The John Lennon Peace Statue

The statue is created by Laura Lian, Laura Lian is a professional artist specialising in sculpture. 

(photo from Laura Lian) 

She was originally inspired to create the John Lennon Peace Statue project to help spread John and Yoko’s message of peace and love to the world. 

(photo from Laura Lian)

Micheal Eavis (CBE and creator of the Glastonbury Festival) is supporting the project and has been to see the statue as it has been created. The statue will start a tour at Glastonbury festival in June  2019, and the statue will be shown in front of the CND tent.

(photo from Laura Lian)

The statue is nearing completion, but needs more financial backing from the public to see it come to life, there will be a link at the bottom of this article to the fundraising page. 

(photo from Laura Lian)

In recognition of any UK donations made for over £35, a "postcard" of John Lennon in profile will be sent to to you, and that price even Includes postage! And In recognition of any donations made for over £65 from outside the UK, the same "postcard" will be sent to you. 

(photo from Laura Lian)

The Limited Editions of the ceramic Postcards will be produced in batches of 20. Each one is marked with the Batch number and Edition number and is signed by the artist, Laura Lian, and 10% after costs will go to WAR CHILD charity. 

(photo from Laura Lian)

Each Postcard is hand finished and hand painted in a bronze effect and is 13cm x 10 cm in size. Please ensure you send your name and address to laura@lauralian.co.uk to enable her to send this to you.

You can find out more and contribute to the Lennon statue’s journey at their Facebook, Twitter and my Website.

(photo from Laura Lian)

https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/johnlennonpeacestatuetravels

https://twitter.com/LauraLianArtist

https://www.facebook.com/LauraLianArtist

https://www.instagram.com/laura_lian_/

http://www.lauralian.co.uk/

John at Kenwood

Kenwood is a house on the St. George's Hill estate, in Weybridge, Surrey, That John Lennon purchased in 1964. It was originally called the Brown House, and built in 1913. When John bought Kenwood on 15th July, he paid £20,000 (that’s just under £400,000 in today’s money) and along with his wife Cynthia and son Julian he moved in that summer.

(photo from google image search)

The private estate that the house was built on was also home to other music stars like Tom Jones and Cliff Richard, and not long after John moving in, Ringo and George also moved in close by.

(photo from google image search) 

Lennon spent £40,000 on renovating the house, a house he said he didn’t particularly like, thinking of it as more a stop over till a better house came up that he liked more. 

(photos from google image search)

He reduced the 22 rooms in the house into 17, he had the grounds landscaped along with an outdoor swimming pool, the swimming pool was originally meant to have an expensive mirror bottom to it,  but John finally decided on a mosaic eye on the bottom of the pool!

(Photo from google image search) 

Finally a heavy sliding wooden gate was fitted to keep the fans out. In the entrance hall Lennon had a suit of armour and a gorilla suit. In the living room was two 18 foot long sofas. And then there was the famous sun room, covered with curios, paintings, caricatures and stickers. The sofa in the sun room was a present from his Aunt Mimi, and he spent a lot of his time laying out on it. 

(photo from google image search)

And that was only some of the rooms on the ground floor, there were two other floors to explore in Lennon’s new home. As well as a massive master bedroom, there were 5 other bedrooms. In the guest  bedroom hung artwork by old band mate and friend Stuart Sutcliffe.

(photo from goole image search) 

The top floor of the house was ‘Lennon’s’ painting it in a bright colour, only to run out of paint before he finished, so he simply continued painting the rest of the room in a different colour. The join between the two was hardly flawless. He installed lots of musical equipment on this floor, for making his own demos for music.

(photos from google image search) 

It was here that John and Yoko made their unfinished music album ‘two virgins’ just before they made love for the first time together. In another room in the attic John filled with three full sets of the model car racing game, Scalextric. 

(Photo from google image search) 

John has 10 cats while at Kenwood and he would the grounds with one of them sitting on his shoulder. It was in the sunroom of Kenwood where (returning from a holiday) Cynthia walked in on John and Yoko in bath robes acting as if they were a married couple. This event signalled the end end of Cynthia and John’s marriage.

(photo from google image search) 

Tittenhurst Park

“A working class hero is something to be” and it might well be. But John was not working class, and more so I don’t believe he ever wanted to be. This is a man who was being driven around his ascot mansion in a Rolls Royce. 

(photo from google image search) 

John’s home from the summer of 1969 till the early 70’s was Tittenhurst Park. A Grade II listed early Georgian country house that was set in its own 72 acres estate. 

(photo from google image search)

It was at this house that John would film and record his most famous album and movie ‘imagine’. The house was bought in May 69 by John and his new wife Yoko for £145,000, (although some say it was £150,000) a price that was large then but now, for such a large piece of property seems amazing value for money. 

(photo from google image search)

From the minute the beatle moved in he wanted things changed. The ground floor was converted into one giant open plan space, nearly completely white. And he built his own studio on the estate also so he would no longer have to always go into London to record at Abbey Road studios either. They also, without permission, had a lake illegally dug out and filled with water at the park, making a small island in the middle to put a summer house on.

(photo from google image search) 

Small boats were purchased to row around and the lake filled with fish, however they all died as the lining that was used in the construction of the lake was actually killing the fish. In 1970 John’s famous white piano was delivered and placed in a room to the front of the house, known as the white room. 

(photo from google image search)

The room large nearly floor to ceiling windows were covered by white wooden shutters. This is the room where the music video for ‘imagine’ was filmed. The gardens of the the estate, were open to the public before The Lebanon’s had moved in, showing off its many rare trees and parkland. 

(photo from google image search) 

A grand house befitting someone with a title more then someone who had been a rebellious teen from Liverpool, it was here that The Beatles had their very last photo shoot as band before John left in late 69. 

(photo from google image search)

When John and Yoko left the grand white mansion to move to America he sold it to Ringo Starr, who went on to have more music videos shot there! And no doubt he made good use of ‘the ascot sound studios’ that John had built there.