My Dad at the NPG

The first installment of my new Podcast with Phil Marriott went live today! Listen here!

Gulliver's 1500!!!


I met my dad at the NPG for a Christmas talk, we learned about the origins of Christmas as we know it, basically the twinkling tree was imported from Germany by Prince Albert and his Mother before him, the world's first commercial Christmas card was invented by Sir Henry Cole In 1843 immortalised in the Bust next to my Dad, Cole commissioned artist John Callcott Horsley to make the artwork, Christmas crackers were invented by Thomas Smith in 1846. During a visit to Paris he came across the bob-bon, a sugar almond wrapped in tissue paper (with a twist either side of the centrally placed sweet). Thomas decided to try selling similarly wrapped sweets in the lead up to Christmas in England.

It was a really lovely event and afterwards we had tea and cake and chatted in the cafe, on our way home we briefly stopped to see the huge Christmas tree in Trafalgar Square and listen to a couple of carols.