We’ve long liked temporary “parade” sculpture trails in London – they make exploring a neighbourhood even more interesting, if around the corner is one of many Gromits, Shaun the Sheeps, kangaroos, elephants, Morphs giraffes or, owls or cows (the Cow Parade was, we think the original). We especially like them when they come with a bespoke hand-drawn map, and the Walking with the Snowman trail, set up around Fleet Street in the western half of the City of London, delivers on all fronts.
There’s 12 decorated Snowman sculptures to visit, in the area until the end of January. Various artists have decorated the sculptures, and the map, featured here and available for download, or obtainable from the City of London Information Centre outside St Paul’s Cathedral, was drawn by children’s illustrator and comedian Olaf Falafel. The trail was set up by Wild in Art, who do a lot of this sort of thing.
And what a lovely map. It is both strongly themed, but also navigationally useful (with the main street network, and tube and railway stations, all present). Each snowman location has a small numbered circle shoing the correct place to spot the sculpture (plus a big snowman vignette nearby). The area containing the snowmen is surrounded by a serious of Christmas tree lights, and there’s a lovely sprinking of Christmas trees, holly and so on and so forth. And a polar bear.
We featured the Festive Fleet Street Quarter at around this time last year. It’s great to see the Fleet Street Quarter Business Improvement District is continuing to produce great looking maps, showcasing the area and season. The trail is ready to visit now, and the BID has also lit up one of the buildings facing Ludgate Circus, with a “waterfall” of lights, while Chancery Lane’s Christmas lights switch on on 28 November at 5pm, and New Street Square’s Christmas tree gets lit up from 5pm on 30 November.
All extracts are from the official map which is © Snowman Enterprises Ltd 2023.