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| Our poppy |
Last week, a long white cardboard box came to our house via the delivery company "Yodel". I opened it and was happy to discover that our ceramic poppy had arrived. I ordered it when I first heard about the art installation that was planned for The Tower of London to co-incide with national remembrance this year - "Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red" - an amazing sea of 888,246 ceramic poppies - one for each British fatality of World War One. Of course profits from the sale of these poppies will be shared amongst military service charities so we were happy to donate and now we have a unique ceramic poppy allowing us to pay regular respect to the fallen. Of course we have no idea which soldier our particular poppy represents but he was somebody's son. When I put the poppy back together, I noticed that there was still soil on the metal stem - from the moat of The Tower of London but I am not complaining.
 Bllod Swept Lands and Seas of Red at The Tower of London |
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It's lovely so envious......you have a bit of real history there
ReplyDeleteI swear I was not tempted to sell it on e-bay! Besides e-bay have banned their sale which is rather nice of them.
DeleteWhat a sight they were. You are very lucky to have one.
ReplyDeleteAll 888,246 were sold ahead of the installation. I am so relieved that you survived the Brisbane hailstones Helen. Is Tony okay to or did he get a big one on the bonce?
DeleteAll fine here thanks YP. Went right past us so we are still bone dry. Not complaining about missing out for once. ( Tony is too tough to let a few little hailstones scare him ! )
DeletePut it back together? Nice to be part of something so memorable. How much did you pay again? I don't recall from your first blog post.
ReplyDeleteDid I mention it before? It cost us £35 with postage. For ease of mailing it needed to be dismantled.
DeleteI'm not being cynical when I wonder where these were made. So many of the things we treasure these days are made by people in other countries, not only because of cost, but because of workmanship. Your poppy is beautiful.
ReplyDeleteMade in Derbyshire, England under the instructions of Paul Cummins, an acclaimed ceramic artist. But I do admire your healthy cynicism Jan.
DeleteWhat a great treasure! We have a piece of the Berlin Wall - brought to us by a friend, but still....
ReplyDeleteWhen my daughter was in Birmingham AL she worked part time at The Civil Rights Institute where she helped to clean shards of glass from the 16th Street Baptist church bombed by white supremacists in September 1963. Four innocent girls died and the pieces of glass speak insistently of those times and the quest for equal rights.
DeleteMan's inhumanity to man. Unfortunately, it continues.
ReplyDeleteHow wonderful! How special and how precious!
ReplyDeleteI've read about the installation on several blogs, and find it a very touching way to remember and pay respect. I didn't know that people could order the poppies afterwards. It is something very much like "you" to do that, I think.
ReplyDeleteYay! I get to see it! It's very RED in't it?
ReplyDelete