A slightly larger version of this picture, just because I like the colors.

// This might be a London plane tree, a hybrid of Platanus orientalis and P. occidentalis. Whatever it is, it’s quite beautiful.

A lovely morning in Greenwich.

Gorgeous shop displays along this street in Greenwich. I absolutely need to go buy rhubarb, presto.

University of Greenwich.

This place has so much atmosphere.

Right on time at the Prime Meridian. A kingdom for one of these in my living room.

Tower Bridge.

Somewhere near the Shard.

Queen’s House.

A great night out with delicious italian food and Birra Moretti.

Another early morning stroll around Greenwich.

Lunch at Tate Modern after a guided tour on surrealism and the concept of conscious versus unconscious creation in art. The Millennium Bridge always reminds me of its previous wobbly state and my ever lasting love for synchronization.

Off to find a pub for a bitterly needed invigorating beer after three more guided tours and hours of heavenly indulging in the arts.

After visiting the White Cube gallery at Hoxton Square we came across this display by Robert Montgomery, which lured us into his delightful exhibition at KK Outlet.

Unfortunately, we walked past this lomography shop just as it was closing and were left with what we could glimpse through the window. Should really take my own plastic cams for a spin more often.

Postcards in a window display.

… My cats have been known to strike the exact same poses …

I think this might be a London plane tree, a hybrid of Platanus orientalis and P. occidentalis. It threw me off at first because the bark reminded me of our plane trees at home but its seed balls looked somewhat like chestnuts. Anyway, whatever it is, it’s quite beautiful.

Street lights of London. I posted a larger version of this one earlier.

London Eye.

Big Ben in all its glory.

While temperatures in Zurich are still below –10° Celsius, London felt like wonderful springtime.

Some species of Galanthus (Snowdrop) enjoying the sun.

Tyrannosaurus Rex hiding behind a pillar in the incredible Natural History Museum. Note the typical Diapsida skull form.

Dippy, the Diplodocus has been at the museum for almost 107 years. This used to be one of my favorite dinosaurs when I was 5 or 6 and totally crazy about everything paleontology (not that anything has changed there ;)).

Hatching eggs.

This one was actually breathing.

The distinguished Dodo, which we drove to extinction in the 1680′s. No wonder he looks so very disapproving.

Birds on pegs in the wall.

Would not want to come this close to one of these in real life.

Or one of these, for that matter.

Darwin contemplating the loud mob of visitors and its implications on our planet and its other species.

One big beautiful stunning building. While waiting outside I noticed the different animal statues adorning the walls. Will have to go back some time soon.

This post looks best when viewed in Chrome or Safari since its title uses bits of CSS3 which only Webkit browsers currently support. animation: rainbow 5s infinite alternate linear; with corresponding keyframes provide the ever changing text color, while an ::after pseudoelement per letter is equipped with multiple mask-images for the lightbulbs. If this does not make any sense to you, feel free to ignore it and enjoy the pictures.

Street lights of London

These guard the streets near London’s Big Ben.

// Four days in London with great friends is like an All-You-Can-Eat-Buffet of inspiration and pleasure.

While editing photos of a recent trip, I came across these pictures taken when traveling the beautiful Island of Borneo in November 2009. They document a three week journey from Kuching to Kota Kinabalu, during which we climbed through caves, camped in the depth of the rainforest, watched newly hatched sea turtles find their way to the water and inadvertently swam with sharks. The diversity of the landscape and fauna on Borneo is truly breathtaking and this small compilation of pictures doesn’t do it credit. I still like browsing through them from time to time and thought I’d keep them here for future reference.

The title of this post looks best when viewed in Chrome or Safari. It’s a heap of textshadows and the map is overlayed using text-fill-color:transparent, background-clip:text and with the help of the ::after pseudoelement. If this does not make any sense to you, just ignore it and enjoy the pictures.

Today January 18th, 2012 we’re all blacked out and protesting against SOPA/PIPA.

(even if it’s happening on another continent entirely, it still concerns us. here’s to internet freedom!)

This is Part Two of a series of photos documenting a journey through Inverness – Bonar Bridge – Kyle of Lachalsh – Isle of Skye – Isle of Mull – Oban – Fort William – Inverness. Part One can be found here.

Winter brings new beginnings which is why I love this season.

Wishing everyone a great New Year,
m.

I just changed the main url of this site to mariannemmichel.com. It can still be reached through all previous URL’s. You will however have to re-subscribe to the RSS feed, since its location has changed.

Thanks for stopping by :) m.

Ever since that vacation in Scotland, when I was 14 or so, I’ve been wanting to go back. The beautiful and multiform landscape often strikes me as slightly surreal, a quality that I avidly enjoy in nature. Not to mention scotland’s other qualities: Interesting history, lovely language, nice people, great beer (and whiskey).

Last September a dear friend and I enjoyed a week of driving on single track roads, seeing lovely vistas and lots of sheep. Unfortunately we were accompanied by persistent bad weather, due to tail lashing Hurricane Katia sweeping across the Atlantic, bringing gale-force winds and heavy rain, which made taking pictures a bit of an arduous task. The photographs shown depict our journey through Inverness – Bonar Bridge – Kyle of Lachalsh – Isle of Skye – Isle of Mull – Oban – Fort William – Inverness.

The Isle of Harris in the Outer Hebrides poses as the surface of Jupiter in Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. The Outer Hebrides are also the main stronghold of Scottish Gaelic, the Celtic language variety which developed after the 12th century. Scots is the Germanic language spoken in Lowland Scotland. Roughly 1% of Scots speak Gaelic while 85% speak Scots. If you go, bring me back some fudge, Amber beer and Scotsmac, I’ll be eternally grateful.

I’m delighted about every single comment and you can still respond to articles and such or tweet me a message, by pressing the Comment via twitter button at the end of each journal or illustration entry. See you on twitter!

Time flies

// A quick photo taken on the way to university.

He’s more scared of you…

…than you are of him.

// A quick sunday morning monster sketch.

Btw, it occurred to me that for some foreigners a wedding must somehow be quite a tourist attraction. How else does one explain the audacity of these tourists, demanding to have their picture taken with the bride and groom? ;)