Now that I’ve finally finished sorting some stuff out for the School of Design’s 2017 Degree Show, I took a few days off to relax, during which I made a trip to Saltaire to take a few photos and get out of the hectic air of the city. Saltaire is only fifteen minutes outside Leeds and is currently protected as a UNESCO World Heritage Site due to it’s history and pretty, quaint appearance.
I arrived in the car, which my parents had left me whilst they went on holiday, and began to meander through the pretty repetitive rows of houses towards the centre of the village.
From the centre I headed down towards the mill, but as the time remaining without rain was limited I thought I better explore the outdoor areas before heading inside. Down the road and after crossing the river there’s a lovely park area where you can sit by the river with an ice cream, but the British weather wasn’t in the mood for cooperating on that particular day…
Wandering a little more, I soon made a friend in a Canadian goose which was wandering through, but as the clouds continued to roll in I soon headed back up the hill towards the church and the mill. For those who aren’t familiar with the history of Saltaire, pretty much the whole village was built in 1851 by Titus Salt, who used his surname alongside the name of the River Aire.
Built around the old textile mill, Salt created the neat rows of pretty housing for the millworkers, and included buildings such as a town hall, community rooms, and a beautiful church – which I wound up visiting after tiptoeing around a family of geese which had invaded the churchyard…
After this I hopped over the road and paid the huge mill a visit, which is now split into four floors of cafés, shops and exhibition spaces. Whilst there I stumbled on the current exhibition of work by David Hockney, the famous artist who hails from Saltaire’s neighbour, Bradford.
After a lovely stroll around, and a huge salad from the café where Hockney had designed the print on the menus, I eventually called it a day and headed back to Leeds. Feeling somewhat refreshed, I am now in the throes of preparing my portfolio and rehearsing my presentation for my final piece of marked university work ever tomorrow… Wish me luck!
So after my trip down to the south of Spain, and ending in Granada where I ended my last blog post on a bus, I did indeed head back northwards to visit my capital and second home. Once I’d landed in the bus station I hopped straight onto the Metro and headed into the heart of the city to bed down in my hostel for the night.
The next day I set about doing some of the things I really miss about living in Madrid, starting the day off in a bar with a coffee and some tomato coated bread. After this I headed up to Chueca to buy a few bits and bobs and explore some of my favourite shops, including a chocolate boutique, a disco lighting specialist, and a tacky shirt shop. Soon though, and with a lightbulb holder, chocolate selection and new shirt in tow, I headed down to the south of the city to visit the design centre in the Matadero – one of my old haunts.
Once I’d had my fill of tinto de verano (a drink similar to sangria) and a snoop around the exhibitions, I headed back for the sunny centre to grab some awesome pizza on the roof of one of the buildings, where I also splashed out on a drink and admired the views of the city below.
After a relaxing evening of tacos with old friends, the next day I head eastward on my way to visit the team at Erretres for a catch up and to head out for some lunch as we always did last year. I ended up taking it so easy through the picturesque gardens of the royal palace in the sun that I rocked up pretty late – I guess I switched to Spanish time…
Arriving back at the office was lovely, with plenty to catch up on in my gradually worsening Spanish. Once I’d had a snoop at a few ongoing projects and had a laugh about a translation quip, we all eventually headed out to the nearby cafe where I spent many a Thursday when working with the team on my year in industry.
After a lovely meal I had to leave everyone to get on with their work, and so I headed down one stop of the Metro to have an ice cream by the lake and just watch the world go by for a while.
The day which proceeded was very lazy, but after all my travels around the south I felt like I’d earned a break. Many cañas and tapas later I found myself having a beer in the park which overlooks the east of the city, watching the sun go down before heading back into the centre for some food.
All too soon it was my last day in Madrid once more, and so I grabbed my camera and went exploring after settling for some beers for the evening. In the evening I wound up down in the south of the city, where I had some lovely tacos and found some street art along the way – as well as discovering an old ruin of a building which I’d never stumbled across before!
The first thing the next morning I had to grab a Cercanías train to the airport and soon found myself flying over France with a glass of overpriced red wine in hand. Since then I’ve been busily away with my final university project, but there’ll be a few more updates over the coming weeks as things like my final year degree show inch slowly closer…
Okay so this post has a weird title, but I shall proceed to explain. About a week or so ago, whilst on my placement with Elmwood, I began to sketch some initial ideas for a new typeface which I’ve had as an idea at the back of my mind for a while now. The typeface’s working title is Goddess (hence the title of the blog post), and the current plan is that it will become the new typeface which I use for all my personal projects – including my website!
As you can see from the photo, I have been building the letters (which are all non-final at present) using simple shapes with a compass and pencil. This process was inspired by one of the greats of typography design, Eric Gill. The sketches below were used to build the typeface which bears his name, Gill Sans, and to me they are objects of exceptional beauty (which may be a little bit sad, but I can deal with that).
For those unfamiliar with the design of typefaces I should explain from where comes the trouble I have been having with the rounded letters, which I can simplify down to two reasons. Firstly, they have to extend slightly above and below the line due to the way the human eye perceives the height of rounded shapes compared to straight-edges ones, and that’s been a nightmare to account for. Secondly, round letters like o should not ever be perfectly circular as they otherwise appear too wide – however if you just simply try to squash a circle a little it begins to look deformed, so I have spent quite some time working on how to make letters like c, d, o, and e look just right.
As you can see with my red pen I am making minor changes as I go, as typeface design takes a good while – just imagine you have 26 letters, double that for capitals, then add numbers, punctuation, an array of special characters (such as the Ñ for Spanish above) for other languages, and much more – all of which has to be designed carefully to flow properly. A right royal nightmare.
I’ll keep you up to date as I begin to make more progress on the typeface as the weeks go by, especially once I begin to start digitising copies – thus far all the work has been done on pen and paper. I love working like this as it makes me much less precious about finer details, and I can adjust and connect curves in a way which just isn’t possible on a screen.
Long live the paper, pencil and compass – even if I have stabbed myself inadvertently a few times with it. Blood, sweat, and tears will have indeed gone into creating this damn font.
After hopping on a bus from Seville to Granada, I wound up landing in my third city mid-afternoon, whereupon I immediately set about finding my hostel. Once there my fifteen minute nap turned into three hours of shut-eye, and so I had to drag myself out of bed after dark and try and find someplace to eat in this new city!
After wandering in a loop for a while (not that I was complaining, the city is beautiful), I found a little Venezuelan restaurant near my hostel and grabbed myself an arepa before heading back to bed to prepare for the next day, where my plan was to visit the unmissable (oh the irony) Alhambra.
Wandering the streets early in a morning
With a bus back up to Madrid booked for 7pm that same day I knew I didn’t have time to faff around, and so made a beeline for the hill atop which sits the Alhambra palace complex. Anyone unfamiliar with it can begin to appreciate the beauty of the palace/fortress with a quick Google search.
Anyway, so I managed to find one of the few roads which lead up the ridiculously steep incline to the entrance, and began my trek hauling the entirety of my possessions for the trip in my backpack once again.
The walk up to the entrance was much longer than expected and a lot more gruelling than I had predicted, but the views were lovely and the sun was out so I wasn’t for complaining. Once I arrived at the entrance though I had the shock of my life – there were no tickets left! Let this be a warning to anyone wanting to visit the Alhambra – book tickets online months in advance or risk being left out in the cold (well, extreme heat, but you know what I mean).
Slightly deflated I sat down and ate some crisps for a bit, before deciding that for the rest of the day I fancied a spot of bar hopping, in order to see more of the city centre and enjoy some refreshing beers and snacks as I went. I began at a bar at the foot of the hill, and soon found myself in the city centre, full of cheese and chorizo and a few cañas for good measure.
Around mid afternoon I sat down for a spot of lunch, ordering once again a menú del día, after which I just spent a few hours wandering the streets and visiting a few shops as I went. The city of Granada really is gorgeous, sitting in a valley and consisting of winding streets full of bars, restaurants, and shops, and I felt very relaxed just traversing the centre.
Floral decorations
Sooner or later though it was time to head back to the bus interchange in order to catch my evening coach back up to Madrid, and in doing so leaving Andalusia and completing my tour of the south of Spain, which included Córdoba, Seville and Granada.
As I said, I was disappointed not to be able to visit the Alhambra whilst down in Granada, but that didn’t detract from my time spent in the city. From its gorgeous surroundings to the bustle of its narrow streets and glorious architecture, I thoroughly enjoyed lazing around for the 24 hours I spent roaming around.
I will definitely have to revisit Granada in order to have a snoop around the Alhambra one day soon, and I think next time I’ll visit for a longer time – and not allow myself the luxury of a “quick nap”…
Part two of four of my tour of Spain began as I got on the train from Córdoba to Seville, whereupon I met a guy called Paco who proceeded to get chatting to me, and as I alighted in Seville I had been given three tips on how to live my life:
Sé una buena persona (Be a good person)
Sé preparado (Be prepared)
Ama lo que haces (Love what you do)
After a lovely chat for the couple of hours it took to roll into Seville I alighted, said my goodbyes, and headed through the city late at night to find my hostel. After bedding down for the night I awoke hungry and in the hunt of some breakfast, and after stopping for some fresh orange juice, a lovely coffee and a napolitana (chocolate pastry), I grabbed my camera and headed out to get my first look at the infamous city of Seville.
I began by wandering down one of the main streets from the north of the city towards the river, alongside which I found some lovely gardens which I dipped into to carry on towards the Plaza de España, a large square built in 1928 for a large exposition. It turns out that these gardens were actually used to film in the land of Dorne in Game of Thrones! Wild.
I then crossed over the main road and soon discovered the Plaza de España in all it’s huge, colourful and intricate glory. The sheer scale of the huge semi-circular structure isn’t apparent in any of my photos after my panorama turned out to be a disaster, but a quick Google search will give you a bit of an idea.
A little bit of trivia for those Sci-Fi fans amongst you all who may recognise some of the architecture here – it turns out that the Plaza de España was actually used for some exterior shots of the fictional land of Naboo in Star Wars: Attack of the Clones. Seville is such a beautiful place that it is quite easy to see why location scouts for such big names in film and TV have come along and had a field day.
After mooching around to take plenty of photos (some of which will wind up on my travel section soon) and catching a spot of flamenco, I then headed towards the centre to grab a bite to eat and begin exploring some of the amazing sights in the heart of the city.
I was pleasantly surprised by the pedestrianised streets and the amount of people cycling around the city as I began to head towards the centre, but I decided to first wander down to the river for half an hour relaxing in the sun and to grab a burger at The Good Burger, a Spanish chain which I became familiar with the first time I ever visited Madrid back in 2015!
After this I once again headed towards the beating heart of Seville, where I’d been advised by my friend Kevin to visit La Giralda, a bell tower built on top of a Moorish minaret and now attached to the city’s huge cathedral.
It should be pretty obvious from all the photos I took, but the colours in Seville are stunning.
Once in the city centre I began to explore some more, stopping for lunch and coffee along the way, before heading back in the direction of the river to check out some of the architecture along its banks.
Once back along the banks of the river I stumbled on the ridiculously named Plaza de toros de la Real Maestranza de Caballería de Sevilla, which is the fancy Spanish name for the main bullring of Seville. To my dismay it turns out that it is still used for bullfighting, and not wanting to contribute to the industry, I instead opted to circle the building and take some photos of its vibrantly coloured exterior.
After this it was time to head back to my hostel, freshen up, and then head out for the evening to find something to eat. After a quick FaceTime call to my mum to show her the city in the evening, I wandered around until I found a lovely little restaurant near my hostel where I ordered a few tapas and una cerveza (naturally).
Seville by night was beautifully lit and bustling with activity.
After my nighttime exploration I headed back to the hostel in order to prepare for the next day where I’d have to carry my full bag around the city before grabbing a bus to Granada in the afternoon. The next morning I realised my camera had somehow changed to a lower quality image mode which made me quite cross, but I calmed down with a coffee and pastry breakfast once more before meandering the city’s gorgeous streets once again.
Contrasting architecture
Once I’d stopped for yet another café con leche, I headed for the bus station where I boarded a nice comfy coach and began my journey eastwards to Granada, which will be the subject of the next blog post!
In the second city of my tour of Andalusia I was once again charmed by the people, the sights, and the atmosphere of Seville. I have to admit that it was my personal favourite of the three new cities I visited on my trip, even if the local accent stumped me and the clouds kept me on edge through the occasional bouts of heavy rainfall!
I would say that Seville is the perfect place to go and spend a good few days exploring, and I am glad that I managed to squeeze a visit in before Semana Santa (Spain’s Easter celebrations) and before the heat of summer made wandering around unbearable. Once again this will be added to my travel page pretty soon, and hang fire for my next blog post where we pick up the action as I arrive in Granada…
