Back in November the British Museum announced the ‘Rosetta Project’, an estimated £1 billion refurbishment plan named after the crown jewel in their Egypt collection. But recently the museum decided to ditch the name.
It seems to be a shrewd diplomatic move. The museum has come under pressure to repatriate various artefacts from its permanent collection, including the Rosetta Stone, the Parthenon Marbles and the Benin Bronzes. A petition to return the Rosetta Stone, drawn up by Egypt’s former minister of antiquities Zahi Hawass, has around 200,000 signatures so far.
The project will now be referred to as the more innocuous Masterplan, says the Art Newspaper. It will see a refresh of museum displays, and an upgrade of the old building, which has been known to spring leaks here and there.
Nonna’s pasta fills in the gaps
The hardest part of acting, thinks Stanley Tucci, is the time spent “languishing” in the trailer. Tucci says to pass the hours he watches Pasta Grannies on YouTube, where a British woman travels around Italy filming nonagenarian nonnas making pasta. “There’s no production value or anything like that,” he adds. Perhaps this is refreshing for Tucci, whose latest TV series with cost $300 million.
Who was who at the Coronation?
House of Commons librarians are scrambling to compile a comprehensive guest list of the Coronation so that historians of the future can look up who went. David Torrance, a library clerk, tweeted: “The great & good are easy enough to track down, but I’m thinking more local heroes”. He has asked any humble folk who bagged an invitation to Westminster Abbey to get in touch.
Priestly pique
The Bishop of London, Sarah Mullally, got a sharp letter this week from Fergus Butler-Gallie, a writer and former priest in her diocese. He writes of a “misery inducing” period in which “I spent a year living out of bags.” He also cites examples of bad management and calls the diocese “a byword for institutional failure”. Butler-Gallie told us he received “a classic non-reply” from the Bishop.
Veuve launches a corker
This week at the Conrad hotel in Victoria, champagne house Veuve Clicquot launched its new vintage, La Grande Dame 2015, with an intimate dinner from Sally Abé, the Michelin-star head chef of The Pem restaurant. Abé’s menu was specially cooked up to compliment the vintage. Italian artist Paola Paronetto, who designed an accompanying range of sculptures, flew in to taste the fizz with her translator.
Designs on the Strand
Last night Sabrina Elba and Vogue editor Edward Enninful celebrated the Designer Fashion Fund at 180 Strand. Queer Eye’s Tan France, model Mary Charteris and singers Ellie Goulding and Pixie Lott were also there.
