Miscellanea Cantabrigiana
Four things
Relieve the unremitting tedium of Cambridge life with four Good Things.
The Mitre pub on Bridge Street
At the risk of sounding incredibly clichéd, there’s a lot out there. The following list of four Cambridge treats may be unoriginal, but you can never have enough ways to broaden your mind without leaving the Fens.
The ‘Changing Spaces’ project
All city centres have empty shop fronts. Sometimes this is a result of the healthy turnover of business ventures which is essential to a dynamic economy; sometimes, as now, it is a sign of a damaging recession. The sight of rows of failed businesses is never a cheery one: how brilliant of the City Council, then, to have set up a scheme – ‘Changing Spaces’ – which fills unused shop fronts with art installations by students, Cambridge residents and small businesses. You may have seen them without quite noticing – at the moment there are examples on Market Square and All Saints’ Passage, among many other places. So fascinating are the results that it almost seems a pity when the venues find a new tenant. More details are available at http://changing-spaces.org/.
Castle Mound
Nothing brings back that exhilarating feeling of childhood quite like running up and down small hills. If you can bear the hike up to the Castle Mound (unless you’re lucky enough to be at a hill college), a treat lies in store. The view is unparalleled, the slight sense of danger is thrilling, and nothing beats rolling down a Norman castle. If the tangible sense of history doesn’t get you, the adrenaline will.
The foyer of the Fitz
No doubt everyone has their own favourite artwork in the Fitzwilliam Museum; mine is the building, with its perfect proportions, elegant fusion of neo-classical and Art Nouveau and lavish wallpaper. The most extraordinary part of an extraordinary edifice is the entrance hall, built by E.M. Barry in the 1870s. It may be a bit rich for some tastes, its mixture of brown, pink and gold a little overpowering, but its huge scale and delicate decoration are seductive. If this is just the foyer, it seems to ask, what of everything else? In another setting in might be vulgar; introducing such a storehouse of treasures, its aggressive beauty seems only appropriate.
The Mitre
Hunting for empty shops, playing on the castle and drowning in Fitz splendour are tiring work. Some pubs are prettier; some are more famous; some are smarter; but the Mitre, on Bridge St, is perfect nonetheless. It is the least self-conscious pub in Cambridge, it’s never full of students, and not only are the staff friendlier than anywhere else, they actually know about the beer they’re serving. Everyone has a favourite pub, and I cannot hope to convince anyone that they are wrong, but to me the Mitre feels like home.
There’s always something to see, somewhere to go.
Topics: Cambridge
