Last updated on April 22nd, 2019As if the Last Tsar exhibition at the Science Museum wasn’t enough of a treat, London is now getting a Romanov double whammy with a new exhibition at the Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace. Russia, Royalty and the Romanovs has glitz, it has glamour, and it has a generous helping of…
Review: othellomacbeth at Lyric Hammersmith
Last updated on January 7th, 2019Yes, you read that title correctly. I’ve just been to see a mash-up of two of Shakespeare’s plays into one and its name is othellomacbeth. When you think about it, Othello and Macbeth have at their core similar DNA: power, greed and green-eyed monsters capable of turning gullible men into…
Covent Garden in a day
Last updated on August 17th, 2020Covent Garden is London’s living theatre, a canvas of the city’s enchanting past and its immersive present. It was once Nell Gwynn’s playground with her King, and home to the oldest theatre in London with its 500 ghosts of theatre past. Eliza Doolittle sold flowers to Mr Henry Higgins outside…
Wallace Collection – A National Treasure
Last updated on February 18th, 2021Tucked behind the Selfridges department store in Marylebone is the Wallace Collection, one of my favourite London haunts. It’s an eighteenth-century city pile with a jaw-dropping art collection and a 500-strong furniture depository which would make Marie Antoinette feel perfectly at home. It’s a sea of crimson red, rococo gold,…
A History of the Savoy Hotel | 10 Secrets about “London’s Greatest Hotel”
Last updated on June 2nd, 2021The Savoy Hotel in London is the hostess with the mostest, London’s grande dame who has partied through two world wars and slept with movie stars, politicians and royalty. If her walls could talk, they would whisper about the great and the godly and the bold and the beautiful that…
Victorian Afternoon Tea at the V & A Museum
Last updated on June 1st, 2018The Victorian Afternoon Tea at the Victoria and Albert Museum had me at seed cake. These two words always bring my childhood back in a whoosh of nostalgia wrapped in a cocoon of Englishness. If seed cake was good enough for Bilbo Baggins and his Unexpected Party, then it’s good…
The Art and Craft of William De Morgan
Last updated on March 9th, 2019He was the leading ceramic artist of the Victorian age, and his works still adorn Leighton House in Kensington, the Tabard Inn in Chiswick and Postman’s Park in the City of London. Fantastical beasts, parading peacocks, and gleaming flora make an appearance in some of the 80 works on display…
A London Literary tour for Kids
Last updated on February 27th, 2023It’s time to hop into your winged slippers and take a trip round a magical London – one where childhood dreams never end. These London tales tell of a honey-loving bear from Harrods, an eccentric detective, boys with magic powers, giants and a Gothic vampire. So, without further ado, let’s…
Afternoon Tea at the Houses of Parliament
Last updated on February 3rd, 2020The Palace of Westminster, or Houses of Parliament as it’s commonly referred to, is one of London’s ultimate tourist hot spots, even if Big Ben is hibernating for the next three years whilst he gets a makeover. When I first arrived in London in the late 1980s, I would count…
Historic House Museums of London
Last updated on May 24th, 2023London has some of the world’s most iconic museums displaying the finest art money can’t buy, but it’s the capital’s little treasures that I want to share with you today. Ensconced in these historical gems, you can amble around at a snail’s pace, savour every museum inch and still have…