Saturday 23 March 2013

London Lullaby...

This week has been an absolute treasure trove of fascinating finds.

It started out with my foray into John Lanchester's Big Fat London Novel, Capital on Monday night.

Friday night I went off to The Lost Lectures, an evening of enchanting topics for enquiring minds in a 'secret' London location.

And mid-week I was checking out my daily fix of clever clogs-ness on Springwise when I came across a rather beautiful and inspiring idea.

Great Ormand Street Hospital (GOSH) is a children's hopsital in London which is famous for its innovative research and forward-thinking practices in child healthcare. As part of a redevelopment project, it has had the exterior pipework on a section of their building repurposed to create a Lullaby Factory, a series of horns and tubes which play sounds to soothe the young patients recovering from illness.

Image Source: www.studioweave.com
StudioWeave created the intricate piece by adorning the existing pipework with horns of all shapes and sizes which can only be seen from inside the hospital. The 'music' was composed by sound engineer Jessica Curry and can be listened to on the Lullaby Factory radio station or through special listening tubes. Between them they have fashioned a kind of industrial lullaby.

In 1929 Great Ormand Street Hospital received the rights to J. M. Barrie's work Peter Pan - the royalties from this continue to help fund the work of this amazing hospital. So it seems fitting that they continue to create a little Neverland-style magic for the children of London.

2 comments:

Charlie Wade said...

It has a bit of a Steampunkish feel to it. Very good, beats most modern art (in my opinion.)

Unknown said...

I agree with you about the modern art Charlie...mind you my ahem experience of modern art has not left me dazzled so that comparison does Lullaby Factory no favours. Suffice to say how marvellous GOSH did this.