From Magna to Manga

We started Tuesday at a charming creperie called Mamie's. Although we sat there for ten minutes before we even got menus (part of the delay was due to a staff member who seemed to be having a diabetic episode, so we couldn't be too indignant about it), we would definitely recommend this place. I had a smoked salmon galette, which we learned is a savory pancake made with buckwheat flour, and Jon had a very decadent dessert crepe. We are adults and we will eat dessert for lunch if we please!

We then headed off to the House of Illustration, stopping first at the new Google office nearby:

It was as Googley as we expected it to be.

We were very disappointed to learn that wasn't a slide.

View from the 11th floor terrace. The building all the way to the right is St. Pancras Station;
the white, round structure to its left is King's Cross Station.

The House of Illustration is a small gallery with rotating exhibits. We saw an exhibit on background illustrations and concepts for Japanese anime--specifically those focused on Japanese architecture-- including two Ghost in the Shell movies, Patlabor, and Metropolis (there wasn't actually any manga in the exhibit but I am too pleased with my title to consider facts). We weren't supposed to take pictures, but...I did. Since this blog is for an audience of approximately three people I figured there wasn't much harm done. The grouping of illustrations by film is based on memory, so I might be wrong on some of them.

Ghost in the Shell:

Each layer of the background is an actual separate layer of paper.

Close-up: each  post/bar structure is its own, tiny layer!

I like this a lot because it looks like it's upside-down.

 



Patlabor:

 These line drawings took me back to my hand drafting classes:

The second exhibit was "Quentin Blake: The Life of Birds," curated by Blake himself. Quentin Blake did all the illustrations for Roald Dahl's books. He has also drawn a lot of birds doing people things.

“I have always liked drawing birds. I can't quite explain why but it may be because like us, they are on two legs and have expressive gestures. It's a way of commenting on the people we see around us without actually drawing individuals.”

As you may know, I am not such a fan of birds, but Quentin warmed me up to them:

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I really like this one! It reminds me of "Frog and Toad,"
and I also really like the idea of a bird reporter interviewing an arrogant, famous bird.

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 And I love this guy in particular:

The last exhibit was about Jacqueline Ayer, a 1960s illustrator and designer who was heavily influenced by her visits to Thailand and made the Thai aesthetic popular in British fashion.

After our visit at the House of Illustration, we went to the British Library, primarily for the "Treasures of the British Library Gallery." The gallery includes literature, music, science, religion, and historic documents--lots of super old things but some newer things as well. It was a climate controlled, dimly lit area to preserve all the Very Old Things, so no photos, but below is a list of highlights (many of the images are also on the British Library website):

• A letter from Queen Victoria to Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone. They did not get along very well but they both hated women's rights, and this letter was essentially Vicky complaining about women wanting equality and whatnot.
• Early editions of Shakespeare's poetry.
• A lot of original copies of music, from Chopin to the soundtrack of Four Weddings and a Funeral.
• Handwritten Beatles lyrics for "Michelle," "She Said, She Said," and "Ticket to Ride," which John Lennon scribbled on the back of a card for Julian's first birthday. Poor Julian. There was also a rambling letter John Lennon wrote to Stuart Sutcliffe (original bassist for The Beatles) after he died of a brain hemorrhage at the age of 21. It was mostly indecipherable but still very sad.
• The original manuscript of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Sonnet 43 ("How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.") This was especially cool because there was a pretty small overlap in the categories of "super old and famous things" and "things written in an English that modern people can understand." 
• The original manuscript of Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles.
• The Codex Sinaiticus, one of the two earliest Christian Bibles, produced in the middle of the fourth century.
• An early manuscript of the gospel of John, produced in the third century.
• A letter from Ada Lovelace (who I did not realize/had forgotten was Lord Byron's daughter!) to Charles Babbage from 1843; it was the first time that the principle of computer programming had been set down in writing.
• A 1550 letter from Michelangelo to his nephew, sharing his wisdom about getting a wife. He advised his nephew not to worry about a dowry or beauty, especially since he was "not the most handsome youth in Florence."
• One of the original four copies of the Magna Carta--this had its own room. The text is all on a single piece of large parchment.

You could also listen to recordings of some of the music featured, from the Hallelujah chorus to "Michelle."

The building itself is also quite lovely:

Before heading home, Jon insisted that we go into Kings Cross Station to see Platform 9 3/4--the made-up platform featured in the Harry Potter series. Jon never even finished the books so I'm still not quite sure why it was such a priority for him, but Kings Cross Station is at least cool looking:

This was the line to get your picture taken at the platform:

So we just snuck around the side and took our own picture. For the non-Harry Potter readers, Platform 9 3/4 is the mystical magical secret platform for wizards to take to get on the train to wizarding school, and wizards can enter it by running full speed into the wall--hence the suitcase/trolley sticking halfway out of the wall.

 That night we ate dinner at Barrafina, a Spanish tapas restaurant that was easily our favorite meal from our 2015 trip. Thankfully they were still serving a lot of our favorite dishes and the staff was still incredibly friendly. We had crab croquetas, pintxos morunos (seasoned pork on a skewer, it was so tender and juicy and flavorful I actually almost cried, that is a fact), braised ox tongue, artichokes and alioli, and the most excellent dessert of milhojas:

On the left you can see that we also had flan. We gobbled it up pretty quickly.

Seriously, if you're ever in London and are only able to do one thing for some reason, just have a meal at Barrafina. We can't say enough good things about it.

There you go! Our day that included Magna (Carta) and Manga (which was actually anime).

xo

Hannah