The Dundee Tapestry Exhibition, V&A Dundee

Posted on 5 January 2025 by Katrina

While we were at the V&A in Dundee to see the Kimono Exhibition we also had a look around the ‘Dundee Tapestry’ exhibition which is free. All of the ‘ tapestries’ which are actually embroideries tell the history of Dundee over the years. In years gone by Dundee was called the Jam, Jute and Journalism city and the embroidered panel below depicts a lot of the characters from the Beano and Dandy comics, read by children of all ages for decades and published by DC Thomson. Oor Wullie is at the top of the panel which also features Denis the Menace (the original) with his dog Gnasher of course, Beryl the Peril and Granpaw from The Broons. There were some young Japanese women looking around this exhibit while we were there and one of the attendants was giving them a bit of a ‘spiel’ about it, but annoyingly she said Oor Willie, which drives me nuts as it’s definitely Oor Wullie, for some reason they anglicise it – to seem posh I suppose.

The Royal Research Ship Discovery which carried Scott and Shackleton on their First Antarctic expedition is berthed right next to the V&A. She was built in Dundee and it was only fitting that she should return there when she became a museum. It’s well worth a look around it. Otherwise the panel below is about the many other scientific discoveries from Dundee.

But it’s not all about the past, an Eden Project is planned for Dundee in the future and the panel below focuses on the nine environmental guilds which it’s hoped will help Dundee’s future to flourish.

This is just a few of the panels, there’s been a lot going on in Dundee over the years, particularly in the computer games industry, so it’s quite a large exhibition with 35 panels which I think is permanent, but it might not be. Some of my photos didn’t come out at all for some reason, but you can read more about the exhibition here.

Escape in Darkness by Kathleen Fidler

Posted on 4 January 2025 by Katrina

Escape in Darkness by Kathleen Fidler was first published in 1961 and was aimed at readers aged 10+. Although Fidler was born in England she moved to Edinburgh when she married and seems to have thrown herself into Scottish society. She was known for her meticulous historical research.

In 1600 King James VI (or James I if you are English) had been attacked by some members of the Ruthven family, meaning to murder him and seize his crown, but they had failed. Unsurprisingly since then James had vowed to ‘stamp out the name of Ruthven forever.’

Thirteen years later in Holland, young James Ruthven’s father has been killed in a duel, before he died he said that his heart must be buried at Culross Abbey in Fife, so his sister Barbara eventually travels to Scotland to carry out that task, along with her nephew James Ruthven’s son. If the king discovers that they are there, they’ll be done for.

This is an entertaining adventure tale which also gives a lot of information about the social history of the times as well as the commercial history of Fife which involved coal mining in very dangerous situations, such as under the River Forth, accessed via a moat in the middle of the river, an innovation. It was a miserable life for ordinary people with the miners being worse off than slaves really.

As it’s Fife accusations of witchcraft were inevitable, the Fifers of the day were very keen on accusing people of witchcraft – especially incomers – or anyone they didn’t like. This was another very local book for me, very much enhanced by my experiences of visiting Culross. I’ve written a few posts about Culross over the years, between 2012 and 2020 which you can see here if you’re interested.

SHAKESPEARE The World as Stage by Bill Bryson

Posted on 2 January 2025 by Katrina

SHAKESPEARE The World as Stage by Bill Bryson was published by Harper Press in 2007, it’s part of their EMINENT LIVES series. It’s very different from the other books that I’ve read by Bryson, where he seems to aim for a laugh a page. This is quite a serious book, but of course the downside is that so little is known about Shakespeare, but he manages to do away with some of the ‘facts’ that others have promoted over the centuries. So despite Bryson being able to delve into historical papers – something that I’m always envious of, there are no real revelations, if anything his famous last will seems even more mysterious than before.

I did learn a lot about the history of the various theatres in London though, and some of the people involved with them. Thankfully Bryson is not one of those strange people who determinedly believe that just about any ‘upper class’ male in Shakespeare’s lifetime wrote the plays, and he swiftly deals with the crazy theories. There are some people who seem to think that anyone who wasn’t an aristocrat would have been barely able to read, never mind be well educated. No doubt they are the same people who believe that a school cannot be a good one – unless you pay richly for being allowed to be part of it. Obviously a nonsense.

This is a quick read at just 200 pages, which includes the bibliography. I enjoyed it.

Kimono Exhibition, V&A Dundee – part 3

Posted on 1 January 2025 by Katrina

This is the last of the Kimono Exhibition photos that I took last week at the V&A Dundee.

Kimonos have been used by film costume designers, such as the one Alec Guinness wore in Star Wars. These are by various modern designers.

The white/cream kimono in the photo below is a bridal kimono. The bride starts out the day in this colour and by the time the ceremony is performed she is in a red kimono like the one in the photo.

The kimonos below are by fashion designers who have updated the traditional kimono designs. Kimonos have been used for stage wear by musicians. David Bowie famously wore what was regarded as a kimono but was really more akin to a Chinese tunic I think.

Lastly the kimono in the photo below was a gift to a member of British royalty in the 1960s.

I doubt if this was ever worn by royalty but the one below was. Rock royalty anyway. It belonged to Freddie Mercury. He was fond of kimonos for stage and party wear.

Happy New Year!

Posted on 1 January 2025 by Katrina

Happy New Year to you all. I hope that 2025 will be a good one for everyone.

My 2024 reading statistics

Posted on 31 December 2024 by Katrina

I write down the books that I’ve read as I finish them – in an old school jotter. With notes in the margins as to what sort of book they are, so I’ve totted up my stats and here they are.

I’ve read 122 books in 2024, I’ve reviewed most of them.

I’ve only read 11 non fiction books – I must do better, although I have also dipped in and out of quite a lot – as you do.

I’ve only read 10 vintage crime books. I thought it would have been more than that.

I seem to have only read 2 contemporary crime novels – how did that happen?

I read 36 books by Scottish authors.

I read 39 contemporary novels.

I read 20 children’s (YA) books

I read 19 historical fiction books, I thought it would have been more.

Only 13 classics, although I am notoriously strict (or picky) about what I deem to be a classic.

Only three books in translation.

It has been quite a good reading year for me. I’ve found more than a few new to me authors that I plan to read more of – or have already done so, particularly C.J. Sansom.

In 2025 I intend to take a very relaxed attitude to my reading so I almost certainly won’t commit myself to joining in with any challenges. I’m going to ‘dree my ain weird’ as we say in Scotland, in other words I’ll do my own thing and go my own way, depending on how I feel, with no pressure whatsoever. I’ll be visiting the library a lot, so many have been closed down completely in Fife over the past ten or so years and I hate to think that they might be going to have another cull of them, but with the state of local council finances it’s a distinct possibility in the future I think. I want to keep their borrowing statistics healthy.

I hope to do more gardening, craft and cookery posts in 2025 – well that’s the plan anyway, but 2024 was a very poor year for gardening. The only decent weather that we had in Scotland during the summer happened to be the almost three weeks when we were in the Netherlands. It was so annoying watching the BBC news while there (they’ve always been able to see the BBC as the signal is so strong) and seeing that the weather was so good back home, especially as we didn’t have very good weather where we were on holiday. To make matters worse as soon as we got back to Scotland the rain started and didn’t stop, if it wasn’t too wet to garden, it was too windy. Such is life.

So that was 2024 – blogwise anyway.

Kimono Exhibition at the V&A Dundee – part 2

Posted on 31 December 2024 by Katrina

Back to the V&A Dundee Kimono Exhibition and as you can see from the two photos below they also had some kimonos being shown on models so that you could see how they would have been worn back in the day.

You can see the roll of padding at the hemline which would have weighted the fabric down and make it hang better. Sadly it wasn’t possible to avoid reflections.

Kimonos were still popular in Japan in the 1930s, the kimono below from 1930 has a very modern design.

They are a lot gaudier than the traditional kimonos, the one in the middle below definitely has a Charles Rennie Mackintosh Glasgow Rose vibe about it.

In the 1930s things were getting more European in design. The small kimono for a young boy features an aeroplane which says kamikaze on it.

As you can see from the designs on the kimonos below dating from 1938 the Japanese had their minds firmly set on getting ready for war with warships and aeroplanes popular motifs on kimonos.

There might be a part three to this Kimono Exhibition as I took quite a few photos of the contemporary kimonos which have been designed by well known fashion designers more recently. But that’s enough for now.

Kimono Exhibition at the V&A Dundee

Posted on 29 December 2024 by Katrina

We had been meaning to go to see Kimono at the V&A in Dundee since it opened way back in May but ‘stuff’ just got in the way. I was a bit shocked when I discovered that the exhibition closes on the 5th of January, so we had to just make time for it, or miss it completely. So we went there yesterday – unfortunately we weren’t the only people who had almost missed it, it was very busy! But I managed to take quite a lot of photos while there, it was much bigger than I had expected and there were a lot of details to pore over as well as information cards to read. We were there for quite a long time. I’m just putting a few photos on here just now. I’ll leave the rest for the new year.

Below is a photo of pieces of fabric which make up a kimono. It’s all straight edges so should be very simple to put together.

Although they’re made out of silk these ones below must be from top quality heavy silk as some of them date from around the 1700s, they’re amazing survivors.

The grey kimono below was made for a young woman. It looks deceptively simple but does have embroidery and texture woven into the fabric.

The portrait below is of Elizabeth Smith, wife of publisher George Murray Smith. She added some embelishments to it, such as buttons and fasteners. The portrait is right next to the actual garment which is below.

Below is a close up of the beautiful embroidery. All things Japanese were incredibly fashionable for quite a number of years in Victorian times. I can well understand the attraction. I’m sure they would be very comfortable, especially when compared with what European women were expected to wear at the time.

The exhibition at the V&A in Dundee is only on until January 5th, 2025 so there are only a few days left to see it, and I suppose the V&A will be closed on the 1st and 2nd of January. I’m glad that we managed to see it after putting it off for so long.

What Time the Sexton’s Spade Doth Rust by Alan Bradley

Posted on 28 December 2024 by Katrina

What Time the Sexton’s Spade Doth Rust by Alan Bradley was published by Orion in 2024 which means that there was a five year gap between this one and the previous book in the Flavia de Luce series – The Golden Tresses of the Dead. I had thought that the author might have run out of steam – or indeed life, so I was glad to hear that this one had been published.

Flavia has been left the family home Buckhouse after her father’s unexpected death. Her two older sisters weren’t at all happy about that, but it means that things go on much as before for Flavia and for the staff who help to run the house – Dogger and Mrs Mullett the cook – in truth Flavia is closer to those two than she is to her sisters who are almost completely absent from this book. A younger cousin called Undine has joined the household, she’s a bit of a handful, even for Flavia, she’s a law unto herself so she supplies some entertainment, but I feel that she doesn’t make up for the lack of snarky banter between Flavia and her older sisters.

When Major Greyleigh, one of the villagers is found dead in his kitchen it’s Mrs Mullett who is suspected of poisoning him. She gave him mushrooms that she had foraged from the woods and she wonders if some of them had been poisoned. It turns out that the Major and Mrs Mullett had had a romantic relationship years before in their youth, but Flavia can’t believe that she could be a murderer.

This tale takes a very unexpected turn towards the end, for me anyway. I enjoyed it although there were some aspects that annoyed me. The setting is 1950s England and everything feels authentic, the suddenly the reader is confronted with American spellings such as tire, color, I didn’t take note of the others. I was particularly annoyed by the word ‘purse’ being used to mean a handbag more than once.

“She rumaged in a sideboard and pulled out her purse. It was a flat Monda-go-to market straw receptacle, good for carrying everything from a check to a chicken. She reached into the depths and dredged up a small sketchbook.”

So definitely not a small purse with just enough space for some coins and paper money then.

It just throws the reader (well me anyway) out of the setting. I was also annoyed by the use of the word foyer when it should have been hall or hallway as it was in a private home. In the UK the word foyer is reserved for theatres, cinemas, large hotels, conference centres and the like. Nit-picking maybe, but I think things like that should be picked up by an editor.

A Darker Domain by Val McDermid

Posted on 27 December 2024 by Katrina

A Darker Domain by Val McDermid was first published in 2008, the setting is mainly Fife in the east of Scotland, and the time switches between 1985 and 2007. This is the second in the author’s Karen Pirie series.

DI Karen Pirie is in charge of cold cases. An adult daughter is desperate to discover the whereabouts of her estranged father who hasn’t been seen since the miner’s strike in 1985. It’s thought that he had been a ‘scab’ who had gone down to Nottingham to get work there. That turned his abandoned wife and young daughter into pariahs as far as the mining community was concerned. It’s now 2007 and the action swings between 1985 and 2007 although it isn’t at all confusing.

Karen Pirie finds herself investigating two cold cases as in 1985 there had been a kidnapping in Fife. The daughter of a very wealthy and well-known businessman had been abducted along with her small son and in the chaos of a handover she had been shot dead, and her young son had never been handed over to his wealthy grandfather with the kidnappers disappearing with him. When an investigative journalist discovers a possible clue in an abandoned building in Tuscany – of all places – Karen has to open that case again too.

I enjoyed this one, I must say that a lot of people have in the past complained that Val McDermid’s books are too grim and violent, but this one isn’t like that. There’s violence but nothing really graphic.

This is the most local to me book that I’ve ever read, one of the detectives even bought a house that must have been about five minutes away from where I lived for 26 years, going from the description. It definitely adds to the experience when you can visualise all the wee villages mentioned in Fife.

The miners strike took me right back to 1985. Jack had trouble getting to work as the police were stopping any cars which only had men in them and as teachers had all been encouraged to car share as parking at schools was a problem, they didn’t have enough spaces. So the car they were travelling in was stopped by the police and turned back as they were suspected of being ‘flying pickets’ travelling to coal pits to help out the striking miners. So the police were menacing and threatening cars full of teachers – and getting huge pay packets for their troubles. Grim times all round.

Pining for the West

Meanderings about recipes, books, craft and more

Author Archives: Katrina