times (V)…

COVID vaccination stickers seen in Putney. PICTURE: John Cameron/Unsplash
LondonLife – Back in lockdown…

LondonLife – Vale John Le Carré (but George Smiley lives on)…
News this week that spy turned novelist John Le Carré has died at the age of 89. His family reportedly confirmed the author had died of pneumonia at the Royal Cornwall Hospital on Saturday night. Born as David Cornwall, Le Carré worked as an intelligence officer for the British Foreign Service and, drawing in his work, began writing Cold War spy thrillers under the pseudonym of Le Carré with his first, Call for the Dead, published in 1961. It was in this novel – Le Carré went on to write others – that his most famous character, George Smiley, made his first appearance. Initially a minor character, Smiley went on to become a star in three novels published in the 1970s, the most famous of which is Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (Smiley’s last appearance was in a later book, 2017’s A Legacy of Spies). In tribute to Le Carré and George Smiley, pictured is 9 Bywater Street in Chelsea, the fictional home of Smiley (albeit a very real property!)
LondonLife – Tate Britain goes Technicolour…
Artist Chila Kumari Singh Burman has transformed the facade of the Tate Britain with an eye-popping art installation, the fourth in an annual series of outdoor commissions to mark the winter season. The Liverpool artist’s neon work, Remembering a Brave New World, references Hindu mythology, Bollywood, colonial history and family memories. It can be seen until 31st January. For more, see www.tate.org.uk. PICTURE: A Winter Commission – Chila Kumari Singh Burman © Tate (Joe Humphrys)
LondonLife – Signs of the times (IV)…

Taken at Bank Underground station. PICTURE: Étienne Godiard/Unsplash
LondonLife – Buckingham Palace’s Picture Gallery empties out…
Old Masters have been removed from the Picture Gallery at Buckingham Palace for the first time in almost 45 years to allow for essential maintenance works. The works, which include paintings by Titian, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Van Dyck and Canaletto, will be featured in a landmark new exhibition – Masterpieces from Buckingham Palace – which, featuring some 65 artworks in total, opens in the palace’s Queen’s Gallery on 4th December. They have been removed from the Picture Gallery – one of the palace’s State Room where Old Master paintings have hung since the reign of King George IV in the 1820s – over a period of four weeks to allow for building improvements which will include the replacement of electrics and pipework – some of which has not been updated since the 1940s – as well as the gallery’s roof. The refurbishment is part of a £370 million, 10 year refit programme being carried out at the palace due for completion in 2027.
LondonLife – Signs of the times (III)…

Spotted in Old Compton Street, Soho. PICTURE: Kevin Grieve/Unsplash
LondonLife – Lockdown sentiment…
PICTURE: Kevin Grieve/Unsplash
LondonLife – New Blue Plaque for sculptors…

Twentieth century sculptors Barbara Hepworth (1903-1975) and John Skeaping (1901-1980) have been recognised with an English Heritage Blue Plaque at their former home in St John’s Wood. The couple lived in the basement flat at 24 St Ann’s Terrace for less than a year in 1927 but during that time held a joint exhibition (Hepworth’s first ever) in the studio, located in a former billiards room at the rear of the house. The room was also where Hepworth created one of her earliest Mother and Child sculptures as well as works including Doves and Seated Figure. Present at the unveiling last Friday were Sophie Bowness, Barbara Hepworth’s grand-daughter, and Nicholas Skeaping, John Skeaping’s son. For more, on English Heritage Blue Plaques, head to www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/blue-plaques/.
LondonLife – Just watching the world go by…
Spotted in St James’s Park. PICTURE: Alexandru Vicol/Unsplash
LondonLife – Not such a lonely bear…

Paddington Bear may look lonely seated on a park bench but he is actually among a host of new statues which were placed in Leicester Square earlier this year. Others include Mr Bean, Mary Poppins, Laurel and Hardy, and Harry Potter and now comes news that Paddington will have more company from spring next year. A 10th statue – depicting the “King of Bollywood”, Shah Rukh Khan, and his co-star Kajol – will be placed in the famous square in what will be the first ever Bollywood statue erected in the UK. The new statue will recreate a scene from the award-winning rom-com, Diwale Dulhania Le Jayenge. PICTURE: Matt Brown (licensed under CC BY 2.0).
LondonLife – Iconic shirt becomes part of Collecting COVID…
A Black Lives Matter tribute shirt worn by Arsenal captain Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang during the 2020-21 Premier League season is being donated to the Museum of London as part of its Collecting COVID project. The Black Lives Matter logo was added to all Premier League shirts following anti-racism protests across the globe earlier this year. Aubameyang – the latest Black player to captain Arsenal – said it was “an honour to have the opportunity to donate my Black Lives Matter shirt to the Museum of London’s Collecting COVID project”. “I hope this will be remembered as the moment that football stood against all forms of racism and that it will inspire young people for the future,” he said. The Collecting COVID project was launched in April this year with the aim of collecting objects relating to how Londoners lived during coronavirus pandemic. For more, see www.museumoflondon.org.uk/discover/museum-for-london-collecting-covid.











