Culture Category

29/12/2025

Henry Purcell, composer

Henry Purcell‘s (1659-95) destiny was unsurprising in direction, though meteoric in impact on the musical sphere of…

03/09/2025

The British Museum

Preservation, protection, research, enlightenment and understanding of the world’s history and cultures are all found in one…

04/01/2025

London Fashion Week

The youngest of the ‘Big Four’ Fashion Weeks ~ the others being New York City (1943), Milan…

28/12/2024

Well Dressing

Thankful appreciation of freshwater supply probably began with nature-worshipping Pagans. It took the form of Well Dressing…

11/06/2024

Haggis

In times past, when tribal societies killed their own food animals, it made sense to use as…

22/03/2024

Listed Buildings

Since its inception in 1882, the designation of ‘Listed Building‘ has been applied to all shapes, sizes…

10/01/2024

Tea on the lawn

The British tend to make the most of the limited number of dry, tranquil summer days and,…

04/12/2023

Burials and cremations

In the Christian era, churchyards became the place to bury the dead, with proceedings conducted by the…

17/09/2023

Punch & Judy

A mixture of pantomime, horror and absurdity, the Punch & Judy show in its portable format has…

01/03/2023

‘New Musical Express’ and ‘Melody Maker’

The world’s first weekly newspaper entirely devoted to music, ‘Melody Maker‘ (MM), began in 1926 and ended…

21/01/2023

The Crystal Palace

The Crystal Palace (a.k.a. ‘the Palace of the People’) began as a glass-walled, modular, 3-storey hall-cum-greenhouse in…

18/12/2022

Gretna Green

“We two matched for mating Came, handclasped, at last, Where the blacksmith was waiting To fetter us…