Our city is perpetually blessed with inventive art in the public realm, from the ongoing Fourth Plinth initiative to last summer's telectroscope. For us, the two finest examples were the Sultan's Elephant of 2006, in which a giant steampunk pachyderm terrorised the West End, and the Cow Parade of 2002, when hundreds of bovine mannequins were unleashed upon London's squares and parks.
These two highlights are set to come together next year in an Elephant Parade. 200 unique fibreglass elephants will be left in locations around London. The models will stick around for three months before packing their trunks for a charity auction, which will raise money for elephant conservation. The idea has been used successfully in Antwerp and Rotterdam, and will reach our shores in May 2010.
Image from FaceMePLS's Flickr stream reproduced under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic.
