I find what’s happening on the rooves in Sydney’s CBD very curious. Maybe it’s just because I can’t see what’s happening on the roof – but that’s not to say something fascinating ISN’T happening there.
I have seen some rooves this week that unfortunately I have not taken photos of … but I have seen signs of people living on rooves with little gardens right on Pitt Street mall (for provincial readers, that’s very central!). But who are these people and what are they doing? Such OH&S-free lives …
Apparently, this guy on the horse [above Chanel, Castlereagh St] is a copy of l’artificier – the statue atop the Hermès store on the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré in Paris. Why Hermès thought it would be a good idea to plonk him ontop of a dull Castlereagh building is lost on me – especially without the secret Hermès garden. He is always looming out from here … who thought ‘oh, this would look nice here’?
By the way, I have just had a major spelling crisis – is the plural of roof roofs or rooves? Was taught rooves but now I look online and find that this is some old-fashioned Australian (???). What a sad dilemma I find myself entangled in (interpret that as you will). But the day we start spelling things ‘roofs’ is a bit like the day Prince Charles becomes King … such developments must be trampled on rather than encouraged.
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The guy on the horse is known as l’artificier and is a Hermes designed motif that can be found on a number of their buildings and some products. I guess they never bothered to move the statue when they relocated?
https://www.google.com/search?q=l'artificier+hermes&hl=en&sa=N&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&ei=btwzUa62Mq6kigeDhIHQCA&ved=0CFgQsAQ4Cg&biw=1920&bih=955
Ben, you are such a winner, thanks so much! Gosh, one mystery leads to another – now that you’ve told me what it is, the mystery becomes the history behind l’artificier itself and I’m sure I have enough spare time to dig deeper. But Ben, how you have come to know this is also somewhat mysterious; how did you come to understand this, surely not just general knowledge? I think all the evidence is there: you are indeed l’artificier?