On Alexandra Palace and Hack Day…

The first time I went inside Alexandra Palace was a couple of months ago, while we were still trying to work out if we were going to be able to carry off this whole Hack Day concept in the UK. It was snowing insanely hard and I got completely lost between the tube and the venue. I was wearing canvassy trainers. They got pretty much immediately soaked through leaving me with numb lumps of uncooked meat at the end of my legs. I kept slipping all over the place and falling over as I tried to get my way up the hill. In the end I got a cab. There were kids everywhere throwing snowballs at passing cars and sledging down the hill. Matt Cashmore—who had thought of the whole Alexandra Palace venue in the first place—couldn’t even make it to the venue because the roads were so slushy and clogged. I took a couple of pictures that day and posted them to Flickr: The view from Alexandra Palace, International Woodworking Convention. But even then walking into the venue I remember getting entirely over-excited by the whole thing.

Last week, I went back for the first time since February. The weather was completely different – beautiful, clear skies. Beating sun. Everything was green. But the effect was pretty much the same. This is going to be great. I’ve put some pictures below to whet your appetite, but if you really want to get the whole feel for it in these last few weeks, I’d recommend checking out the Flickr set I’ve put together: Site visit to Alexandra Palace. And if you’ve not applied to come yet, then there’s still time.