A singing tree...

This piece of public art is high above Burnley on the Pennine moors in Lancashire, England. It was designed by architects Mike Tonkin and Anna Liu in 2006 and won a Royal Institute of British Architects award. The Singing Ringing Tree is a 3 metre (9ft) tall construction comprising pipes of galvanised steel which harness the energy of the wind to produce a slightly discordant and penetrating choral sound covering a range of several octaves. Some of the pipes are primarily structural and aesthetic elements, while others have been cut across their width enabling the sound. The harmonic and singing qualities of the tree were produced by tuning the pipes according to their length by adding holes to the underside of each.

Today marks the 5th anniversary of its official opening to the public, so here it is:

Small big world

Or should I say big small world?

Mrsgunka sent me a link to this fascinating video:



This is the world's biggest train set which covers 1,150 square meters (12,380 square feet), features almost six miles of track and is still not complete.

Twin brothers Frederick and Gerrit Braun, 41, began work on the 'Miniatur Wonderland' in 2000.

The set covers six regions including America, Switzerland, Scandinavia, Germany and the Austrian Alps. The American section features giant models of the Rocky Mountains, Everglades, Grand Canyon and Mount Rushmore. The Swiss section has a mini-Matterhorn.The Scandinavian part has a 4ft long passenger ship floating in a 'fjord.'

It is expected to be finished in 2014, when the train set will cover more than 1,800 square meters (19,376 sq ft) and feature almost 13 miles of track, by which time detailed models of parts of France, Italy and the UK will have been added. 

It comprises 700 trains with more than 10,000 carriages and wagons. The longest train is 46ft long. The scenery includes 900 signals, 2,800 buildings, 4,000 cars - many with illuminated headlights... and 160,000 individually designed figures Thousands of kilograms of steel and wood was used to construct the scenery...

The 250,000 lights are rigged up to a system which mimics night and day by automatically turning them on and off.

The whole system is controlled from a massive high-tech nerve centre. In total the set has taken 500,000 hours and more than 8 million to put together, the vast majority of which has come from ticket sales. Gerrit said: "Our idea was to build a world that men, woman and children can be equally astonished and amazed in." Frederik added: "Whether gambling in Las Vegas, hiking in the Alps or paddling in Norwegian fjords - in Wunderland everything is possible"

Thank you, Mrsgunka.