LINK TO ARTICLE
Saturday, 19 February 2011
LEEDS GUIDE Review (Feb 2011)
LINK TO ARTICLE
Lauren Wright gives her verdict on the much talked about display of pop memorabilia
As a huge fan of the Spice Girls when I was growing up, I thought a Spice Girl exhibition would be a dream come true – and it didn’t disappoint.
It was a trip down memory lane full of the merchandise I had owned myself and even more of the merchandise I had wanted. Being only seven when the Spice Girls first came on the scene I hadn’t actually realised that it was only a couple of years from their first number one single to when Geri left the band. They accomplished so much in such a short space of time!
The exhibition is full of memorabilia, magazine covers, special edition CDs, clothes and shoes worn by the girls as well as the platinum awards they won. Various Spice Girl classics are being played throughout the exhibition and the Spice World film is also being shown – I was very tempted to sit down and watch it but had to restrain myself (I will definitely look for it on DVD though). The assortment of items is impressive to say the least; it is shocking to think that this is all one person’s collection.
As well as having all this on display the exhibition has a number of activities, so it’s good for keeping children of all ages entertained. There is a ‘VIP Manager’s Pass’ to pick up as you walk into the exhibition which can be filled in along the way, which is a step-by-step manager trail to see how the Spice Girls became global stars and to learn how to create a successful band – it’s a fun activity for children and makes the whole exhibition interactive.
There is also a section to accessorise your own pop star for an interview by colouring in a printed face and since all the sheets had been used by the time I got there (which I was very disappointed about!) this is obviously a popular activity. There is also a dressing up section with wigs, outfits and accessories, which is not just for the girls, as there was a little boy dressing up as Geri Halliwell in a ginger wig and finding it hilarious. And to top it off you could participate in ‘score the star’, which gives you the chance to sing along to the Spice Girls classics and be scored on a scale of one to 10.
This exhibition definitely took me back to my childhood and for the time I was there I was just as willing to participate in all the activities available as the children were (I make a great Geri Halliwell!). I would definitely recommend it to anyone who was (or still is) a Spice Girls fan and any parents with children who want something different to do on a Sunday afternoon – and after all, it is free!
Lauren Wright gives her verdict on the much talked about display of pop memorabilia
As a huge fan of the Spice Girls when I was growing up, I thought a Spice Girl exhibition would be a dream come true – and it didn’t disappoint.
It was a trip down memory lane full of the merchandise I had owned myself and even more of the merchandise I had wanted. Being only seven when the Spice Girls first came on the scene I hadn’t actually realised that it was only a couple of years from their first number one single to when Geri left the band. They accomplished so much in such a short space of time!
The exhibition is full of memorabilia, magazine covers, special edition CDs, clothes and shoes worn by the girls as well as the platinum awards they won. Various Spice Girl classics are being played throughout the exhibition and the Spice World film is also being shown – I was very tempted to sit down and watch it but had to restrain myself (I will definitely look for it on DVD though). The assortment of items is impressive to say the least; it is shocking to think that this is all one person’s collection.
As well as having all this on display the exhibition has a number of activities, so it’s good for keeping children of all ages entertained. There is a ‘VIP Manager’s Pass’ to pick up as you walk into the exhibition which can be filled in along the way, which is a step-by-step manager trail to see how the Spice Girls became global stars and to learn how to create a successful band – it’s a fun activity for children and makes the whole exhibition interactive.
There is also a section to accessorise your own pop star for an interview by colouring in a printed face and since all the sheets had been used by the time I got there (which I was very disappointed about!) this is obviously a popular activity. There is also a dressing up section with wigs, outfits and accessories, which is not just for the girls, as there was a little boy dressing up as Geri Halliwell in a ginger wig and finding it hilarious. And to top it off you could participate in ‘score the star’, which gives you the chance to sing along to the Spice Girls classics and be scored on a scale of one to 10.
This exhibition definitely took me back to my childhood and for the time I was there I was just as willing to participate in all the activities available as the children were (I make a great Geri Halliwell!). I would definitely recommend it to anyone who was (or still is) a Spice Girls fan and any parents with children who want something different to do on a Sunday afternoon – and after all, it is free!
OFFICIAL LEEDS CITY COUNCIL Press Release (18/02/2011)
LINK TO ARTICLE
Spiceworld Exhibition makes record-breaking start
The new exhibition devoted to the Spice Girls at Leeds City Museum is already proving a record-breaker.
In its first two weeks the exhibition based around memorabilia and merchandise from the most successful girl band of all time has attracted over 5,000 visitors – smashing all records for new exhibitions at the museum.
And news of its success has even made its way to Los Angeles, home of Leeds’ own Spice Girl Mel B. Such has been the number of messages she has received praising the exhibition, Mel replied on Twitter saying “Thank you for all your amazing pics from the Leeds Spice exhibition” and even hinting at a return to the city to see it in person by telling collector Liz West “I will make a point of taking a trip to you to see it all for myself.”
Since opening to the public on 28 January, over 5,400 people flocked to the museum off Millennium Square to visit the exhibition in its first two weeks. This compares to 3,500 who attended the first two weeks of the previous best attended exhibition, Dr Rock’s Lost Gallery which was on display last year.
Running until July, ‘Spiceworld: The exhibition’ is free to enter and celebrates the success of the Spice Girls as well as examining what it takes to be a modern celebrity.
The basis for the exhibition is the extraordinary collection of Yorkshire’s Liz West, who is the foremost collector of official Spice Girls memorabilia and merchandise in the country with almost 4,000 items of all kinds devoted to the band.
The exhibition at Leeds City Museum is the first time Liz’s collection has ever been on display in its entirety in public and features outfits worn by the band, accessories, platinum discs, books, magazines and dolls being sourced from all over the world.
Spice Girls memorabilia collector Liz West said:
“I am absolutely delighted that so many people have taken an interest in coming to the exhibition. Everyone who has seen it seems to like it so that is great to see. Obviously it would be amazing if Mel B came along to see it for herself – the offer of a full tour is always open whenever she likes!”
Leeds City Museum curator of exhibitions Helen Langwick said:
“The visitor numbers for the first two weeks have been really impressive and we are all really pleased. People of all ages are coming along to see it and that shows it has the broad appeal that we were hoping it would.
“The fact so many people have been in touch with Mel B to praise the exhibition is really nice to hear. We look forward to welcoming thousands more people to see it in the coming weeks and months.”
As part of the exhibition, wannabe popstars will have the chance to emulate their heroes at a special tribute day on Friday 25 February. Taking place from 10:30am-12:30pm and 1:30pm-3:30pm, fans can visit the museum dressed as their favourite music star and have their photo taken which will be added to the wall on fame in the exhibition. They can also follow in the footsteps of their heroes and perform for their friends and family in the SingStar interactive zone.
Spiceworld: The exhibition will run at Leeds City Museum from Friday 28 January to Sunday 3 July. Admission is free.
For further information on Leeds City Museum, visit the website at http://www.leeds.gov.uk/citymuseum/
Notes to editors:
The Spice Girls are Melanie Brown, Emma Bunton, Melanie Chisholm, Geri Halliwell and Victoria Beckham (née Adams) who quickly became known by the nicknames Scary, Baby, Sporty, Ginger and Posh.
Following the impact of debut single ‘Wannabe’ which topped the charts in 31 countries in 1996, the Spice Girls enjoyed phenomenal success selling over 80 million records worldwide, having nine UK number one singles, starring in their own feature film and creating the ‘girl power’ mantra which is credited with inspiring a generation of girls and women to achieve.
FAMILIES LEEDS Blog Review (31/01/2011)
LINK TO ARTICLE
Spicemania returns to LEEDS
Families Leeds reviews Leeds City Museum's new SpiceWorld Exhibition
Pull on your platform boots and check your lip stick. You're invited to go behind the scenes at a Spice Girls concert and take a trip down memory lane with one of the biggest pop bands of all time. Leeds City Museum are hosting a collection of over 3,000 items of Spice Girls memorabilia hoarded by fan Liz West over more than a decade. From key rings and branded chocolate bars to some of the most memorable outfits worn by the give Wannabees, it's all here for you to see. As you walk into the exhibition, you're invited to be either an artist or a manager, and take their journey with Baby, Sporty, Ginger, Posh and Leeds' own Scary. Given Mel B's roots here in Yorkshire the City Museum is the obvious choice for such an exhibition, and they're delighted to be hosting it.
"This is contemporary collecting at its best," says Helen Langwick, Curator of Exhibitions at Leeds City Museum. "Liz is a modern day version of the people in Victorian times who traveled the world collecting crocodiles. They are the reason we have museums and the collections of today, like this, are the history of tomorrow."
The Spice Girl's history is the history of a generation, the history of the 90s. Their Girl Power slogan made a generation of young women, my generation, believe they could be anything they wanted to be. Girl Power is everywhere as you walk around the exhibition - it's in the music, on the magazine covers and in the masses and masses of merchandise Spicemania produced. For Liz West, collector and Co-Curator of the Exhibition, seeing her collection in the museum is a huge achievement. But is there anything she hasn't got?
"I'm proudest of the outfits - especially the ones worn by Mel B," says Liz. "I'd obviously love to get hold of Geri's Union Jack dress, and I'd like a set of outfits worn by all five girls at the same time."
The exhibition runs at the museum until July and Liz is keen to take her collection to other museums across the country to share her love of Girl Power with more Spice fans. For now though, Helen and her team here in Leeds are delighted to play host.
"We hope to bring people in to see something they easily recognise, then hopefully they'll walk across the corridor to go to the Ancient World gallery and learn about something they didn't know about. "
It's an exhibition that has something for everyone. For the Spice Fan, there are facts, memories and music galore. For the sons and daughters of the Spice Fans out there, this is an interactive exhibition. Pull a cord to listen to a best selling track, dress up and take to the stage to sing Wannabee, or simply take a seat and enjoy the Spice World Movie. If you're not a fan when you walk in, you will be when you leave!
CULTURE VULTURES Blog Review (18/02/2011)
LINK TO ARTICLE
Spice Up Your Life
by Eleanor Snare
We don’t think that either of us could accurately predict what effect this exhibition would have on us. Both big Spice Girls fan in our yoof with our particular favourites – Geri, for Elly (naturally), and Sporty for Jess – this exhibition was at once utterly delightful and completely worrying. Jess unashamedly loved the Spice Girls when she was a youngun’, and for her walking into the exhibition was a little like stepping back a decade and a half.
The theme itself, ingeniously, has been expanded from just ‘the Spice Girls’, into a walk-through event where you choose either a Manager or Artist card at the beginning. Really, this is an exhibition about the music industry, about the manufacture of pop and Spice Girls-mania, and the cards you pick contain little, quite tongue-in-cheek questions for you to fill out as you explore the exhibition.
The sheer volume of stuff that has been collected over the years is astonishing. Aside from the maybe more obvious posters, CD editions, magazine covers and the like, also on show are some of the costumes the Girls wore for their stage shows. Mel B’s catsuits and Emma’s giant boots were there, and much of it custom made.
But this wasn’t just a “Spice Girls” exhibition. This was an homage to everything utterly rubbish about the 1990s. The first corridor you came to was all the magazine covers from the beginning to the end of the Spice Girls’ life. The way the girls’ faces change, the hair, the clothes: it brought back many memories of school, wearing your hair in a scrape back with two dangling bits down the side of the face even though you know it doesn’t suit you, because that was “the style”. Reliving some of those memories was an integral part of the exhibition. Geared towards interactivity, the exhibition has a dressing up area, an art table where you can design your own Spice Girl or album cover, and a karaoke stage to croon to rubbish music of the 90s or early 2000s.
There were two concepts that really stood out to us. Firstly, the collection of all the ephemera of the Spice Girls over the years, including after their split and subsequent solo careers, made very transparent just how manufactured the entire thing was. Shifts in personal image, calculated poses and quotations, rapid turnover of merchandise: when you’re a young gel hollering along to ‘Spice Up Your Life’, these things don’t really register. What was really sad was how much we bought into this. At the start of the exhibition they genuinely come across as likeable, normal girls. It’s only when you see fifty changing pictures of them in a row you realise just how choreographed even their photos are. They even had their own coloured pens to “tell them apart” for autographs. Although we’re used to the X Factor and Bieber-ites now, whose very existence is a long-game that has been planned, step by step, from the start, the Spice Girls really took the biscuit. They were the manufactured, shoddy pop starlets, who were dressed up like dollies and paraded around, who conquered the world. They laid the foundation for all the Britain’s Got Nowt Talent wannabes because they succeeded where so many others continue to fail.
Secondly, we were both shocked by the unadulterated fanaticism of this collector, Liz West. It’s something people often joke about, about keeping things in wrappers, vainly trawling eBay for that long-lost first pressing, but here it was, real as the nose on V. Beckham’s face (ha) and utterly, utterly bizarre. While both Jess and I owned some Spice Girls memorabilia – postcards, lollipops, kids’ stuff – the sheer volume of all these THINGS was astounding. A whole wall, entitled ‘Props Store’, was taken up with DVDs, videos, comics, books, electronics, dolls, sweets – all Spice Girls themed, and all in their original packaging. As Jess aptly put it: ‘Imagine pulling a guy, and then you bring him home to your flat, and then there’s this’. It’s an exposure of the young, feminine side of Comic Book Guy.
This isn’t a negative appraisal, however. In fact, there are a lot of obsessed fans out there whose collection of stamps, shrunken heads, Coronation tea-towels and the like, could make some incredibly interesting and surreal exhibitions. Maybe that’s the next step – send a call out to all those who collect, avidly and without stopping, the stuff of everyday life, and use it to show people things maybe they hadn’t realised before. This exhibition will be a trip down Memory Lane for some, and maybe with a sharp left turn down Honesty Drive for others.
Find out more about the exhibition on the Leeds City Museum website. The exhibition will be running for the foreseeable future. Find out more about the collection on Spice Girls Collection Online.
Spice Up Your Life
by Eleanor Snare
We don’t think that either of us could accurately predict what effect this exhibition would have on us. Both big Spice Girls fan in our yoof with our particular favourites – Geri, for Elly (naturally), and Sporty for Jess – this exhibition was at once utterly delightful and completely worrying. Jess unashamedly loved the Spice Girls when she was a youngun’, and for her walking into the exhibition was a little like stepping back a decade and a half.
The theme itself, ingeniously, has been expanded from just ‘the Spice Girls’, into a walk-through event where you choose either a Manager or Artist card at the beginning. Really, this is an exhibition about the music industry, about the manufacture of pop and Spice Girls-mania, and the cards you pick contain little, quite tongue-in-cheek questions for you to fill out as you explore the exhibition.
The sheer volume of stuff that has been collected over the years is astonishing. Aside from the maybe more obvious posters, CD editions, magazine covers and the like, also on show are some of the costumes the Girls wore for their stage shows. Mel B’s catsuits and Emma’s giant boots were there, and much of it custom made.
But this wasn’t just a “Spice Girls” exhibition. This was an homage to everything utterly rubbish about the 1990s. The first corridor you came to was all the magazine covers from the beginning to the end of the Spice Girls’ life. The way the girls’ faces change, the hair, the clothes: it brought back many memories of school, wearing your hair in a scrape back with two dangling bits down the side of the face even though you know it doesn’t suit you, because that was “the style”. Reliving some of those memories was an integral part of the exhibition. Geared towards interactivity, the exhibition has a dressing up area, an art table where you can design your own Spice Girl or album cover, and a karaoke stage to croon to rubbish music of the 90s or early 2000s.
There were two concepts that really stood out to us. Firstly, the collection of all the ephemera of the Spice Girls over the years, including after their split and subsequent solo careers, made very transparent just how manufactured the entire thing was. Shifts in personal image, calculated poses and quotations, rapid turnover of merchandise: when you’re a young gel hollering along to ‘Spice Up Your Life’, these things don’t really register. What was really sad was how much we bought into this. At the start of the exhibition they genuinely come across as likeable, normal girls. It’s only when you see fifty changing pictures of them in a row you realise just how choreographed even their photos are. They even had their own coloured pens to “tell them apart” for autographs. Although we’re used to the X Factor and Bieber-ites now, whose very existence is a long-game that has been planned, step by step, from the start, the Spice Girls really took the biscuit. They were the manufactured, shoddy pop starlets, who were dressed up like dollies and paraded around, who conquered the world. They laid the foundation for all the Britain’s Got Nowt Talent wannabes because they succeeded where so many others continue to fail.
Secondly, we were both shocked by the unadulterated fanaticism of this collector, Liz West. It’s something people often joke about, about keeping things in wrappers, vainly trawling eBay for that long-lost first pressing, but here it was, real as the nose on V. Beckham’s face (ha) and utterly, utterly bizarre. While both Jess and I owned some Spice Girls memorabilia – postcards, lollipops, kids’ stuff – the sheer volume of all these THINGS was astounding. A whole wall, entitled ‘Props Store’, was taken up with DVDs, videos, comics, books, electronics, dolls, sweets – all Spice Girls themed, and all in their original packaging. As Jess aptly put it: ‘Imagine pulling a guy, and then you bring him home to your flat, and then there’s this’. It’s an exposure of the young, feminine side of Comic Book Guy.
This isn’t a negative appraisal, however. In fact, there are a lot of obsessed fans out there whose collection of stamps, shrunken heads, Coronation tea-towels and the like, could make some incredibly interesting and surreal exhibitions. Maybe that’s the next step – send a call out to all those who collect, avidly and without stopping, the stuff of everyday life, and use it to show people things maybe they hadn’t realised before. This exhibition will be a trip down Memory Lane for some, and maybe with a sharp left turn down Honesty Drive for others.
Find out more about the exhibition on the Leeds City Museum website. The exhibition will be running for the foreseeable future. Find out more about the collection on Spice Girls Collection Online.
Saturday, 12 February 2011
Order your Spice Girls Exhibition catalogue HERE:
Published to coincide with the touring exhibition Spiceworld: The ExhibitionLeeds City Museum 28th January - 3rd July 2011
£12.00
by Liz West
Foreword by Nicholas Oddy
Designed by Matt West & Designers Front
Paperback
102 Pages
Published by Kroma Press
Examples of inside pages:
Friday, 11 February 2011
MYHOILGAY.COM Blog Review (08/02/2011)
LINK TO ARTICLE
Gay Travel: Spice Girls Exhibition, Leeds, England.
Now be honest which was your favorite Spice Girl? Was it Sporty, Baby, Posh Ginger or Scary? Well its been 15 years since Girl Power came alive with their first hit ‘Wannabee’ went to number one in the UK. They have remained a popular band for gays and lesbians all over the world and you can still hear their tracks chosen on juke boxes in many a gay bar!
For die hard fans you need to travel to Leeds, in Yorkshire, England for a unique Spice Girls Exhibition. Leeds City Museum have chosen to celebrate Girl Power, with a special exhibition on the five pop princesses.
Spiceworld features an extensive collection of Spice Girls memorabilia, which has been loaned to the museum by Spice Girls super fan Liz West. Liz has nearly 4000 pieces of Spice Girls merchandise, including clothes worn by band members!
Gay and lesbian fans of the Spice Girls group have until July 3rd to see the exhibition, so plenty of time to arrange your travel to Leeds.
Gay fans traveling to Leeds will find the Spiceworld Exhibition is one of many attractions the city has to offer. The city has a vibrant gay scene which is concentrated in and around a couple of streets in the centre of the city. This is a city for clubbing and the gay club nights in the city are legendary. Time your trip with one of these ultimate gay club nights, to ensure you maximize your trip.
www.leeds.gov.uk/citymuseum
Gay Travel: Spice Girls Exhibition, Leeds, England.
Now be honest which was your favorite Spice Girl? Was it Sporty, Baby, Posh Ginger or Scary? Well its been 15 years since Girl Power came alive with their first hit ‘Wannabee’ went to number one in the UK. They have remained a popular band for gays and lesbians all over the world and you can still hear their tracks chosen on juke boxes in many a gay bar!
For die hard fans you need to travel to Leeds, in Yorkshire, England for a unique Spice Girls Exhibition. Leeds City Museum have chosen to celebrate Girl Power, with a special exhibition on the five pop princesses.
Spiceworld features an extensive collection of Spice Girls memorabilia, which has been loaned to the museum by Spice Girls super fan Liz West. Liz has nearly 4000 pieces of Spice Girls merchandise, including clothes worn by band members!
Gay and lesbian fans of the Spice Girls group have until July 3rd to see the exhibition, so plenty of time to arrange your travel to Leeds.
Gay fans traveling to Leeds will find the Spiceworld Exhibition is one of many attractions the city has to offer. The city has a vibrant gay scene which is concentrated in and around a couple of streets in the centre of the city. This is a city for clubbing and the gay club nights in the city are legendary. Time your trip with one of these ultimate gay club nights, to ensure you maximize your trip.
www.leeds.gov.uk/citymuseum
Friday, 4 February 2011
GAYLEEDS.COM Review (04/02/2011)
LINK TO ARTICLE
Spiceworld: The Exhibition
GayLeeds.com attended the opening of Spiceworld : The Exhibition at Leeds Museum last week. Based on local Spice Girls fanatic Liz West’s personal collection of Spice Girls memorabilia, the free exhibition allows you to follow your own journey to stardom through the history of the Spice Girls.
We were treated to Spice Girls covers by a local band, and food from the exhibition’s sponsor, Spice Quarter. After a few speeches, and a couple of drinks, GayLeeds and a gaggle of over excited gays toured the exhibition.
You might think that a collection by a local collector would be slightly underwhelming, but you’d be thinking wrong. Liz’s collection is massive, and there are an overwhelming amount of Spice Girls paraphernalia in this exhibition. Curator Helen Langwick told GayLeeds that there are more pieces in the exhibition than in the entire museum - that’s Spice Power!
There is just about everything that you can imagine or remember about the Spice Girls in this exhibition, including platinum and gold certification plaques, posters, magazines, tour passes and programmes and clothing. There’s even a Spice Girls Polaroid camera. (If there’s a particular piece of Spice Girls memorabilia you clearly remember owning in the 90s, even if no-one else does, it will be in this exhibition!) The exhibition also charts the girl’s solo careers and successes. The most interesting part of the exhibition is close to the end, where theres bookshelves stuffed with thousands of Spice Girls endorsed products.
We met collector Liz West, who is exactly what you’d expect from a Spice Girls fanatic - mental, but fabulous. She told us her favourite Spice Girl is Mel C, and told us all about her journey collecting all the pieces, and rivalry between other collectors. Her enthusiasm certainly rubs off - GayLeeds were soon in the dressing up box and taking, rather unprofessionally, to the Spice Girl karaoke stage. Yes, you can even dress up like your favourite Spice Girl and sing along to your favourite song!
Here at GayLeeds we might be slightly biased (considering we adore The Spice Girls) but this exhibition is definitely worth checking out. It’s a jam packed, fun, colourful trip down memory lane into one of music’s most loved and iconic group.
Spiceworld : The Exhibition is open now at Leeds Museum, and runs until July. Free entry.
Leeds City Museum, Millennium Square, Leeds, LS2 8BH. For more info visit the website.
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