I’ve just had the sad task of adding an obituary to the website of one of my clients. I first met Robert in 2003 when I designed the website for Metapraxis, the company he founded. In 2005 he approached me again to design a website for a book that he had written developing a new theory on the location of Homer’s Ithaca – Odysseus Unbound. Although I didn’t know him well, I liked him from the first time we met. He was a man of boundless energy and a true inspiration.

I’ve now been twice to see the Eric Ravilious exhibition at the Dulwich Picture Gallery. I love his work, particularly the watercolours of the chalk downland and chalk hill figures. But I find his depiction of the Cerne Abbas Giant extremely puzzling. The giant is painted brown, rather than gleaming chalk white. Read more…

LinkedIn has just reminded me that it’s 18 years since I’ve been working as a freelance website designer. And that reminded me that it’s 20 years since I made my first website – for the audio visual production company that I had at that time with my business partner Darryl Johnson. I can remember having loads of fun getting my head around table layouts and frames and probably loads of other things that would be anathema to web standards today. The first browser I used would have been Mosaic, but Netscape came along in 1994 and that’s the one I was using when I made the website in 1995. It’s quite amazing how far the web has come in just those few years.

A couple of days ago I went to the Victoria and Albert Museum to see the medieval galleries. Many years ago I photographed some of the objects in the collection for a wide-screen audio visual programme at the English Romanesque Art 1066-1200 exhibition at the Hayward Gallery in 1984. This included the mitre which is thought to have belonged to Thomas Becket. Being allowed to handle that was a real thrill. The programme mainly depicted the architecture of the period, and I spent many days photographing some of the best Romanesque buildings in the country, including Durham cathedral where we were given a key and told “This key opens any door in the building – make yourselves at home”. Read more…

The lobby of the Lloyds TSB Bank at 222 Strand, London is a wonderful display of art nouveau tiling by Doulton painted by J H McLennan. Formerly a restaurant and built originally as the Palsgrove Hotel, this is the work of the architect G Cuthbert, and dates from 1883. Read more…

Last weekend I completed my walk along the Regent’s Canal starting at the Islington Tunnel and going to where it meets the Thames at the Limehouse Basin. Read more…

No one knows when the ‘Obby ‘Oss festival, which takes place on the 1st of May (or the 2nd if the 1st is on a Sunday) every year in Padstow, Cornwall, started. The earliest written reference to it is in about 1800, but it’s likely that the festival dates back to much earlier times and is probably related to Celtic Spring rituals.

The celebrations start at midnight the night before when the Night Song is sung to the landlord of the Golden Lion Inn. The next morning, with the town decorated with branches of green leaves, bluebells and cowslips, the children’s parade, with smaller sized, colt ‘Osses, starts at about 8.00am. The Day Song is accompanied by drums and accordions.

Unite and unite and let us all unite,
For summer is a come unto day,
And whither we are going we will all unite,
In the merry morning of May. Read more…

Earlier this week I drove up to the very north of Cornwall to photograph and make 360° panoramas of the churches at Morwenstow and Kilkhampton. They have some of the earliest features still to be seen on any Cornish church, both having Norman arches to the south door. In the case of Morwenstow a second Norman arch (reused from another church) was added when the porch was built, probably in the 15th century. Three bays of the north aisle also have Norman arches with zig-zag moulding.

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And to wind up a few very busy weeks, a complete redesign of Performance & Wellbeing‘s website has just ‘gone live’.

PaW commissioned illustrator James Oses to produce a set of drawings for the site. These give a light touch and are a welcome relief from the more typical stock library photos that are all too common on small business websites.

I’ve just completed a redesign for The Alliance’s website. The new site has been made using WordPress and is based on the Smart theme by ThinkUp. It’s been heavily customised using a child theme and some extra bits in the functions.php file. The site is fully responsive and has been tested on various screen sizes, platforms and devices. It’s been a very nice project to work on.