Last night my Sis Jay of Epegamedia (http://www.epegamedia.com/ ) PR infvited me andsome friends to the latest addage to the Proud Dynasty of Upmarket but edgy Galleries on the King's Road!
Great space on the main road of one of London's most recognisable streets.
It was beautiful Photo Exhibition by Tom Hanley of beguiling life of Beatle John Lennon......
http://focushubcourses.com/blog/2010/10/john-lennon-tom-hanley-proud-chelsea/
My favourite photos from this great and illustrous Photogrpaher were of the Legend that is Jimi Hendrix!
Thursday, 25 November 2010
Jimi Hendrix Room At The Cumberland Hotel
On our 2012 Olympic accommodation trail seeing hotel rooms and setting up deals I went to the holy grail of bedrooms for me. Jimi Hendrix styled room at the Cumberland Hotel.
Exhausted from the rigours of touring, besieged by hangers-on, worn down by his own drug use and unsure of where his career was going next, Hendrix was in need of sanctuary.
In the four years that Hendrix lived in London, he would stay in any number of hotel rooms, furnished flats and boltholes.
He lived with his girlfriend Kathy Etchingham in a flat at 23 Brook Street – next door to the house where Handel had lived and where he composed Messiah – and once described it as "the only home I ever had".
But the Cumberland was his private redoubt – a place to which he would often retreat to find privacy – and to conduct his hectic and often complicated love-life.
As Keith Altham, a music journalist who became Hendrix's friend and confidante, puts it, the Cumberland was where Hendrix would go "for the purpose of meeting various young ladies when he wanted to keep away from the various other young ladies that he was seeing".
The hotel is also named on Hendrix's death certificate as his place of residence. He died on the morning of September 18 1970 from an overdose of barbiturates in the room of a girlfriend at the Hotel Samarkand in Lansdowne Crescent, Notting Hill.
Nowadays, the Cumberland is a luxury hotel, its reception area a huge expanse of marble and glass, bathed in lime-coloured light, with a Gary Rhodes restaurant attached. In Hendrix's day it was somewhat more louche, a favourite with rock musicians passing through London, with "running hot and cold hookers" in the bar, as Altham remembers.
To mark the 40th anniversary of Hendrix's death, the Cumberland Hotel has styled a special "Jimi Hendrix suite", on the same floor, the fifth – if not the same room – where the musician stayed.
An accurate reproduction of Hendrix's suite would probably be furnished with G-Plan furniture and a candlewick bedspread. Instead, the designers Mary Gannon and Cynthia Garcia have fashioned a contemporary version of the psychedelic Sixties, as they put it, to "capture the ethos of Hendrix, and ultimately be a sanctuary where Hendrix himself would enjoy spending time".
Primary-coloured op-art lines swirl across the ceiling; there are zebra-skin throws, fibre-optic lights, framed pages from the music papers of the period, and a huge mural of Hendrix by the artist Andie Airfix dominates one wall. It is a fun experience, if not exactly an authentic one, lent a particular poignancy by the film of Hendrix flickering on the large plasma television screen – "a little big to throw out of the window", as Garcia puts it, and by a tape of Hendrix's last-ever interview, which was conducted by Altham in the musician's suite on the afternoon of September 11, and which is available for guests to play.
Hendrix's voice echoes across the years – rambling, gnomic, amused. At the end of the interview, Altham asks whether he has now amassed enough money to be able to live exactly as he would like to.
"Ah, I don't think so," Hendrix replies. "Because, like, I want to get up in the morning and just roll over in my bed into an indoor swimming pool and then swim to the breakfast table, you know, come up for air and get maybe a drink of orange juice or something like that. Then just flop over from the chair into the swimming pool, swim into the bathroom, and you know, go and shave and whatever…"
You want to live luxuriously? Altham asks.
"No! Is that luxurious? I was thinking about a tent, maybe," Hendrix laughs, "overhanging a mountain stream."
A week later, he was dead.
In the four years that Hendrix lived in London, he would stay in any number of hotel rooms, furnished flats and boltholes.
He lived with his girlfriend Kathy Etchingham in a flat at 23 Brook Street – next door to the house where Handel had lived and where he composed Messiah – and once described it as "the only home I ever had".
But the Cumberland was his private redoubt – a place to which he would often retreat to find privacy – and to conduct his hectic and often complicated love-life.
As Keith Altham, a music journalist who became Hendrix's friend and confidante, puts it, the Cumberland was where Hendrix would go "for the purpose of meeting various young ladies when he wanted to keep away from the various other young ladies that he was seeing".
The hotel is also named on Hendrix's death certificate as his place of residence. He died on the morning of September 18 1970 from an overdose of barbiturates in the room of a girlfriend at the Hotel Samarkand in Lansdowne Crescent, Notting Hill.
Nowadays, the Cumberland is a luxury hotel, its reception area a huge expanse of marble and glass, bathed in lime-coloured light, with a Gary Rhodes restaurant attached. In Hendrix's day it was somewhat more louche, a favourite with rock musicians passing through London, with "running hot and cold hookers" in the bar, as Altham remembers.
To mark the 40th anniversary of Hendrix's death, the Cumberland Hotel has styled a special "Jimi Hendrix suite", on the same floor, the fifth – if not the same room – where the musician stayed.
An accurate reproduction of Hendrix's suite would probably be furnished with G-Plan furniture and a candlewick bedspread. Instead, the designers Mary Gannon and Cynthia Garcia have fashioned a contemporary version of the psychedelic Sixties, as they put it, to "capture the ethos of Hendrix, and ultimately be a sanctuary where Hendrix himself would enjoy spending time".
Primary-coloured op-art lines swirl across the ceiling; there are zebra-skin throws, fibre-optic lights, framed pages from the music papers of the period, and a huge mural of Hendrix by the artist Andie Airfix dominates one wall. It is a fun experience, if not exactly an authentic one, lent a particular poignancy by the film of Hendrix flickering on the large plasma television screen – "a little big to throw out of the window", as Garcia puts it, and by a tape of Hendrix's last-ever interview, which was conducted by Altham in the musician's suite on the afternoon of September 11, and which is available for guests to play.
Hendrix's voice echoes across the years – rambling, gnomic, amused. At the end of the interview, Altham asks whether he has now amassed enough money to be able to live exactly as he would like to.
"Ah, I don't think so," Hendrix replies. "Because, like, I want to get up in the morning and just roll over in my bed into an indoor swimming pool and then swim to the breakfast table, you know, come up for air and get maybe a drink of orange juice or something like that. Then just flop over from the chair into the swimming pool, swim into the bathroom, and you know, go and shave and whatever…"
You want to live luxuriously? Altham asks.
"No! Is that luxurious? I was thinking about a tent, maybe," Hendrix laughs, "overhanging a mountain stream."
A week later, he was dead.
Fabian Perez Art At Clarendon Fine Art Gallery
Oh where would we be without Xmas. On my way to an Art Exhibition to meet a lovely client from Polo Ralph Lauren I was caught in the throng on Bond Street that awaited the Xmas lights being turned on by Lisa Snowden. Using sidestepping skills that where most useful in my Rugger years ( oh how I miss those salad days) I managed to manoeuvre myselft through the crown to my destination private view at the Clarendon Artt Gallery in Dover St of new works by Fabian Perez, official artist to the Latin Grammy Awards, Vancouver Olympics and the London 2012 Olympics.
This important exhibition represents one of the largest and most diverse collections of Fabians' paintings ever to be shown in the country. It offers collectors a unique opportunity to acquire both new works and a small number of pieces from the artist's personal portfolio, at a time when his work is in huge demand.
This important exhibition represents one of the largest and most diverse collections of Fabians' paintings ever to be shown in the country. It offers collectors a unique opportunity to acquire both new works and a small number of pieces from the artist's personal portfolio, at a time when his work is in huge demand.
Passionate work, nice guy and thanks for the invite cousin Tayo x
Gorrillaz featuring De La Soul Concert, O2
November in previously years had been the lull month before the tsunami wave that is December in way of Events & Parties. But this year November has been busy with Client events, 2011/2012 Conference Planning and invites to some very interesting VIP Events. None so much as the Gorrillaz featuring De La Soul Concert.
I was honoured to be invited with VIP Backstage passes to one of the most futuristic and enchanting concerts I have ever been to. The vision of of genius songwriter & producer Damon Albarn along with artist and designer Jamie Christopher Hewlett is breathtaking. The songs were awesome, the cartoons were memerising and the After Party was delicious. Thanks Smiles (Manager of De La ) for your continued friendship & support. Shame the fog delayed the Boys flight back from Amsterdam so they missed a large part of the show. What a visionary collaboration it was though......Bobby Womack, Neneh Cherry & Brown from Farside to name the main - Good luck with the MONSTER tour and see you on the other side! Thanks for the love :-)
Sunday, 7 November 2010
Double Fireworks Nights ! Remember, remember the 5th of November!
As things have changed I have found more time to spend with some dear friends than I didnt have the opportunity to in years gone by. So Friday I was able to hook up with my good buddy Luc & his lovely girlfriend Constanza as they invited me to Ladbroke Sq in Notting Hill for a Fireworks display in ode of a poor ill fated Yorkshire man called Guido!!! WOW - what a memerising and enchanting time of the year this autumn is starting to become .....1st it was my Birthday, then a double Halloween week-end and now a double Guy Fawkes week-end. These superior quality residential squares really spend money on the fireworks. In the buisness we know that displays go for about £500 - £1,000 per minute. Geeez, it was almost 20 minutes a spectacular array of dreamlike kaleidoscopesque vividity. Beautiful! Then on Saturday eve I was once again invited to another great Fireworks display by mon ami Alex in Randolph Square....Awesome! I love fireworks. Something quite beguiling about low explosive pyrotechnics. Thank you 12th Century Chinamen for 1 of 4 of your great inventions. Thanks for the love Guys!!
Want to know more about Guido & his friends?
Guy Fawkes (13 April 1570 – 31 January 1606), also known as Guido Fawkes, the name he adopted while fighting for the Spanish in the Low Countries, belonged to a group of provincial English Catholics who planned the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605.
Fawkes was born and educated in York. His father died when Fawkes was eight years old, after which his mother married a recusant Catholic. Fawkes later converted to Catholicism and left for the continent, where he fought in the Eighty Years' War on the side of Catholic Spain against Protestant Dutch reformators. He travelled to Spain to seek support for a Catholic rebellion in England but was unsuccessful. He later met Thomas Wintour, with whom he returned to England.
Wintour introduced Fawkes to Robert Catesby, who planned to assassinate King James I and restore a Catholic monarch to the throne. The plotters secured the lease to an undercroft beneath the House of Lords, and Fawkes was placed in charge of the gunpowder they stockpiled there. Prompted by the receipt of an anonymous letter, the authorities searched Westminster Palace during the early hours of 5 November, and found Fawkes guarding the explosives. Over the next few days, he was questioned and tortured, and eventually he broke. Immediately before his execution on 31 January, Fawkes jumped from the scaffold where he was to be hanged and broke his neck, thus avoiding the agony of the drawing and quartering that followed.
Fawkes became synonymous with the Gunpowder Plot, which has been commemorated in England since 5 November 1605. His effigy is burned on a bonfire, often accompanied by a firework display
Fawkes was born and educated in York. His father died when Fawkes was eight years old, after which his mother married a recusant Catholic. Fawkes later converted to Catholicism and left for the continent, where he fought in the Eighty Years' War on the side of Catholic Spain against Protestant Dutch reformators. He travelled to Spain to seek support for a Catholic rebellion in England but was unsuccessful. He later met Thomas Wintour, with whom he returned to England.
Wintour introduced Fawkes to Robert Catesby, who planned to assassinate King James I and restore a Catholic monarch to the throne. The plotters secured the lease to an undercroft beneath the House of Lords, and Fawkes was placed in charge of the gunpowder they stockpiled there. Prompted by the receipt of an anonymous letter, the authorities searched Westminster Palace during the early hours of 5 November, and found Fawkes guarding the explosives. Over the next few days, he was questioned and tortured, and eventually he broke. Immediately before his execution on 31 January, Fawkes jumped from the scaffold where he was to be hanged and broke his neck, thus avoiding the agony of the drawing and quartering that followed.
Fawkes became synonymous with the Gunpowder Plot, which has been commemorated in England since 5 November 1605. His effigy is burned on a bonfire, often accompanied by a firework display
Tuesday, 2 November 2010
Silverstone Driving Experience
We do some good business with the F1 Circuit and have been especially fond of the people we do GP business with at the Silverstone Circuit. So it was great when Felicity and I got an invitation to the Circuit by Claudia and the team to learn more about the new and ever improving Silverstone Circuit near Banbury. This we have to remember is where Grand Prix racing 1st began. But we must also not forget that the 800 acred Silverstone circuit is also has a new futuristic Start/Finish Hospitality Building under construction ( ready in May 2011) that doubles as a 4,000 delegates Conference space, a Car Rally Driving circuits as well as Moto GP & Moto Cross tracks.
It was a very early start but my was it worth it! Afte a fast train ( 35 mins) from Euston to Milton Keynes then a taxi drift to Silverstone we were warmly welcomed by Claudia & Helen into the Stowe Enclosure for bacon sarnies and coffee. After an induction and update by ex Drivers Mike & Steve we were given the grand tour of the Garages,
Control Room & British Racing Drivers' Club where the likes of legends such as Stirling Moss &
Graham Hill, as well as Stars like Lewis Hamilton, David Coultard & Jenson Button were honoured for their services to racing!
There I stood on the podium thinking of what it must have taken to reach this spot on a race day. Since the 1900s mad hatters aka Petrolheads had dedicated their time, and in some instances lives, to the thrill of speed. When I was given a Le Mans styled stick shift red Ferrari F430 to drive 10 times around the circuit I knew why they did it!
Well done Felicity for beating all us Guys and recording a better circuit time - But it's
only because your Dad was top Rally Driver & you have the inside story from a couple of F1 GP Champions. But fair dues " A win's a win!"
Myyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy - what a buzz, what an experience, what great memories.
Thinking of a gift for a loved one or a prize for clients or employees? Then look no further! You couldn't go wrong with signing them up for the Silverstone Experience.
Their moto included Passsion, Safety, Innovation & Constant Improvement .......now I know exactly what the mean! Seeing is believing!
Thanks Claudia, Mike, Helen, Chris, Steve & the Silverstone Crew for an awesome day out!
I WANT A RARI! ;-)
Monday, 1 November 2010
Halloween 2010 is massive in UK
Wow I didn't realise until this past week-end how massive Halloween is in the UK. After years and years of relentless marketing from US ( think of Jason & Halloween) the UK has given herself fully like an initially unwilling bride of Count Dracula on the night after the big day ;-)
Well this year I was lucky enough to go to both Home House and Soho House Halloween Parties on consecutive nights with some good friens. Man o man what larks we had. And I wasn't even drunk. People went to so much effort with their costumes and themes. The costume that still scares me the most is seeing 2 different Osama Bin Ladens on both nights!
London was awash with blood, gore and fangs.......loved it!!!
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