Freightliners Farm
A recent trip to Islington for lunch with some friends afforded the perfect opportunity for a visit to Freightliners Farm. As it happens, I used to live about 200 metres from this farm many, many years ago, but back then my leisure-time priorities were different and I never made it through the gate. Now, with the little man in tow, it just didn’t seem fair to pass by without having a look.
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Hackney City Farm
Pigs, goats, donkeys and sheep, just a few yards from Hackney Road? Yes, that’s right. This week we went to visit the popular Hackney City Farm.
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Wellcome Collection (are you incurably curious?)
The Wellcome Collection bills itself as a “free destination for the incurably curious”, which is possibly the cleverest tagline for a museum/gallery that I’ve ever seen. Being of a curious persuasion myself (then again, how many people would admit that they’re not?), as soon as I read about the Wellcome Collection it went straight to the top of my “to visit” list. And so we went along to see how it shapes up as a destination for curious babydaytrippers…
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Horniman Museum and Gardens
I have to declare an interest in the subject of this week’s post: the Horniman is my local museum and my son and I have spent many a happy hour there. Behind its attractive Arts and Crafts exterior, this quirky South London museum houses the eclectic collections of the tea merchant and philanthropist, Frederick John Horniman. With 16 acres of gardens, an aquarium, and its famous, stuffed Victorian Walrus (yes, really), the Horniman Museum is a great, family-friendly destination.
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Spitalfields City Farm
Mention Brick Lane and you might be thinking about curries, trendy boutiques, vibrant nightlife or the famous 24-hour bagel shop. Or at least I do, but maybe that’s a sign of a misspent youth. When I’m in the area these days, I’m less likely to be found checking out a new bar, and more likely to be taking a short detour down a side street to the Spitalfields City Farm…
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Crystal Palace Park
After our successful trip to Greenwich Park a couple of weeks ago, this week we set off to explore another of London’s fantastic, green spaces: Crystal Palace Park. Although the Crystal Palace that gave the area its name is long gone, the Park retains a number of quirky attractions that make it worth a visit.
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V&A Museum of Childhood
Dogtanian and the Three Muskehounds. SuperTed. Sooty and Sweep. He-Man. Care Bears.
If these names fill you with nostalgia for the toys, books and TV programmes of your youth then you will love a trip down memory lane at the Museum of Childhood. An outpost of the V&A situated in Bethnal Green, the Museum unites the V&A’s collection of items relating to childhood, both antique and modern.
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Geffrye Museum, Hoxton
Interested in interior design? Then a trip to the Geffrye Museum of the Home could be for you. Located on Kingsland Road in Hoxton, just a stone’s throw from the City of London, the Geffrye Museum’s permanent display consists of eleven rooms decorated in the style of different periods from 1600 to the present day. The museum shows how the changing lifestyle of the urban middle classes in Britain over the past 400 years affected the design of their homes, complete with furniture and artefacts from each era. We visited during the Geffrye’s ‘Christmas Past’ exhibition, for which the period rooms had been decorated to demonstrate how the festive season was celebrated throughout the ages.
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