A trip to Koskela in our 'fancy silber car'

I've never been into cars at all. We have an old car. It goes. I put petrol in it. It goes some more. All good. However, for better or worse, things have now changed...

Thanks to the generous folks at Ford and Kidspot, I have been driving around in a brand spanking new Ford Focus Titanium* for the last few weeks (and the next few too). I was all ready to continue being unimpressed with cars but the technology in this one is pretty darn incredible.... and now I'm kind of smitten...



+ It reverse parks itself! seriously. That blew my mind. It finds you a space and then the steering wheel is taken over by some kind of parking god. ta da! Hello tight spot. Bye-bye embarrassing parking attempts.

+ I can literally just say the command and it will call who I want to call via Bluetooth, play music on the stereo and probably do lots of other things that I haven't discovered yet too.

+ When it rains, the windscreen wipers just go! No flicking on and off of that damned lever. That's some kind of magic right there.

+ It tells me how to get places! I am thoroughly enjoying not having to juggle imaps and the steering wheel at once... and the rest of the driving nation is probably relieved too!

So... it turns out I been living under a technological rock when it comes to cars! Who would have thought that it could actually be an enjoyable experience to drive around the city?!?! I'm thinking this may be a problem when I have to drive our old rust box around again but for now I'm just going to roll with it.

Our little trio took a drive to Koskela to see the Beci Orpin exhibition (more about that in a post to follow) and have a little peruse around the amazing (but sadly too pricey for our pockets) homewares on show.



We ended the day by driving to centennial park for a scoot (the cub did the scooting) and an ice-cream. Thanks for the ride 'fancee silber car'




*'fancy silber car' is what the cub calls our new wheels. He loves getting in it (no battles. Yay!) which makes me love it all the more.  

This post is one of three written as part of Ford Australia's 'Choose Your Own Adventure' challenge (in conjunction with Kidspot, Voices of 2013). I was not paid to write this post nor was I told what to write. But, I was given a swish car to drive around in for 6 weeks which is proving pretty nice!

An exhibition : 'Paper' at the Saatchi Gallery, London

The Saatchi Gallery is one of my favourite London art spots. Always full of such interesting and unique contemporary works with what feels like very little art snobbery (despite it being owned by a ridiculously rich man and being in the middle of a very fancy pants part of london!)



Obviously, after finding out that there was an exhibition on Paper artworks while we were in London, we had to go there! It was full of some amazing works by an entirely new barrel of paper wizards (new to me only, probably quite well-known in the world of art) - both paper sculptors and those simply working 'on' paper.



My favourite piece of the exhibition was Marcelo Jácome’s Planos-Pipas (‘kite-planes’ in the artist’s native Portugese). Filling up a whole room, you could duck under and walk around and get totally lost in it's colourful brilliance. It was made of just bamboo, paper and thread and felt like it was just happily floating in space. Needless to say, I spent awhile in that there room!

Another highlight was the paper cut trees series by Japanese artist, Yuken Teruya. He converted a whole range of paper bags (varying from a McDonalds takeaway bag to a Louis Vuitton shopping bag) and painstakingly cut out intricate little trees from them. The result was a series of almost private lightboxes mounted on the wall at eye level. The shadows cast by the trees were almost as great as the little figures they came from too. Truly beautiful and ridiculously ornate.







The exhibition is on until 3rd November 2013 (it looks better in real life than in my below average photos)
The Saatchi Gallery is located 5 minutes walk from Sloane Square station

The Wind Portal Installation // Najla El Zein

This stunning installation by Lebanese artist and designer, Najla El Zein, was commissioned by the V&A museum for the 2013 London Design Festival. The 5,000 (hand folded!) paper windmills are joined together in strands to create an incredible 8 metre high gate that in combination with the provided (artificial) breeze, spin and whir as you walk through it.




It is not actually a physical gate but more of an optical illusion. It appears from a distance as a wall of paper that as you approach it seems to open up to let you through (apparently this is a effect known as 'trompe l'oeil'). The exhibit is a fabulous combination of very clever design and divine construction.




All images via Najla El Zein
The exhibit will be at the V&A until 3rd November 2013. Catch it if you can!