Four UK Museums On Shortlist For Art Fund Prize

by Sean McLachlan on

Four UK museums have made the shortlist for the Annual Art Fund Prize. The winner will get a hefty £100,000 ($161,000) donation, most welcome in these times of economic austerity.

One of the museums, the Hepworth Wakefield, only opened a year ago and has already smashed attendance expectations by attracting half a million visitors. Located in Yorkshire, it focuses on contemporary art and has an innovative modern building design.

The Royal Albert Memorial Museum in Exeter is housed in an elaborate Victorian building and has a broad-based collection ranging from local archaeological finds to Egyptian mummies, British watercolors and digital art. There’s also a natural history section with fossils, birds, insects and a rather intimidating tiger.

The Scottish National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh reopened last December after a major renovation and now features free entrance and 60 percent more space to show off all those guys in kilts. The Watts Gallery in Guildford showcases the work of famous painter G.F. Watts as well as a huge collection of Victorian photographs and temporary exhibitions of British art.

The winner will be announced on June 19.

[Top photo of Hepworth Wakefield courtesy Carl Milner]

World’s Oldest Backpacker To Travel Europe This Summer

by Jessica Festa on

When most people think of backpacking, they picture a bunch of youths in their mid-20s eating street food, hiking to city sites and sleeping in dorms of 10 or more travelers. Australian nomad Keith Wright is breaking the stereotype, and at 95 years old, has planned a two-month backpacking tour of Europe for this summer.

Nicknamed the “world’s oldest backpacker,” Wright began backpacking when his wife passed away 10 years ago. Since the age of 85, the Aussie has been exploring the world solo, selling his home, staying in hostels, sipping brews with fellow travelers and trying as hard as he can to get off the beaten path.

“I have seen things most tourists haven’t seen, because I walk the back streets and take trains or buses to nearby towns for the day,” he told The Daily Mail.

Travel has become a large focus of Mr. Wright’s life, as he carefully budgets all year long for these special trips. Starting May 28, the backpacker will spend his summer visiting Madrid, San Sebastian, Paris, Munich, Vienna and London.

In-Flight Cellphone Calls To Be Allowed On Virgin Atlantic Flights

by Meg Nesterov on

Passengers on Virgin Atlantic will soon be able to make in-flight cellphone calls, send texts and browse the web on their way home from Europe, it was just announced. The new service is part of the airline’s upgrade to the Airbus A330, which will also provide expanded in-flight entertainment, USB ports and a very spiffy upper class. Cellphone service will initially be available only on London to New York flights, but will be expanded to more cities by the year’s end. There are a lot of caveats, however: you’ll need to be on a Vodafone or O2 network, only 10 calls will be allowed at one time and service won’t be cheap. Calls will cost 1 GBP per minute and texts 20p each. You’ll also still need to turn off your devices for takeoff and landing, and turn them off within 250 miles of US airspace, so no flight-long games of Words With Friends.

Gadling readers: would you use this service? Do you think it’s any improvement over the old-school in-flight phones? Or will it just be another amazing innovation that no one appreciates?

[Photo courtesy Flickr user Highways Agency]

Dine At An A380-Inspired Restaurant

by McLean Robbins on



Love to fly? Sure. What if you could have the experience of traveling first class without the hassle of security lines? We’d like that even better. But when the question comes to “do you love airplane food?” or “do you fly because of the food?” the answer is almost always “no,” unless, of course, you make a regular habit of first or business-class international travel.

But a new restaurant in China is making waves for marrying the luxury of first-class travel with a fine dining concept. The A380 restaurant is actually the second of its kind – the first is in Taipei – and is drawing regular crowds who come to be served by waitresses dressed like flight attendants in a fully recreated upper class cabin interior.

What do you think? Would this fly in the United States?

Thanks to BornRich for the tip.