University College London Alumni

"Make a list of herbs you want to grow. Begin with the s and greys, as these will make the framework of the garden and be most apparent in the winter. These plants include , , , , , and ."

"Chrysanthemum parthenium aureum, the golden feverfew — now known as aureum, is the golden variety of the old physic herb grown widely an antidote to fever and headache. it is native to Europe and reliably hardy."

"Rosemary Verey, who has died aged 82, was the doyenne of the gardening world. A pioneer gardener, designer and writer, she made "good" gardening popular, and by her example — both in the aesthetic and practical horticulture so admired at her home at , , and through her serious, but highly readable, books - she also made it achievable by a whole new generation. ... Verey's work as a designer established her particular style throughout Britain and in north America, with the Prince of Wales, Sir Elton John and among her clients. In the United States, she designed for many private individuals, as well as creating a large plan for a new (still to be implemented) at the ."

"s are undoubtedly among the garden aristocrats and every garden should have one, somewhow, but not on an east-facing exposure. They are and their oval shiny leaves are a joy at all times of the year, but they come into full glory when covered in flowers. The sheer number of varieties and is bewildering. For years I only admired them from afar, put off from growing them, by my very limey soil and by the successful growers who made me fell too ignorant to own them"

"Long before it was a fancy , was famous for its . Designed by the hallowed Rosemary Verey, its vistas of purple , avenues of trees, walls and emerald lawns still cause gardeners to gasp with pleasure."

"… The accepted idea of the of a building, furniture or a painting, as the rehabilitation of an object already in existence, albeit in imperfect form, cannot be applied to gardens which are by their nature organic. They have allotted life spans and have been dug up and refashioned over the centuries. ... At the has been able to restore the garden of the great from original plans, so that the design of the s and seen today is much as Evelyn described it when he visited in 1678. At in the National Trust has restored a from engravings, existing evidence and plant list which have enabled them to use contemporary plants including old cultivars of Turkish irises, apples and pears and old tulips. A current true restoration is being undertaken at , , where the poet 's famous beds, painted by in 1777, are being reinstated with authentic planting. … The ultimate in scholarly garden reconstruction is the Roman garden at executed through excavation and .."

"In the and the of the , grandiloquent homes were built for the nation's leaders and heroes with great avenues of approach and triumphal arches. Villages which were found to stand in the way of these grandiose undertakings were removed out of sight. Sweeping changes were made at the seat of the , the victor of , which necessitated the moving of the village of in ; was destroyed in the creating of 's dramatic for the ; disappeared in the lay-out for the magnificent seat of the in . The great Whig palaces and extensive gardens at , and overran ancient villages and hamlets that stood in the way of improvements. , who had envisaged an avenue of trees between London and his , began his improvements by removing the village of which lay in the shadow of his house. The village of in was resited to give breathing space to the family of . ... By the middle of the century great gardens were being made, not only to reflect their creator's importance or political beliefs, but to demonstrate the excellence of his taste. The new vogue was not for great avenues, canals, fountains and grand parterres but for naturalized landscape. Wealthy families in every county bought up vast tracts of land to make natural gardens, which would look like landscape paintings; some took the English countryside for these picture gardens and with the help of idealized and, 'improved' it; the with memories of their s revelled in the creation of Italian classical landscapes."

"Mavis fell in love with her future husband, , himself one of the Bletchley “break-in” experts, after he helped her with a particularly difficult code breaking problem: “I was alone on the evening shift in the cottage and I sought the help of what called 'one of the clever Cambridge mathematicians in Hut 6’. We put our heads together and in the calmer light of logic, and much ersatz coffee, solved the problem. Dilly made no objections to my having sought such help and when I told him I was going to marry the 'clever mathematician from hut 6’ he gave us a lovely wedding present.” After the war Mavis Batey brought her indefatigability to the protection of Britain’s historical gardens. Her interest began in the late 1960s, when her husband was appointed the “Secretary of the Chest”, the chief financial officer of Oxford University. They lived in a university-owned house on the park at and she set about ensuring that the overgrown gardens were restored to their original landscaped state."

"We all have an innate desire to do something for humanity"

"Next is recruiting data scientists who have the machine learning and statistics skills to find insights from the data. Then, the third is [finding] what I call the decision scientists: people who can understand how to make decisions or solve optimization problems that leverage those insights."

"And fourth, crucially, for true AI, you need to have an AI architect who understands how to glue these three components together: the data, the machine learning, and the optimization to build adaptive systems. And at the moment, it’s the CIO who is trying to step into that role of overseeing this. But I don’t know of many companies out there that have true AI architects. For now, companies are managing maybe part of this, but not all four categories."

"The world is changing so quickly, it’s very difficult to actually have all the necessary data points to be able to help you forecast accurately. At the moment, that’s still in the realm of human beings."

"AI will be disruptive, but will ultimately provide opportunities."

"As [futurist] Roy Amara noted, the impact of technology tends to be overestimated in the short run and underestimated in the long run. For now, you can probably ignore the idea of having adaptive systems in your business. That will come later. In the short run, you can use AI to remove the friction of mundane and repetitive tasks across the organization. If used correctly, this can absolutely change your business. But there’s a lot of hype out there, and a lot of people investing in these technologies don’t know what they’re doing."

"Digital twins are the next evolution of digital transformation. To be able to adapt more quickly to a changing world, companies need to create a digital replica of all of their physical assets, their infrastructure and people. Once you have a twin, you can start to run experiments and simulate scenarios to operate your business more effectively. Further down the line we may even have AI setting those experiments, and running experiments without the aid of the human. The role of the strategist and of leadership is to develop a strong vision and purpose, i.e., [determining] what key objective the organization needs to aspire to. I hope that organizations will realize that this objective needs to be much more sophisticated than a financial return to be able to attract, empower, and motivate talent. Exceptional talent wants to align with a strong purpose and inspirational leaders."

"There are four categories of AI skills. The first category is the data. Companies should ask: Are we getting our data into the shape where people can consume it? There are lots of companies out there that are throwing money at building data lakes — that’s all the raw data that a company holds from code generation to sales information — because they think at some point in the future data lakes will be useful. That’s not a bad investment, but I would also suggest that you need to be building applications straight away on top of that data lake that drive value into your business. Companies…should be thinking about building digital twins of their organizations, i.e., a perfect digital representation of their physical assets, like their infrastructure and employees."

"We can build AI to represent every corner of society… we can use it to ensure we build a less biased experience"

"I’ve always been interested in what it means to be human, and in the nature of the universe. I did my undergraduate [degree] in AI and my master’s in AI, and my Ph.D. in AI, so I guess I’ve been doing 19 years’ worth of activity in AI."

"There are two definitions of AI, and the more popular one is the weakest. This first definition [concerns] machines that can do tasks that were traditionally in the realm of human beings. Over the past decade, due to advances in technologies like deep learning, we have started to build machines that can do things like recognize objects in images, and understand and respond to natural language. Humans are the most intelligent things we know in the universe, so when we start to see machines do tasks once constrained to the human domain, then we assume that is intelligence.But I would argue that humans are not that intelligent. Humans are good at finding patterns in, at most, four dimensions, and we’re terrible at solving problems that involve more than seven things. Machines can find patterns in thousands of dimensions and can solve problems that involve millions of things. Even these technologies aren’t AI — they’re just algorithms. They do the same thing over and over again. In fact, my definition of stupidity is doing the same thing over again and expecting a different result."

"The best definition of intelligence — artificial or human — that I’ve found is goal-directed adaptive behavior. I use goal-directed in the sense of trying to achieve an objective, which in business might be to roster your staff more effectively, or to allocate marketing spend to sell as [much] ice cream as possible. It might be whatever goal you’re seeking."

"There is a bit of a bubble in AI. I don’t think that it’s going to go to waste. I think that all this investment will be additive, but there’s an over-expectation of what machine learning can bring right now, because of a lack of appreciation of the fact that machine learning is only part of the journey. And the next part of the journey for most big companies is optimization and decision making."

"Hierarchies are not structured for good decision making"

"I wanted people to feel free to use them whenever they wanted, using their creativity rather than feeling constrained to a name. I use the tapered brush for shadow work on the eyes as well as to strategically apply concealer. Everything is designed by an artist, made for you"

"I’m constantly on the lookout for new and innovative products. It can be overwhelming when you see brands with thousands of lines. As an artist, I’m constantly editing down the products I have for my kit, and I wanted to make it easy for everybody to do the same"

"I may not shout and scream but I have always stood up for accessibility. Nobody should go into a store or shop online and find that nothing works for them"

"We are constantly discussing ingredients, sustainability, formulation advancements and new packaging innovation. Whilst we have to be conscious of costs in the given climate, launching products that don’t deliver would be detrimental to my credibility as an artist and brand founder"

"The darkest berry shade looks beautiful on me as someone with a nude complexion and equally as beauty on someone with a pale skin tone"

"When I browsed stores, I noticed a lot of complicated products being touted as ‘perfect’ for altering your appearance to look like someone else. The increase of filters being used online created a gap in the market for those that wanted a more natural, simple approach. I want to see people celebrating themselves and feeling comfortable in their own skin"

"Whether it was over-drawn, over-plucked brows or, in my case, striped eyeshadow, every look served its purpose. The most beautiful thing about style is that it evolves and grows with you… so rather than look back with embarrassment, it gives me huge joy to look back and see myself experimenting and just having fun with it. At the end of the day, that’s what makeup should be - FUN"

"Makeup, style, and beauty should never be about restriction. They should be about freedom—the freedom to feel like you, at every stage and in every season of life"

"Looking good is all about self-confidence"

"We all know how unpredictable the comments section can be—but I said yes. Not because I’m fearless, but because I believe in showing up, as I am, with confidence and kindness"

"confidence is the most powerful thing you can wear. It doesn’t come in a bottle, a bikini, or a lipstick tube—it comes from how you feel in your own skin. And that feeling? It’s something you build, not something you wait for permission to have."

"True beauty is not defined by age, colour, size or sex - it is reflected by the spirit within. Someone who has a ready smile, who shows kindness and warmth is always beautiful"

"If you like it, wear it"

"And if you feel your best with bare skin and a strong brow? Go for it."

"Confidence is ongoing. Let’s keep showing up for ourselves"

"Skin first, confidence always. Less is more, but it’s not about doing less, more so choosing better. The beauty of now about embracing who we are - knowing what suits YOU, what brings you joy, and what makes you feel your best. These days, I’ve ditched the drama in place of well-prepped skin - the secret to glowing, long-lasting makeup isn’t in the foundation or setting spray, it’s in the skin underneath. When your skin is healthy and you’re already glowing, all you need is a touch of makeup to bring your face to life. I look for multi-tasking products infused with skincare ingredients, and use only where needed. Whilst the drama may have softened, confidence is stronger than ever."

"If a red lip gives you a spark—put it on."

"If you feel powerful in a black swimsuit—wear it with pride"

"Our main goal is to enhance people’s natural beauty, creating a safe space to ask questions online and encourage people to embrace their unique looks"

"Does your product or service already exist? What is your point of difference? Also, don’t be overwhelmed by other people’s opinions"

"You are allowed to feel good. You are allowed to enjoy beauty. You are allowed to be seen."

"Nothing could have prepared us for the complications that arose. Applying makeup was banned, so technology became key to the business rather than a hands-on approach. You had to learn to adapt"

"Selling food on the streets is very uncertain. You’ve got to be a bit of a gambler and you’ve got to be really, really resilient and willing to get on with a lot of hard work. It’s really physical, but for those who ‘get it’, it creates an amazing energy to be around. I wanted to create more of that."

"I love consolidating talents. I wanted to create a new movement that provides strength in numbers for street traders and cultivates more people doing great food on the streets. Festival organisers prefer to deal with collectives rather than individuals."

"We want to democratise good food. The idea of 'street food' is being trendified as a career option. But we're saying: let's leverage this so it touches all cultures, not just middle-class life-changers."

"Ask yourself if you’re ready to get comfortable with nothing being predictable and flying by the seat of your pants for the foreseeable future. If you like to have certainty about your future, this may not be for you."

"But when Science, passing beyond its own limits, assumes to take the place of Theology, and sets up its own conception of the Order of Nature as a sufficient account of its Cause, it is invading a province of Thought to which it has no claim, and not unreasonably provokes the hostility of those who ought to be its best friends."

"Having described the breed known as the Carrier, and the varieties allied to it, we have now to consider the different kinds of s, or those that are remarkable for their powers of flight and their attachment to the home in which they have been reared and first flown. There are numerous varieties that exhibit this peculiarity, such as the Dragon, the ordinary flying , and the Skinnum, or mongrel race, between these two breeds. Among the pure breeds that can be flown good distances may be mentioned that called the . But the varieties in which this homing faculty is developed to the highest degree are unquestionably the different races of Belgian birds, which are termed in England by the general name of Antwerps, and in Belgium are known as , s, Demi Bees, &c."