Joanne O'Connor

1 month ago | msn.com | Joanne O'Connor

Microsoft Cares About Your PrivacyMicrosoft and our third-party vendors use cookies to store and access information such as unique IDs to deliver, maintain and improve our services and ads. If you agree, MSN and Microsoft Bing will personalise the content and ads that you see. You can select ‘I Accept’ to consent to these uses or click on ‘Manage preferences’ to review your options and exercise your right to object to Legitimate Interest where used.

1 month ago | theguardian.com | Joanne O'Connor

There’s a collective intake of breath as the curator slowly unzips the white garment bag to reveal the treasure within: a white military-style jacket embellished with gold buttons and epaulettes, worn by Elton John on his 1981 World tour. To my left, laid out on a table, are a gold Versace bag and a pair of daintily embroidered blue silk shoes dating from the 1720s. To my right, a Vivienne Westwood corset and a Balenciaga pink taffeta evening dress from the 1950s.

Mar 26, 2025 | msn.com | Joanne O'Connor

Microsoft Cares About Your PrivacyMicrosoft and our third-party vendors use cookies to store and access information such as unique IDs to deliver, maintain and improve our services and ads. If you agree, MSN and Microsoft Bing will personalise the content and ads that you see. You can select ‘I Accept’ to consent to these uses or click on ‘Manage preferences’ to review your options and exercise your right to object to Legitimate Interest where used.

Mar 26, 2025 | theguardian.com | Joanne O'Connor

‘The first thing to say is that I’m a terrible swimmer,” says Amber Butchart, curator of a new exhibition on swimming that opens at the Design Museum in London this week. Growing up, school swimming lessons were “horrible, traumatic” – the cold water, the humiliation, the scrutiny from teenage boys. But something shifted when she moved to Margate 10 years ago and discovered the joy of swimming in the resort’s huge tidal pool, which was built in the 1930s.

Mar 5, 2025 | auburnpub.com | Joanne O'Connor

Maud, Fiona, Alice and Denise are the character names for the strong women featured in four tip-top films celebrating Women's History Month to be shown this March at Auburn Public Theater cinema:"Maudie" (2016) is the remarkable story of Canadian folk artist Maud Lewis (1903-1970). Most of Maud’s life was spent in poverty living in a one-room house, without running water or electricity in Marshalltown, Nova Scotia.