I walk a lot; the best way to experience a city. So it’s sometimes to do with the way places join up. This cast concrete letterform is a part of the Lycée’s gateway. Each of the form’s facets arrives at a different character, so six possible letters come from each cast object. I’ve never been inside the Lycée but always walked through this way up to the V&A, in order to examine again and again how each form works. The surfaces set the tone for the V&A and its incredible Ceramics floor, a perennial inspiration.
Website
vam.ac.uk
Address
ycée Français Charles De Gaulle / V&A Ceramics Display, Cromwell Road, London, United Kingdom
Current city: London
Peter Nencini came to London in 1992, to study at the Royal College of Art. Aside from a three-year interlude working in Brussels, he stayed put. A designer and educator, he has worked across print and television for clients such as the New York Times and the BBC. More recently, he has gravitated towards editioned and exhibited work in ceramic, fabric, wood and metal — with a bonding interest in the space between typographic and figurative form. An interview about his work, with Ryan G. Nelson for the Walker Art Center, can be read here. His editioned box and wall works are currently showing at Partners & Spade, New York.
 

More Places in London 471

A treasure trove in the The City of London. The Archive of London. Strongrooms hold kilometres of shelving; boxes of matter that has somehow been catalogued and categorised in a traceable manner by the public, for academic, genealogical and other research. This beautiful book is from a box on Epping Forest. On the same visit, I looked through photographs of Blitz singsongs in Bethnal Green Underground station, 1980s anti-Thatcher / pro-GLC gig posters and paper concertina optical models of the Crystal Palace.
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Posted by Mike Guppy
I grew up in the countryside, and if you're ever in need some instant escape from the city, this place is like a time warp. It's a huge space full of over grown mausoleums and graves, feels like a movie set. They also do tours.
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The best live jazz band I ever heard was at a packed out night in Brilliant Corners. I was happy to be squashed.
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My favourite restaurant as the moment which was a former boxing hall. You sit on the old spectating seats and get served butter chicken on pine cones which infuse their flavour into the food. A really different experience.
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Being down on the underground can be quite stressful and draining, but if you have the chance to look up and into the details that has gone into the tiling of the platforms and stations you might start to see some beauty down there. A lot of stations has bespoke tiles and decorations, almost a century old. Bethnal Green station is one of a handful in London to have been given a very specific additional decoration to the classic cream tiles and name strip. Easy to miss, but dotted around the station are a series of tiles with raised motifs on them, representing aspects of London and places that the Underground visited. Or for typographers: check the type on Hampstead station or Holloway Road for some inspiration.
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