Five on Friday: Christmas drink anyone?

Taking five minutes to enjoy five things...

Christmas drink anyone?
I offer you...

Champagne

at The fan Museum, Greenwich.

Rum
on HMS Belfast,
issued daily, 'Up Spirits'.

Cocktails
on the roof of the Brunel Museum.
You'll have to wait until the summer, served by Midnight Apothecary.

Gather round the table for a cuppa in the Second World War
at the Imperial War Museum, London.
Served in the Allpress family's model home
in the Family in Wartime gallery.

Or share your favourite tipple with a friend,
a Viking horn cup each from
The British Museum,
Sutton Hoo Gallery.

I am joining in with Amy with Five on Friday, taking five minutes from our day to enjoy five things.

Please visit the five others who are also blogging about Five on Friday this week.

Kristie from North of 49

Patricia from A place for everything.....

Selma from Eclectic Home & Life

Marion from my two girls

Amy from Love Made My Home

Want to know more about The Fan Museum, HMS Belfast,
the Brunel Museum and Vikings at the British Museum?
Click on the links below to read my previous posts about them.

Seduced at the Fan Museum
Life on Board HMS Belfast
The Brunel Museum
What would your birthday cake have looked like during wartime?
Viking Currency

Happy christmas!

Seduced at The fan Museum

SEDUCED! FANS AND THE ART OF ADVERTISING
is the exhibition currently showing at

The Fan Museum, Greenwich.

These fans date from 'La Belle Epoque',
'The Beautiful Era'.
'Dating from the late Victorian to the Edwardian era' (in England).
which doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

We'll stick with, 'La Belle Epoque',
when advertising fans came into their own
with the "birth of modern consumer culture".

Fans became bill-boards for advertising.

Some were a bit like the classifieds in the back pages of the newspapers.

Others produced by commercial artists,

designed to make the most of the shape of the fan.

There are fans created for luxury brands.

Champagne anyone?

Fans serving as theatre programmes.

This fan was designed by Francisque Poulbot,

who lived and sketched life in Monmartre, Paris.

Some adverts are not so subtle.

This is the kind of fan I would have loved playing with as a kid.

There's something magical about opening that 'fanning out' tissue-paper thing.

It wouldn't have lasted very long in my hands.

But I don't suppose any of these fans were designed in perpetuity.

But they have been kept, in perfect condition, some for 100 years

to be admired by the ad-weary public of the 21st century.

To remind us of times gone by.

Their power is not so much now in the advertising,

but in their beauty,

and the sense of nostalgia.

"Now, I just fancy a glass of champagne!"

Seduced? At the Fan Museum?

Seduced! Fans and the Art of Advertising

is on at The fan Museum in Greenwich

until 28th Sept 2014.

Details on their website.

The Fan museum: Useful & beautiful

 On one of the hottest days of the year,

I went with a friend to The Fan Museum in Greenwich.
We couldn't use them unfortunately,
only look,
and learn more about fans.

There was a lot to look at.

Painted fans,

the only known fan leaf by Gaugin, 1887,

and by Sickert, 1889, painted on fine kid leather.

We saw how fans were made.

Historically some questionnable materials were used...

...ivory,

...and turtle shell.

Shells were also used to make fans,

mother of pearl and abalone.

There are fans from around the world.

Mozambique (in the centre),

China,

Togo.

Those countries can get pretty hot.

"Wonder if today London might be hotter than them?"

Here the great debate about 'form' and 'function',

'useful or beautiful',

continues...

Beautiful? No.

Useful? Yes.

"If only these weren't behind glass."

Beautiful?
The galleries, particularly that yellow and grey paintwork.

Useful?
"Award-winning ladies toilets".
They are very proud of them.

Magazines, well extracts from magazines, are displayed on the back of the toilet doors.

Something to read on the loo.

'The Fan'  "...and is just plain-old needed when it's 30 degrees in London."

The Fan Museum

has over 4,000 fans in its collection.

They can't all be on display at the same time,

so to give us many opportunities to see all these fans, 

the fan exhibition in the gallery upstairs is changed several times a year.

Currently, the exhibition is,
Seduced! Fans and the Art of Advertising.
On until 28th Sept 2014.
Coming soon in my next blog post.

The fans above should all be around whenever you happen to visit in the future
as they are part of their permanent collection.
As for the Gold certificate for their Ladies' loos,
visit in 2015 to find out if they have retained that prestigious award.