Victoria & Albert Museum

It's a new day and we're near London! After a hearty breakfast at the hotel, we head out to the Victoria & Albert Museum. This requires us to take the train and so off to Slough Station we go to catch a train to Paddington Station. This station still impresses me with it's shear size and ornamental ironwork . . and I wasn't the only one.


While Lisa was photographing the station David was attempting to explain to me what trains and times we were going to catch to get where we wanted to go

I always have been rubbish with directions.

We hop a few trains and the Underground puts us right at an entrance. So in we proceed. Now, by way of explanation, Victoria & Albert Museum is HUGE and since we needed to cover it in 3 hours or less we needed to pick and choose our exhibits. First things first . . Clothing! The lighting was less than optimal for my non-flash camera and so several of the pictures turned out very dark . . photoshop might be able to help or it might not, I'm still experimenting.


On our way towards the next exhibit we passed by Statuary and HAD to stop in as the sculptures in these rooms are more than impressive. Besides, Danielle figured more research could be done on clothing using the sculptures.


The Jewelry exhibit was next but on our way we passed through the miniature portraits exhibit.


We passed from portraits into the new Jewelry exhibition and it was fabulous. I started out trying to photograph the pieces that were appropriate for American Civil War era, but was quickly told that photography was not allowed in this exhibition so I had to attempt to remember what I was seeing. This was a much harder task than it would seem as the exhibition had so many great pieces not only from that time period but from across several time periods. As we sat down at one of the computers to learn more about some of the pieces we had seen, we were told that our umbrellas were not allowed in the exhibit either and therefore we were asked to leave. Hmm . . wonder why the guy telling me about the camera didn't mention it? We were a little flustered but we were done with the press of people that had gathered into that small space and as we left the exhibition from the opposite door from where we came in we saw the little signs notifying us of no photography, no bags, no umbrellas, etc. Hmm .. wonder why the guy who watched us walk into the exhibition from the portrait gallery didn't say anything and why there weren't any signs posted there? Ah well, onward and upward.

By happenstance, leaving Jewelry we ended up near textiles and so we HAD to see it. After all, we'd heard so much about it. What we'd heard didn't begin to do it justice. Here is a room where they have fabric, clothing pieces, lace pieces and any other kind of textile you can imagine in glass trays and they allow you to take them out and photograph them for the purpose of research. What was going to be a 15 minute side trip turned into something closer to an hour and would have gone longer if David hadn't been insistent that we see ANYTHING else but what was in that room.


We'd overextended our time and so we needed to head to the British Museum. But before we headed back onto the train, we opted to get something to eat from the cafeteria area at V&A.

For all the pictures that we took at V&A you can watch the slideshow below. Please note that some of the pictures will appear black, but there is something there and as I work with lightening the photos I'll post the repaired ones. Thanks for your understanding.