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ICONIC PRINTS, WITHOUT THE P&P
New Street Signal Box once housed technology that was as revolutionary as the building itself. A testament to its resilience, after 50 years the boxy structure still controls what we can only assume is the busiest rail interchange this side of the Death Star. Gaining Grade II listed status in 1995, the illustration is the newest addition to design house - Dorothy's - Lost Destination prints and as a wise I Chooser, you can get it as well as three other Brum prints minus the postage and packaging. A series of throw backs to the iconic travel posters of the early 20th Century, pick from 60x80 designs (at £35 a pop here) of the Central Library, Spaghetti Junction and Rotunda. Enter BRUMMIE in the promo code box at the end of checkout to receive free standard shipping until midnight on Wednesday. Or don't, but then you'll have to pay for it, which would be £5 worth of full-on madness.
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Venue: The Stable, 115 John Bright Street, B1 1BE; website
Choice: The Perry Barr Baa (£11.50) Chooser: Co-founder, Andy
Where are your top five pizzerias in Brum? The fact that we can't answer that question - and we're not exactly ones for keeping schtum - makes us really rather cheery that a dedicated pizza place has opened up moments from New Street. Plump for the co-founder's pick. Borne out of the time Andy spent in Oz, get an Aussie roast on stone-baked sourdough. Marinated lamb, mint, goats’ curd and thyme roasted sweet potato, the anything but parochial Perry Baar Baa sums up The Stable concept - less than usual toppings, executed laudably, with an eye to the local in spite of the outfit's rapid expansion. Talking toppings, the curd is the creation of Broomhall Farm, Worcester and the Adlington smoked ham - which you'll find on the only Hawaiian we've ever enjoyed - comes care of Pheasant Oak Farm of Coventry. Masterfully lit and the right amount buzzy, herein lies a super spot for pretending to be a member of the cast of a slightly hipster version of Friends. Menu.
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WIN: 53 WEEKS OF WINE
There aren't many things for which we'd throw in this job. But when we heard that 53 bottles of wine, hand-picked by Birmingham's answer to Bordeaux (Chris Connolly) were up for grabs, we did consider other employment until the fruition of this particular competition. But enough of such silliness - if you're somehow yet to make it to Connolly's shiny, refurbed Livery Street HQ, there's ludicrous amounts of beer, enough gin to to fill 12,796 bath tubs, and even more of that fermented grape juice people seem to hold so dear. Which also means there's even more wine for Chris to pick from when it comes to prize-giving. To be in with a shot at securing a bottle of wine a week for a year, plus a bottle arriving before Christmas, enter our competition.
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MOVIE CHOICE: CAROL
OK, OK, it came out last week, but Bridge of Spies was hoovering up all the attention and this corker slipped under our net. Cate Blanchett all but clears space in her downstairs loo for her third Oscar here as the eponymous Carol, an Eisenhower-era housewife undergoing a divorce and embarking on a tentative romance with Rooney Mara – who’s also terrific. Things get complicated as Carol’s husband uses her relationship with a woman as an argument against her receiving custody of her children. It’s not exactly news that the Fifties wasn’t the most open of decades, but the strength here is the extraordinary acting: Blanchett and Mara pack more into stolen looks than some actors into whole careers, and deliver performances for the ages. Trailer and times
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