Mushrooms! Christmas cakes! Anniversary celebrations in Paris! It must be autumn.
Click HERE to see last autumn in Paris, HERE for Piemonte 2023, HERE for Paris 2022, and HERE for Copenhagen in 2021. And for good measure, 2020..
My high school friend from Texas came to visit in September. We met up in London and I showed her Borough Market, Neal's Yard cheese shop, Southwark Cathedral, and other sights.
Southwark Cathedral, including Hamlet stained glass (Shakespeare was a parishioner), and the Monument to the Great Fire of London
Leadenhall Market, St Dunstan in the East Church Garden, and the smallest public sclupture in London, of two mice fighting over a piece of cheese
Art and architecture in the City, Saint Paul's Cathedral (top right), and Covent Garden cigar shop Scotsman
Art Deco on Flreet Street, Goodwin's Court, and martinis back at the five star hotel. Right: this is a good year for porcini!
We celebrated our 27th anniversary visiting Ljubljana, a new city for us. It was a magical place, full of Art Nouveau, great food, beautiful scenery, culture, and Invader's dragon-themed mosaics. More of them later. Click HERE to see last year's anniversary in Paris.
We stored out luggage in the gift shop of the pink Franciscan church before heading off to flash our first Invader. The Dragon Bridge is often regarded as the most beautiful bridge produced by the Vienna Secession. It was one of Europe's earliest reinforced concrete bridges and the first bridge in Slovenia to be paved with asphalt. When opened in 1901, it had the third-largest arch in Europe at that time.
These are all the Invaders that we found during our week's visit, 38 out of the original 42. The search led us to lots of exciting parts of the city.
Jože Plecnik's Colonnade is an enormous structure that stretches over 300 meters in length, all the way from the Triple Bridge to Dragon Bridge. It is filled with food shops and cafes. His architecture shaped the look of modern Ljubljana. We visited the Central Market every day and bought vegetables from the woman in green.
Our first meal was from the Central Market, and included the meat dish top left and truffle smash burger, centre.
We saw lots of the main tourist sights on our first day, including the kangaroo fountain, one of many public water fountains around the city. The memorable coctail contained bitter alcohol, apple, and demerara sugar. The poor man at the unpasteurised milk machine learned the hard way that if you use your card to help one tourist buy milk, you'll be there all day. We returned later in the week to buy our own milk with cash.
The Adam and Eve sculpture and Prometheus sculpture are modernist bronze pieces by Slovenian sculptor Jakov Brdar located at the southern end of the Butchers' Bridge.
There was a two-day marathon at the start of our visit. We stood on the sideline and rooted for the runners, including the man with the accordion, centre left.
Probably my favourite thing about Ljubljana was the public bike system. We rode everywhere for the whole week for only one Euro. Initially sexy, the Monument to the Victims of Reprisal Killings is a marble bust that depicts one of the male hostages opening his shirt and showing his bare chest in an act of defiance against the Axis occupying forces during the Second World War.
Scenes from Tivioli Park, including statues of writers Edvard Kocbek and his friend Boris Pahor, a group of men playing dress up, the bronze guart dogs, and the American Embassy, centre.
While waiting for our Invader tour at two o'clock, we went for a Mexican lunch and saw lots of marathon men in tiny little shorts. Tivoli's greenhouse has an Invader cactus on its side. Later in the week, we went to see The Threepenny Opera at the opera house, bottom left.
In 2021, Invader installed an exhibition of his work at The International Centre of Graphic Arts in Ljubljana. He left behind several of his mosaics in the offices, stairwells, and other spaces, which can be seen daily at 2.00pm. We were among a small group of French and Italian fans. The green Invader on my phone is particularly mysterious: if you flash the empty corner of the wall, you will be rewarded points for one that is not actually there!
Back in town, there was lots of stunning architecture, including Galerija Emporium, now a luxury department store, housed in a stunning Art Nouveau palace built in 1903.
Shown above are the colourful Vurnikova hiša, the bronze statue of the Slovene national poet France Prešeren, and the Triple Bridge, the oldest bridge in Ljubljana. In the early 1930s, the architect Jože Plecnik redesigned and expanded it. It was later added to the UNESCO World Heritage List as part of Plecnik's enduring legacy.
Locksmith Alley contains 700 bronze faces running through the centre, culminating in a drinking fountain and a couple other odd sculptures, namely a bronze hand and a skeleton trapped in a cage. This surreal scene is the work of the renowned Slovenian sculptor Jakov Brdar, whose bizarre bronze figures can be found throughout Ljubljana, including the Adam and Eve shown earlier.
I flashed my 1500th Invader near Krizevniska Street, one of the oldest streets in the city. That's Hercules on the column.
We cycled to the east of the city, to a small farmers' market to find the fruit and veg Invader shown centre on our Invader collage, above. We went to flash the next Invader near the train tracks, shown above, when Nick realised he'd left his rucksack containing Tiny Cow and his wallet back at the market. We sped back and found it safe and sound.
This is the biggest Invader mosaic in Ljubljana.
We had a nice lunch beside the river before cycling around to find more Invaders and things to look at. The pyramid was created in 1927, in memory of Žiga Zois, a Carniolan nobleman, natural scientist, Freemason and patron of the arts.
We found another of the city's water fountains and lots of Art Nouveau buildings, as well as some modern street art.
Atlas Obscura recommended Zvezda ("Star") for cakes. We had better from the market and from a woman who ran a small shop just at the bottom of town. Triple Bridge and Central Market drew us back ever day.
I liked the Highlights magazine colours of the pointy pole. We made pumpkin risotto with a pumpkin we bought at the market, topped with dry roasted pumpkin seeds, a moreish snack I discovered at our local Mercator supermarket. We looked all over for sage and finally found it back at the Central Market.
There was a crumbling and hard-to-flash Invader on the entrance to the Slovenian art commune known as Metelkova, once a military barracks, but now a rather frightening hippy hangout, covered in a psychedelic cacophony of naive art, graffiti, and punk rock visuals. I got the creeps halfway through there and was relieved to get out. Soon after, I slipped and fell on the wet pavment, which left me walking slowly for the next few hours.
The Museum of Contemporary Art Metelkova was full of thought-provoking work. On the surface, some of it looked like the I Could Do That school of art, but once learning about the ideas behind things, the meaning was profound. Shown above, displaced workers affected by the fall of communism, the wildly swinging chandelier that symbolised fickle politicians, and the oversized clothes that reflected the inflated prices in the textile industry.
Some of my favourite works, including 1950s children's books, distorted perspective of the communist floor art, a creepy "Selfie", we were asked not to sit on, and the blue neon sign that reverses a popular partisan chant, while the frozen bust of Karl Marx slowly melts into the pool below.
Clockwise from top left: EVR (e-flux video rental), Klobasarna's smoky Carniolan sausage, our risotto, flying figures, roasted cavolo nero, a yellow church, and Nick drawing milk from the vending machine.
Martin Bricelj Baraga’s Cyanometer sculpture, located in the centre of Ljubljana, blends art and science, measuring the blueness of the sky and looking stunning doing so.
Saints Cyril and Methodius Church is an Eastern Orthodox church in Ljubljana. It belongs to the Metropolitanate of Zagreb and Ljubljana of the Serbian Orthodox Church and is named after Saints Cyril and Methodius, brothers known as the "Apostles to the Slavs."
At the Museum of Modern Art, we learned that masked revellers traditionally "crashed" wedding party to dance and celebrate. We also learned about Bacon-esque Marij Pregelj, whose Pompeian Company at Table reflects the concentration camp experience of internees gathering around a table to eat their meager meals. I liked the photo of the un-named artist in his dressing gown.
From matchbooks to golf tee, flaming flourescent hearts to what looks like a shirtless Benedict Cumberbatch in tracksuit bottoms, the museum was full of fascinating things.
Our pizza was made trendy with the inclusion of vegetarian pepperoni and hot honey. We revisted the charming old Krizevniska Street and later the speech bubble dragon Invader.
Saint Nicholas' Cathedral was full of opulent splendour behind its bronze bishops doorway. The view from the castle was sweeping. We could see the Central Market and Dragon Brdige, plus Slovenian mountains in the distance.
After a selfie with the dragon and spotting a spectacled shop keeper on the street, we took a bus back to our AirBnB and had bubble and squeak plus three different local desserts on our 1950s table.
On Friday, we went to the National Gallery, which was also full of wonderful treasures. A group of drama students re-created two of the gallery's most famous paintings and photographed the results. I think their photo is better than the originals.
The gallery houses the original Robba fountain, protected by a purpose-built glass atrium.
Males through the ages, including one who looks uncannily like the tweed-wearing historian I used to work with.
The Slovenian Madonna oversees gilded saints and oil painted revellry.
We ate lunch at JB Restaurant, one of the top 10 restaurants in Europe. World renowned chef Janez Bratovž worked all the tables with his son Tomaž. He spoke to us about sourcing delicious potatoes on top of a nearby hill and signed a cookbook for me. Each book had a unique hand-painted design. I was brought a stack of the remaining English copies and chose the one with the green brushstroke, shown above. Our meal included cured duck breast on beer batter star, cauliflower soup, trout carpaccio in citrus and sumac, roast duck breast with those potatoes, and a fantastic crème brûlée with blueberries and dried flower petals.
We went to the opera house to see Weill and Brecht's The Threepenny Opera. We had box seats and a great view. The production was patchy but had some innovative ideas.
On Friday, we cycled back into town one final time, finding the chrome fountain and more Art Nouveau, as well as the final Invader mosaic of this trip.
Our journey took us south of the city, past church spires and allotments to the house of architect Jože Plecnik, who is largely responsible for the post- earthquake look of modern Ljubljana.
Plecnik's garden was beautifully autumnal, and inside, we learned about his conservative religious nature and habit of making his guests as uncomfortable as possible so they would leave quickly.
Plecnik died in 1957, recent enough that the house was filled with his actual possessions, rather than museum recreations. The drawing supplies, hat, brushes, and spectacles are all his, as well as the chair he designed, not only to resemble his own face, but to provide discomfort to all who sit there.
Curiosities in Plecnik's studio
Some of my most glorious photos are from our final, sunny day in Ljubljana.
The Franciscan surch, Mary reflected, and crumbling Art Nouveau façades are all noteworthy, but my favourite thing about this trip was certainly the milk machine at Central Market. We filled our bottle with fresh unpasteurised milk and sat on a nearby bench, eating a jam-filled doughnut followed by swigs of cold milk. My idea of heaven.
Our final full day in Ljubljana was spent taking in the sights before going to a thrilling concert by the Slovenian Philharmonic in the evening.
Maybe the best orchestral concert I've ever heard, the Slovenian Philharmonic played Debussy's Three Nocturnes and Holst's The Planets. The forces were enormous, including 40-strong women's chorus, alto flute, basset horn, contrabassoon, two harps, celeste, and organ, which we sat right beside. We were close enough to the stage to notice how the orchestra was full of young, attractive players such as principal bassonist Mihael Mitev. The boyish conductor was Joel Sandelson.
We loved our week in Ljubljana and plan to return to Slovenia for a longer stay.
