London Bus Sculpture Trail VII

This bus is 360°Panorama of London by Rob Wilson. It is in Trafalgar Square on one of those featureless grey traffic islands that are dotted around it. At least this bus brightens it up a bit. This design is quite clever. The artist has painted what you see in front of you as you look at the bus. Where you see Nelsons Column the bus has part of the column painted on it and it lines up with the real column. Painted on another side there is the base of the statue it shares the island with. Because this photo is taken at an angle it doesn't work, but this way you can see more of the design.

I like this bus it brightens up the square, it's brighter than the real square. Its a pity it won't be kept here as its the best thing about Trafalgar Square since they got rid of the road in front of the National Gallery and the pigeons. The bit in front of the National Gallery is now populated with people painted silver pretending to be statues or Yoda – not sure am I why Yoda someone would paint themselves as, nor money give to them another – I say bring back the traffic and pigeons.

London Bus Sculpture Trail VI

Here's another bus. This one was in an alley near Leicester Square Station. It goes by the name of Swinging London and is by Sian Storey. The design is inspired by London in the 'swinging sixties'. In this photo you can see the Carnaby Street road sign on the front and a car - I like the car all buses should have one painted around the driver. On the other side from where the photo was taken there is a road sign for Abbey Road and a large picture of Twiggy.

London Bus Sculpture Trail V

The fifth bus I found is on Charing Cross Road just as it meets Trafalgar Square. This is London Skyline Bus by Kristjana S Williams, who also did Gull Graeni Straeto which I photographed earlier. It is decorated with images of London landmarks.

London Bus Sculpture Trail IV

Back on the bus trail and this is Busby. Also outside the London Transport Museum. Busby is also known as 'Queen's Conductor', I presume a play on bus conductor and the guardsman's uniform the bus is wearing. This one is by Oliver Dean an illustrator and artist from Essex, he has another bus on the trail. As this bus is wearing a bearskin hat (not real bearskin I hope) it was a bit warmer to sit on on a winters day than the others with metal roofs (or rooves if you're from parts of the country that use that).

I like this bus. It has the chin strap coming down and the markings from the uniform of one the guards regiments uniforms. On the side is the rose shoulder badge and at the front are the garter stars from the collar badge, though I thought they were eye's at first. It's the Coldstream Guards uniform, but it doesn't have the red plume in its bearskin.

London Bus Sculpture Trail III

I'm now at the start of the bus trail which is outside the London Transport Museum in Covent Garden. This bus is called Accessibus and is by Liliana Ortega. Accessibus is decorated using ideas from UCLs Accessibility Research Group, Liliana Ortgea is a Phd student at UCL. There's lots of words and phrases that come up in interviews all over the bus.

The windows on this bus are covered in blackboard paint. The idea is that people can give their thoughts using chalk. The quote from the website is "Accessibus is an ever-changing sculpture which will give helpful feedback on people's views on these topics." From my photo the feedback seems to be that buses should be driven by 'Mrs Dean' and 'Delia & John' should sit upstairs at the front. Which of the three 'people' are Delia and John I'm not sure. I look forward to all buses being driven by 'Mrs Dean', though how easy that will be to achieve I don't know.

London Bus Sculpture Trail II

This bus is close to the Buckingham Palace one in the previous post, just a few yards away. It's called Gull Graeni Straeto and is by Kristjana S Williams an artist born in Iceland. I guess the buses name means something in Icelandic then. It has a lot of London's landmarks painted on it, the other side is slightly different. The front has the London Orbit Tower on it, which was built for the Olympics, with the London Eye. You can just make it out in the photo. To the back of the bus I think is the Post Office Tower with a giant bird on it - would look better with a dragon instead.

London Bus Sculpture Trail

2014 is the 'Year of the Bus'. I don't know why it's the year of the bus nor who decided it was, I might decided to call 2015 the 'Year of Cute Little Red Dragons' and see who goes along with it. Anyway, as part of The Year of the Bus there are 60 model buses being placed around London to form trails. Lots of artists and designers have come up with designs for these buses, the basic model is the new Route Master, to showcase the role of Buses in London (you can tell I'm reading the publicity blurb as I'm not really sure what its all about).

This bus is inspired by Buckingham Palace. It is the work of Mandii Pope, an artist from New Zealand, and is outside Transport for London offices on Victoria Street. I resisted the urge to wear a big black wig and play guitar when I got on the top.