One Word: Gastrotypographicalassemblage (two other words:Wall Art and Graffitti)

Lou Dorfsman designexhibition at the Kemistry Gallery to start off the London Design Festival.

I was very dissapointed that they didn't actually have a portion of the wall there, but instead they had a half scale print out on the wall.

And now a tour of East London's graffitti and celebrated wall art (this is starting out at Old Street)! This is where a lot of Banksy's original pieces were done, however, they since been tagged over or removed.

I could have used a cup of tea...

Accidentally made my way to Spitalfields Market. It worked out quite nice though as Friday is fashion day, and I got a cheap dress and scarf! I also found a bench outside of the market to eat my absolutley delicious b.l.t. sandwich (real crispy bacon, not that uncooked crap they have on all the other British b.l.t.'s) and pickle. The best lunch I've had since I've been here.

Somewhere off of Brick Lane

This looks like a really mad pacman.

The pink car used to be park of a Banksy exhibit. Now the car is in a glass box.

Some ground art as well...

So I did not realize that Brick Lane was like Little India. Even all of the street signs were in Arabic and it reaked of curry smell!

see...(I entered Brick Lane from Hanbury Street, and I felt like if you turned right off of Hanbury, you ended up in India, and if you turned left, you got more into the artsy and somewhat risky part of Brick Lane).

A turn into the more artsy part...

This looks like something out of Mario Brothers to me...but more evil!

London Design Festival starts tomorrow and goes on for 9 days. They have a few exhibits that opened today though, and one of them is Gastrotypographicalassemblage-a Lou Dorfsman exhibit. Lou Dorfsman was a designer who spent 40 years at CBS designing their advertising and corporate identity. One of his greatest works was the 35 foot wide, 8 1/2 foot tall wooden hand cut typographic wall that spread the length of the canteen wall and spelled out words related to eating/food. It was completed in 1966. I was hoping they had part of the wall at the exhibit, but it's apparently undergoing a large restoration process after being in storage since the 1990's.

From the exhibit, I found a beacon of light to my hungry stomach-or more a bacon of light! A corner deli called "B.L.T. Deli". It was only about a 10x10 space, and the inside was so packed with people, that you had to queue up outside, then when you get in, they make you yell out your order so they can make as many at one time. I got the most delicious bacon sandwich that reminded me of one I would get at Central Market. Annnnnndd, I got a real pickle (not one of these sweet cucumbers parading as a pickle). It was amazing.

After a quick walk through Spitalfields market and the surrounding shops, I made my way to Brick Lane. I was under the impression it would be really arty with cool-off hand boutique shops. But it seemed more like just curry shops. I did find a few cool places going down the opposite way from the string of curry shops and mosques, but it wasn't as exciting as I had hoped. But it did have great graffitti and wall art. I tried to get back to Old Street at this point, and accidentally took the wrong way down Commercial Street getting to Aldgate East tube stop instead (it's not even on a real line that I could get to Old Street from). I finally made it back to Old Street tube stop and made my way back to Bob's. Definitely a great day for graffitti!