Friday, September 30, 2011

The club scene, and London again!

The past weekend the girls and I checked out the club scene here in Southampton. Friday night we went to Junk which was, well just okay. I mean, we had fun, but the place wasn't fun. And the DJ(s) played annoying music, because they would play an intro to some hit and then go on to the next intro. So we NEVER got to hear a whole song.

Saturday night we went to my friend from Sykkylven Sarah's place. This is where we started our evening and got to know three other girls that she knows. We continued to Orange Rooms this time and this place was way better than Junk. I actually read that they have won Southampton's Best Bar Award. Here's a picture of the interior from their website.

I loved the interior, and the place was packed, so the atmosphere was really great! (Also the music was normal in comparison with Junk...) I'm not dissing Junk, it's probably a great place on other evenings when they have more people and other music-themes. Just, not this Friday...


Before the weekend, actually when I was in London on Tuesday and met Marianne for the coffee, we talked about me coming back for this weekend for 100%DESIGN. That's basically a huge event where a lot of designers and companies gather to promote their products and prototypes. I really wanted to go, but didn't know if I would really be in shape for it after two days out in a row. BUT, I found myself up and running at 8 o'clock Sunday morning, sat on the bus to the Central Station at 9, and had my butt placed in the train to London at 10! I'm very pleased with this achievement.

I met Marianne at Earls Court, where we later met Runa (from my class in NKF). I really didn't know that Earls Court was as big as it was, I had only heard about the name. 

But, it was this big.




And actually that's just half of it.


So as you can see, this place was big enough to have fun for hours. 
But after 4 hours you're pretty tired and don't have any more space in your head to take in what's left.

I've made another slideshow for you, (I think I'm gonna stick to this when posting loads of pictures...), and they show some of my favorites from Channelsdarestudio, Il Vetro Dei Dogi and Melin Tregwynt.


I stayed in London for the night with Marianne. On Monday before she left for her first day of school, she showed me a place called Brick Lane. Basically this street is a designer/artist/musician street, and you can find many cool vintage shops, not-so-known-(yet) designer stores and a great music store called Rough Trade. I loved this little colorful strip.


When we said our goodbyes for now, I went to the Victoria and Albert museum that I had heard many great things about. Sure enough, this place was filled with amazing art and design from different periods. Divided into different styles and countries, it was way too much for my head to see absolutely everything. That is why I stuck to checking out the Asian part with beautiful decorations, handmade furniture, ornaments and amazing and colorful textiles. I am very fascinated by the Oriental art and culture. Maybe this is something I can use in my coming dissertation later on this semester?

I also checked out the iron section, the glass section (mostly window glass paintings), and last but not least the performance and theatre section - something that I'm also very interested in. I love both the stage part of the theatre and the costumes. I love colors and patterns, and think the idea of forming a role or a character's clothing is very exciting, with all the different textiles and masks and what not.

Here's a little bit from the V&A museum.





There were extremely many cool things at both 100%DESIGN and at V&A that I will take with me in future projects. I gathered very much inspiration before school-start, and think that when I've digested all the impressions and sights, I will be ready for this coming year. And it's all starting on Monday October 3rd!

After everything I'd seen and learned I decided to go be a real tourist before I headed back to Southampton. I'm not going to tell you much about that, because everyone who's been in London have probably done the same things as I did, which was seeing Picadilly Circus and take a stroll through Chinatown and Covent Garden. After that my head nearly exploded, so I took the next train at 1635, 1 1/2 hour earlier than planned. 

Picadilly Circus.

When walking in Covent Garden, I stumbled upon this place, a dear memory from the days back in high school, when visiting London for a week together with my dancing class.

Pineapple Dance Studio.
London - you showed me Way too much - but I loved it!


- vic -

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Induction week and London

So the induction weeks have begun and there's been a lot going on. These weeks are really only about getting to know the school, the teachers and fellow students, and so far we've also been going through how things work, such as loaning photo- and videocameras and the IT-system. We haven't gotten our student ID's yet, and won't get them until this thursday. Pity, because all around the city there's 20% discounts off on clothes and shoes! Who doesn't love discounts...!


Last thursday I met up with my course leader, Sarah. She showed me and another girl I'll be studying with, Rebecca, our study room. It is pretty modern, spacious and light, and we got to see previous student projects. (Everything that's hanging along the walls and some dissertations in the picture under). Very inspiring and great work.

I'm really looking forward to start school now. Sarah told us that this Thursday we're going to meet the rest of the interior design students and pretty much start the course, and than next week we will be going full speed.

Part of our studio.


























On tuesday the same week we went to London with the international students to visit Tate Modern. Me, Torun and Unni walked around for about three hours; the museum was so HUGE. There was very much exciting to see, everything from interior and sculptures to paintings and textiles.

I also met up with Marianne very quick. Our bus back to Southampton left at 6 and we had to meet up half an hour before, so I felt a little stressed not having any idea what tube to take to where. But I made it for a short cup of coffee at Café Nero in Leicester Square, and it was so nice to see her!

Here's a short slideshow with pictures from the London trip early in the week. I don't have the patience to upload 13 single pictures here at Blogspot, hehe.



This was a short post, but many pics. I'm sorry I still haven't posted pictures of our house, it will come soon, I promise!!

- vic -

Friday, September 23, 2011

Southampton so far!

It's been such a long while! I've been wanting to write since Sunday but I never find time for it, and when I have had time I've always forgotten! (It's so typical...)

So hello again. I hope you are ready for a (long?) breakdown of the past week - moving to a new country and getting to know the city of Southampton a little better!

I'm ready to check out the city!

You all know what happened Tuesday so I'm gonna go straight to Wednesday. On this day we had a viewing booked with Marques Letting Agency and when we got there at noon, a slightly pale faced agent welcomed us to sit down and tell us that they almost didn't have Anything suitable for us three girls, which would be; central, furnished and 3 bedrooms. Luckily, going through their list of what they still had available, there was 1 house suitable for us, about 10 mins away by car, in Shirley, and long story short - we took it!

We didn't get to move in, until Monday this week, though. But we have a apartment, I'm sorry, a HOUSE!, which means we didnt' have to stress the rest of the week, instead we could enjoy exploring the city!

My mom and I walked for miles during the next days, around 8000-11000 steps (she had a step counter along with her, just for fun). We walked countless times up and down the High Street and we explored Ocean Village, the area around the Civic Centre/Guildhall/Central Library and Bedford Place. The pics under are from High Street. To the left you see one of the Titanic memorials,  with me standing on the left, Torun on the right, and Unni in the middle.






Walking towards the old town.

High Street, heading north.

We did a lot of shopping of course, and we were at the hairdresser Sanrizz, me coming out looking like Jesse J, and my mom having a completely new, modern haircut of the decade! We also treated ourselves with some Tropical Paradise Pedicure at Vikki Pink Beauty saloon. That last one right there... It was magical!

The saloon was down in Ocean Village, the high-end part of the city. It's very pretty there, and not so much people like in the city centre. We had a glass of very good white wine that I unfortunately don't remember the name of, at Banana Warf before we headed north again to the beautiful and relaxed Oxford Street, not far away from Ocean Village. Here we had yummy lunch at Olive Tree.  


During the week my mom and I went to many different restaurants and learned that there's lots of great places to dine out in Southampton. Here's a quick recap for you if you ever visit the city; go to Zen for fantastic Japanese cuisine (as mentioned in my previous post). For sensational Italian food you go to Lupa, and trust me; you'll get blown away. At Coriander you'll get, just, breathtakingly good Indian meals, while at City Beijing in High Street they have tasty chinese cuisine. 

Indian. YUM.

Here is a very delicious white wine we had to the Indian, at Coriander.

Up in Bedford Place there is also a delicious Mexican restaurant, Cantina. Personally I recommend all of these places. Which one to pick really just depends on what cuisine you prefer. At Sunday we came back to Cantina to celebrate Unni's birthday with good food and drinks.


Later in the week we learned that every Thursday to Saturday or Sunday there is a marked in High Street, Above Bar. Here you can find many different snacks, or meals if you would like some Thai for instance. There's also many booths with clothing, flowers, books and other stuff that usually is useless or in poor quality. But it has a great charm and it was nice to walk around and try some of the home cooked food and look at the goods and chattels. On Saturday me and my mom went up to Shirley to see the house again and check out the walking distance and area from the house to the high street. Shirley is its own little part-of-the-city centre and we have all facilities that we need here for when we move to our new place.

In front of our house!

What I've learned so far living here for a week, is that it's perfectly normal to have pink hair, 70% of the people in Shirley are polish (and so are the supermarkets), Always look to the right when you want to cross the road unless you have a deathwish and for crying out loud - stand on the left side of the road when you're waiting for the bus too!

There are also palms this south on our planet; we have proof in our backyard, everyone is so friendly and more outgoing than Norwegians, they even interupt conversations when asking other strangers for directions, and finally the food is three times cheaper than in back home in Norway.


I think I'm going to like it here. So far, so good.

- vic -

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Time to fly

It is finally time to leave Trondheim for new adventures. As I write I am on the plane from Trondheim to Gatwick airport in London. I figured I might as well write an update up here since this really isn't a place to do much else but sleep.

I think I see a ship all the way down there..
Imagine if we just dropped down, right now.

This weekend I finished up packing early so that I would have time to spend with my dear Lars before I left. I'm happy we got a lot of time together, because our goodbyes when I was getting into the bus earlier today to the airport was quick and brutal, I think. I'm also glad that it's only 3,5 weeks before he will be here with me.

We've been busy finishing the stairway-room and now it is almost as good as done.

The wall-colour is called Macchiato. It's made the room very calm and it makes me feel like reading a book, sitting on top of the stairs.

We have further plans for the room; we're going to decorate the walls with paintings, photographs and other decorating objects we find. I'd really like The Cucú clock from Diamantini & Domeniconi (without the coo-coo. That would just be annoying in that tiny apartment!). Also on top of the stairs there are two doors; one to the loft and one to a small storage. We want to paint the door to the loft in a pale blue that compliments the Macchiato tone. The door to the storage is very old and it has deep profiles, so on this one I'd like to lay a flower-print wallpaper on the two big profiles, in pale beige with green, blue and red tones. I think when we are done with all that, the room will be complete.

I continue my writing after a looong day travelling. I met my mom in Gatwick and then we took a train to Southampton, which arrived quite fast I think. My first thoughts about this city is that it is a very nice place, and the atmosphere seems very similar to Trondheim, a place that has really grown on me over the last two couple of years.

Me and my mom checked in at Premier Inn, a hotel that is right by the school I'm going to attend, (Southampton Solent University). We went there first to unpack and relax of course, then later we went out to eat and of course landed in a sushi restaurant. (It wad actually a Japanese restaurant, but we had to have sushi!!) We ended up eating a buffet; sooo much good stuff, as you see in the pictures:

This is just the beginning. Later on we had hot dishes, green tea and rosé wine on top! Loved it all!

That is it for my one-way journey to the (big) UK for now. Tomorrow apartment viewings await; hopefully we'll have a deal by the end of the day!

- vic -

Wednesday, September 07, 2011

I've started packing...

Only 6 more days before I leave for the UK - it's surreal.

I've been packing a little, because as I've mentioned, my mom is coming with me. She will take some of my stuff in her bag, but she is travelling from our home in Sykkylven - that is why I'm packing to send a small back to her this week.


This is just the beginning, because as you can see, I have a little folder right there on the floor with lists of what I need to pack. What you see is only one list. I have three. This room will eventually pile up with clothes, shoes, electronics, make-up and all sorts of goods and chattels. Can't wait for the chaos.

I have three folder with lists, diplomas, insurance-documents, travel information and other important documents, so i'd say I'm pretty organized, but I still feel like I'm not ready to move _at all_.

As the days go by I don't really do much now that most things are in order before take-off. I spend a lot of quality time with Lars and I see my friends. Marianne is back in town so we've hung out a bit, and tomorrow (thursday) we're going to have a homemade sushi-night at another friend's place. We're also gonna invite our former interior design teacher and some other girls. I've never made homemade-sushi, so I expect it will be an interesting experience.

Yesterday, myself and Lars met up with Runa, Magnus and Torgeir (from the road trip in the US), and Torgeir's girlfriend Ida. We ate some real restaurant made sushi, at Kyoto once again (the best place in Trondheim for sushi). It was really nice to catch up with Runa - I haven't seen her for a long while!


What a great group of people, and great food. Unfortunately Lars turned out a little weird in this picture! He's not weird usually, you know, only sometimes :) (I just noticed he actually looks like he's got a shiner, but no - 
it's not!)

Today I'm going to do a little work in the stairway room here. We've done some remodeling by taking away some old wall panel and we've put on a layer of wall covering to fix the wall behind the late panel, which was a little cracked after removing it. 


Now we want to paint the room and I honestly haven't had any ideas for what we should do with it since the living room downstairs has beige and grey tones, the stairs have an ugly green tone, and the loft is kind of white/black. I want the whole apartment to have a unified whole, and so what we've decided is to go for a safe (...) brown/beige tone in the stairway room, and then add colour in details, like the door to the loft, carpets and so on. I think it will be very pretty when it gets done. 

So until next time,

- vic -

Thursday, September 01, 2011

The clock is ticking..

Well hello again! Time flies and it is now down to about two weeks _only_ before I leave for the UK! It is craaazy!

The living-situation has changed a bit; we are now three girls instead of two! The newcomer Unni will also attend Southampton Solent University, and she will be studying the same as Torun - Graphical Design.

The three of us have been looking for apartments lately, and I'll sure tell you; it's hard to find some place that meets our criteria. Not that we have so many; only that we wish for a decent and contemporary place, where we will, after all, spend the whole of a year!

I've booked us some viewings for the 14th of September, and if we are in luck we will have a apartment by the end of that day! Oh wouldn't that be Great!

I realize now that time really goes by so awfully quickly, and I feel like I have to make the most out of it together with Lars. I have only one day left at the restaurant, so at least that won't keep us apart these last days.

I am very excited though, because Lars has already booked a flight to come visit in October, and he will be with me in Southampton from the 7th to the 11th! I can't say now that I can't wait since I got him right here with me at the moment, but it will be so nice to have him over! He will come with me to school since it's not only weekend when he will be there, and I am looking forward to spending time with him in small and short, vacation-like times.

There will be only a two week space after my mom leaves before Lars comes over. Then when he leaves, another two weeks and Therese will pay me a visit! (And with her comes two tickets to a particular Katy B concert in Bristol!! Oh my god I'm really looking forward to that one!)



While the clock is ticking I have been spending some great time here in Trondheim with my friends. Therese was here and we hung out a lot. I miss the time we spent for hours looking into Mac screens at school and our occasional strolls for a coffee in our breaks.

I was also on a little blueberry-trip out in the woods with the girl that lives downstairs here, Elin, and her friend. They found many blueberries; I didn't, and ended up with Cow-/Fox-berries.


On our way down back home we met four beautiful and nice horses that were enjoying the sun. Of course we had to stop to cuddle, and we stayed for about 20 minutes! Oh adore!
This is becoming a extremely long post, so I'm going to quit before you start to snore!

Speaks,

- vic -