A Royal Park, Two Royal Colleges and The Royal British Society of Sculptors

Way back in November, I met up with an old friend from Uni whom I'd not seen in about ten years. It was so nice to catch up and have a good old natter.

We popped into the Kioskafé to check out their truly awesome selection of magazines (my goodness, I could spend so much money in this shop!) and to buy a coffee for him and a cuppa for me...

...then we headed to nearby Kensington Gardens, which was looking pretty gorgeous in the bright autumn sunshine.

We stopped off at the Serpentine and Serpentine Sackler galleries to see their (then) current exhibitions. The art at the Serpentine galleries isn't always to my taste, but they show such an interesting mix of things and all for free! They have a great shop, too, with great selection of art books and creative magazines. I always pop in when I'm passing.

On the other side of the park, we visited the Royal College of Art which was hosting a rather fabulous Crafts Council exhibition of contemporary jewellery. The exhibition was only on during November but you can read a bit about it here if you're interested in that kind of thing.

Then, just round the corner and opposite the Albert Hall...

... we visited the Royal College of Music museum, which was delightful. I was going to write about how great this little museum is and how it's free and quiet and so close to all the big, famous museums in South Kensington that you really must visit it sometime if you're in the area... but it turns out it's now closed for redevelopment, until 2019!

In the meantime, you can tour some of the highlights of the collection in this online exhibition.

After visiting the museum, our walk continued past lots more splendid buildings...

... to one particularly special building I'd wanted to visit for ages: the Royal British Society of Sculptors.

Apparently they have a gallery with regular exhibitions here, but it was the building itself I was interested in - or, rather, the fantastic sculpture that's been installed in a gap at the front of it:
 

Pretty cool, huh?

Quirky things like this are such a joy!

I feel like a bit of a weirdo every time I've mentioned this building to friends visiting the area - "a really cool building" doesn't have quite the same on-paper appeal as an exhibition or other "proper" attraction - but it's well worth a look if you're nearby.

Aaah, London. Always so many interesting things around each corner!