Little Voice

Today we caught the train with Colin to Birmingham. Priority on disembarking at Snow Hill was coffee, especially as it was chucking it down with the wet stuff. We found a Nero near the Birmingham Cathedral (St Phillips) and quenched our caffeine need, except for Colin who had decaf.

As we are collecting cathedrals recently we thought we'd pop into St Phillips, mainly to see the magnificent windows designed by Edward Burne-Jones. During the war these windows were dismantled and stored in a Welsh coal pit for safe keeping, just as well as the church was bombed.

It had stopped raining by the time we left so we walked across to The Rep theatre to pick up this evening's tickets and have a look at the new library. The place is very impressive, though still not sure about the cladding. We found a bench to eat our sandwiches on then moved across Victoria Square, which is not really square, to the Gas Hall Gallery, part of Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, to see and exhibition of Andy Warhol and William Morris art and design.

We then took the lift to the main museum and had a look at their excellent collection of pre-raphaelite paintings and then to the Staffordshire Hoard, the largest collection of Anglo-Saxon gold ever found. 

By now it was time for a cup of tea so we retired to the Edwardian Tea Rooms in the museum for a pot.

Moving on from tea to dinner we walked over to The Mailbox to sus out the restaurants. Zizzi's came out favourite and we had a nice pizza and pasta meal.

It started raining again whilst we were in there so we dawdled over after dinner drinks. On leaving we walked through Gas Street Basin to the ICC and through to Centenary Square and The Rep where we were going to see The Rise and Fall of Little Voice, an excellent play.

Finally last train home to Stratford, the end of a very cultural day.