On first impression it’s enough to put a nesting Robin off its stride for good and liable to bring other garden creepers into disrepute - but it’s just the English celebrating Spring.

The caption to Toby Melville’s picture informs us, “A costumed festival participant marches in the Jack In The Green procession in Hastings in southern England May 5, 2008. The traditional annual May Day festival has origins at least as far back as the 17th century, with hundreds of costume-clad dancers and musicians - many dressed in green foliage - marching through the coastal town and symbolically slaying a giant Jack at the finale.”.

Some are more ‘out’ than others.

Elsewhere other revellers cover themselves in the remains of dead animals and 

there is evidence that it is something to do with fertility;

also that the Kruegers may have English country cousins.

Having grown up in the ‘Green Belt’ around London believing that ‘rural’ meant nothing to do evenings and weekends, I had always considered myself something of a country boy; however I was completely oblivious to any of this organised ritual fertility business. Of course it may just have been that I never got invited but surely all of us look pretty much alike after a couple of coats of green paint. 

As the song has it, “it’s life Jim but not as we know it“.

I wonder if it works with Magnolia emulsion paint?

Yesterday May 1 saw voters in England and Wales go to the polls to elect their local authority representatives. Londoners will have to wait until this evening to know who will be their new mayor but it is hard to imagine that it won’t be either the incumbent Labour Party candidate Ken Livingstone or the Conservative challenger Boris Johnson. Whatever the merits or otherwise of the other contenders, this has pretty much been a two horse race almost from the start. 

Some reports have said that Mayor Ken Livingstone has looked rather weary and Stephen Hird’s picture (which appears on the front of  yesterday’s FT), shows him taking a break from the last day of campaigning, at what is colloquially know in this country as a ‘greasy spoon’ cafe. Intended, I suspect, to demonstrate his ‘just-like-us-ness’. It may in fact have succeeded rather too well because he does look just like any other tired old bloke.   

Traditional symbols have been mercilessly exploited. Boris, an old Etonian had as his campaign bus one of the famous old red Routemaster London buses that Ken, as mayor, banished from service (Toby Melville).

On Polling Day Ken donned the traditional Labour politican’s garb of raincoat and Red Rosette (Toby Melville) and Boris seemed to complete the transformation into Winston Churchill that he had shown signs of earlier in the campaign (Darren Staples and Alessia Pierdomenico).

Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose.

Spring in London has finally sprung. The lid of concrete grey cloud has occasional cracks in it allowing the sun to shine through which completely transforms the appearance of the place.  

The seasonal ’showers’ this year have had a monsoon-like intensity but having suffered the discomfort of long days of rain, Londoners have been rewarded by some wonderfully dramatic sunsets as Toby Melville demonstrates

The rain has transformed London’s parks into an explosion of lush new foliage and sprawling suburbs are transformed by cherry blossom. 

However as Alessia Pierdomenico shows, for those without access to parks and gardens all is not lost, because when the sun sets the Guerilla Gardeners emerge. Working under cover of darkness, armed with seed bombs, chemical weapons and pitchforks they transform urban wasteland. “Their tactics are anarchistic, their attitude revolutionary. Their aim: to beautify.”

And London can be a very beautiful city indeed.

I live close to Richmond Park in South West London, where at dusk a few days ago the sun setting beyond the vast expanse of Heathrow Airport, shone diffused through a rain shower, turning new leaves transluscent and with the herd of deer grazing in the foreground looked just like a scene from Ridley Scott’s Legend.

Unfortunately it was one of those ‘better remembered than photographed’ moments.

The State visit to Britain by French President, Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife, Carla Bruni drew widespread attention not the least from the massed ranks of photographers and televison crews keen to record the couple’s every step.  No cliche was left unturned as members of the press vied with one another to describe their partnership.

But… a state visit by a French President would always draw interest, and with the added glamour angle you had a winning formulae.  The drab world of formal visits was to be given a makeover - I for one hoped so. In my view, the visit was not so much a breath of fresh air blowing away the cobwebs, but a mix of contrasting elements standing together. With this visit we hoped to  see contrasts of age, style and appearance. In addition the sense of anticipation was heightened because the people involved represented the historic differences between the English and the French. Would they come together in a new entente cordiale? Would the charge be led by the French President? Not on your life, it was led by his wife, the amabassador extraordinaire.

Did Carla Bruni-Sarkozy disapoint? Here are the photographs, judge for yourselves.

(Apologies for the cliches and metaphors - all of them mixed)

France’s first lady Carla Bruni is off to a good start as she rides in a carriage with Britain’s Prince Philip on route to Windsor Castle. Photograph by: Darren Staples

Bruni rides in a carriage on route to Windsor Castle.    Photograph by: Darren Staples

Usually there are are so many obstacles that either get in the way or need to be included in a photograph, that simple clean shots can often be missed. Here is a good example of a simple but solid picture of Bruni with Queen Elizabeth at Windsor Castle.   Photograph by:Kieran Doherty

This photograph shows the many contrasting elements of the visit, as  Bruni  speaks with Prince Philip during the welcoming ceremony at Windsor Castle.  Photograph by : Philippe Wojazer

It’s wasn’t all about Bruni of course, and we needed a pciture of her husband too. However, his expression tells us more about her (or, at least, his feelings for her) than about the situation.  She is applauding him after his address to members of both Houses of Parliament at Westminster.  Photograph by: Stephen Hird

Another example of the expression on the faces of others telling us something about Bruni herself, as she and Nicolas Sarkozy meet war veterans after laying a wreath at the statue of General de Gaulle in London. Photograph by: Darren Staples

The mood of the moment captured perfectly as Sarkozy and Bruni share a laugh as he delivers a speech at a meeting with the French community in London. Photograph by: Philippe Wojazer        

Here is another example of a simple, clean and effective photograph as Bruni visits the Royal Naval College in Greenwich.    Photograph by: Kieran Doherty

Bruni could hardly put a foot wrong, all she had to do was turn up to impress, as she proved when she arrived for a state banquet at the Guildhall.   Photograph by: Stephen Hird