Wednesday, October 26 - London

Our second day with the Santa Fe Weaving Gallery group.  We spent the bulk of the day at one of my favorite museums - the Victoria and Albert.  Met at 9am with one of the curators of a featured special exhibit: Postmodernism.  He took us on an interesting but whirlwind tour of the show that contained a wide variety of design items from the 80s and 90s.  My favorite was David Byrne's "Big Suit" from Stop Making Sense.  

Next, a meeting with a curator from the textile department.  Unfortunately their exhibition spaces are being completely redesigned and will not reopen until May 2012.  However she did show us one temporary exhibition room that had a lovely dress designed by Alexander McQueen and a suit made by Stella McCartney for Chris Martin of Coldplay.  

We then went on a marvelous tour of the textile conservation lab with the head of this department, Joanne Hackett.  This vast white space is home to 8 large tables arranged in two rows, each with a conservationist hard a work repairing or cleaning garments.  Our tour was very interesting; we saw costumes of all sorts: clothing from movies such as Blade Runner, Pirates of the Caribbean.  We saw Dorothy's gingham smock from the Wizard of Oz, the Queen Mum's Jubilee Gown and a Schiaparelli velvet evening dress with pink flowers around the shoulders.  We were thrilled to learn that the Duchess of Cambridge, better known as Kate Middleton, would be visiting this very same textile conservation lab in the afternoon!

The Queen Mums dress.

After our morning of textiles we were let loose in the museum to spend a few hours on our own.  Ferris and I had lunch and then spent time studying the VandA's amazing jewelry galleries (completely remodeled since the last time I saw them), the Raphael Cartoons (the space has been turned into a playroom, yes a playroom) plus we discovered two interesting photography exhibits. 

The Raphael Cartoon playroom.

As we entered one of them, Ferris grasped my arm and said "look over there".  Much to my amazement about 10 feet away was a regal, whisper thin, tall and gorgeous Kate Middleton.  As Ferris said, she looks exactly like she does in magazines; identical.  She was accompanied by three or four men who were clearly looking out for her safety but otherwise she looked very much like a regular visitor to the museum.  She was not surrounded by an entourage in a way that made you immediately notice her.  She had on a navy blue St. John suit and high heel boots.  I got a very good glimpse of her and was (again) thrilled.  She disappeared into a door not far from the entrance to the photo exhibit.

When we finished seeing the show I was overcome with curiosity to see where she might have gone.  I walked over to the door she'd gone into and at that very instant  the door open and she reappeared.  She walked through the door directly toward me.  This time I got a perfect look.  I never imagined that in my life I'd ever see Kate Middleton and here I'd seen her twice in one day.  She probably thinks I'd been standing there the whole time stalking her.  What an amazing coincidence! 

In the late afternoon we regrouped and visited an antique textile dealer near Victoria Station.  Ferris and I left early and stopped into an international jewelry gallery not far from the hotel that we'd heard about from CAA earlier in the week.  Had dinner with the group in the hotel.