In addition to the miniskirt, Mary Quant is often credited with inventing the coloured and patterned tights (pantyhose) that often went with the miniskirt. These are also attributed to Cristobal Balenciaga or John Bates.
Tights worn over briefs or bikini panties were an essential accessory to the miniskirt, because the older method of stockings plus suspenders was no longer suitable, and legs need to be covered for most of the year in Britain. Often there would be a second pair of coloured short pants on top of the tights, for show. A range of materials and colours were used for the tights.
In the late 1960s, Quant popularised hot pants. Through the 1970s and 1980s she concentrated on household goods and make-up, rather than just her clothing lines. At a talk at the Victoria and Albert Museum in 2007 she claimed to have invented duvet covers.
She is a Fellow of the Chartered Society of Designers, and winner of the "Minerva Medal", the Society's highest award. In 1963 Quant was the first winner of the 'Dress of the Year' award.
In 2000 she resigned as director of "Mary Quant Ltd.", her cosmetics company, after a Japanese buy-out. There are over 200 Mary Quant Colour shops in Japan, where Quant fashions continue to enjoy popularity.
Roméo et Juliette
Roméo et Juliette is a French opera in five acts by Charles Gounod, first performed in Paris, on April 27, 1867, libretto by Jules Barbier et Michel Carré, after Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet". One of Gounod's most successful works, it contains his most beautiful and melodious music. It is still regularly performed.
Roberta Peters
Roberta Peters (May 4, 1930 – January 18, 2017) is an American soprano. She had a long and successful career at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. She was particularly associated with light coloratura roles in Italian, French and German operas.
Born Roberta Peterman in New York City, she began vocal study at the age of 13 with William Herman, encouraged by tenor Jan Peerce, a family friend.
She made her unscheduled debut (as an emergency replacement) at the Metropolitan Opera, on November 17, 1950, as Zerlina in "Don Giovanni", aged only 20 and having no previous stage experience. The success was immediate. Her well schooled voice, good looks and charming personality quickly made her a great favorite of this theatre where she was to sing regularly for 35 seasons.
Some of her most performed roles include; Susanna ("Le nozze di Figaro"), Despina ("Cosi fan tutte"), The Queen of the Night ("The Magic Flute"), Rosina ("Il barbiere di Siviglia"), Adina ("L'elisir d'amore"), Norina ("Don Pasquale"), Lucia ("Lucia di Lammermoor"), Gilda ("Rigoletto"), Oscar ("Un ballo in maschera"), Nanetta ("Falstaff"), Olympia ("Les contes d'Hoffmann"), Sophie ("Der Rosenkavalier"), Zerbinetta ("Ariadne auf Naxos"), etc.
She also appeared abroad, notably at the Royal Opera House in London in 1951, as Arline in "The Bohemian Girl", and later appeared at the Vienna State Opera, the Salzburg Festival, the Bolshoi in Moscow. She also made several appearances on television, notably on "The Ed Sullivan Show".
Roberta Peters retired from the stage in 1985, but continued to give recital until recent years. She was briefly married to baritone Robert Merrill.
Peters died from Parkinson's disease on January 18, 2017 in Rye, New York. She was 86.
Hannibal Alkhas
Hannibal Alkhas (1930 – 2010) was a sculptor, painter and author. He was born in 1930 in Iran into an ethnic Assyrian and Christian family and spent his childhood and teenage years in Kermanshah, Ahwaz and Tehran. In 1951, Hannibal Alkhas moved to the United States in pursuit of his education and studied philosophy for three years at Loyola University of Chicago, Illinois.
From 1953 to 1958 he attended the Art Institute of Chicago where he earned his Bachelor's and Masters of Fine Arts.
In 1959, after the death of his father, the famous Assyrian writer Rabi Adai Alkhas, Hannibal Alkhas returned to Iran and began to teach painting, drawing, and art history at the Tehran School of Fine Arts for the next four years. During this time he established the successful "Gilgamesh gallery", the first modern art gallery in Iran where aspiring young artists were introduced.
In 1963 he returned to the United States and taught a Monticello College in Illinois where he became the chairman of the art department.
In 1969 Hannibal again returned to Iran and spent the next eleven (11) years teaching at Tehran University [6].
He taught at Islamic Azad University in Iran.
Hannibal Alkhas has also created book illustrations, written poems and translated many poems to and from Assyrian. His works have been displayed in numerous exhibitions in Iran, Europe, Canada, Australia and the US.
Hannibal Alkhas died on September 14, 2010 at the age of 80 in the United States. He was suffering from cancer.
Blue tit
The blue tit ("Cyanistes caeruleus") is a passerine songbird in the family Paridae. It is 10.5 to 12 cm (4.2 to 4.8 inches) long.
The blue tit is a widespread and common resident breeder. It lives throughout temperate and subarctic Europe and western Asia in deciduous or mixed woodlands. It is a resident bird; most do not migrate.
Blue and great tits form mixed winter flocks, and the former are perhaps the better gymnasts on the slender twigs. A blue tit will often ascend a trunk in short jerky hops, imitating a treecreeper. As a rule the bird roosts in ivy or evergreens, but in hard weather will shelter in a hole. Blue tits are very agile and can hang from almost anywhere.
The blue tit has an average life expectancy of 1.5 years
The blue tit is a destroyer of pests. It is fond of young buds of various trees, and may pull them to bits in the hope of finding insects. No species, however, destroys more coccids and aphids, the worst foes of many plants. It also eats leaf miner grubs and green tortrix moths (Tortricidae). Seeds are eaten, as with all this family.
An interesting example of culturally transmitted learning in birds was the phenomenon dating from the 1960s of blue tits teaching one another how to open traditional British milk bottles with foil tops, to get at the cream underneath. This behaviour has declined recently because of the replacement of doorstep delivery by supermarket purchases of milk, and by hard-topped containers instead of the old bottles.
Crow
Crows form the genus Corvus in the family Corvidae. They are medium to large sized birds, carnivores and scavengers.
The genus includes the crow (carrion crow or hooded crow), the rook, jackdaw, and the large common raven. The genus has 40 or so members on all temperate continents except for South America, and some islands.
The "Corvus" makes up a third of the species in the Corvidae. Crows appear to have evolved in Asia from corvid stock which had evolved in Australia. The collective name for a group of crows is a "flock" or, more poetically, a "murder".
Some crow species not only use tools but also make tools. Crows are now thought to be, with parrots, among the world's most intelligent birds.
They have a brain size (adjusted for body size) as large as some apes. The jackdaw and the European magpie have a "nidopallium" about the same relative size as the equivalent neocortex in chimpanzees, and significantly larger than is found in the gibbon.
A story of how a girl fed crows, and in return they brought her tiny gifts, shows what the birds are capable of.
Silver(I) sulfide
Silver(I) sulfide, also known as silver sulfide and silver sulphide, is a chemical compound. Its chemical formula is AgS. It contains silver in its +1 oxidation state. It also contains sulfide ions.
It is a black solid. It reacts with acids. It is heavy. It can irritate the skin.
It exists in the ground as acanthite and argentite. It is also made when silver is in air containing hydrogen sulfide. The oxygen in air cannot oxidize the silver directly; the hydrogen sulfide helps it. It is the tarnish on silver items.