SELLING Q&A May 6, 2010 MANAGING DIRECTOR OF PROPERTY HUNT Q. Dear Russell, I’m selling my home but it is taking ages. How do I know if the buyer is stalling? A. The key is to have a good solicitor on board who is a specialist in residential property rather than a generalist. They will be able to deal with [...]
Be chairman of the board in this City penthouse May 6, 2010 SPENDING one’s working day in the boardroom is one thing, but living in one? That’s the option awaiting anyone who snaps up this smart-as-they-come penthouse on the edge of the City. The triplex three bedroom apartment called The Provenance (you’ll just have to get used to the name) sits at the top of a Victorian [...]
The girl that’s helping City ladies sparkle May 6, 2010 LAUREN Adriana could have taken the easy route of gliding, It-Girl style, through her twenties. At 24, she is fashion aristocracy, being the grand-daughter of designer Paul Smith and the child of fashion world insiders. She’s friends with all the right people (including the world’s most famous jeweller Joel Arthur Rosenthal, known as JAR) and [...]
High concept meets low aspirations May 6, 2010 Film HOT TUB TIME MACHINE Cert: 15 ** PRESUMABLY the makers of Hot Tub Time Machine started with the title – as titles, and indeed ideas, for high-concept extreme silliness go, it’s a humdinger. What couldn’t be funny about a hot tub that transports you back to the neon-coloured, mullet-sporting 1980s? Hmmm – well, pretty [...]
ALSO OUT THIS WEEKEND May 6, 2010 FILM THE BACK-UP PLAN Someone allowed J-Lo to make a film again, supposedly a romantic comedy. Bad idea. NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET Lame and pointless attempt to remake the Freddy Kruger slasher flick. FURRY VENGEANCE Even worse, Brendan Fraser gets set upon by CGI woodland animals. I mean really. DVD THE PRISONER The recent remake [...]
ON IN LONDON | SIX OF THE BEST May 6, 2010 ART: Angela de la Cruz Head along to the Camden Arts Centre to decide for yourself whether de la Cruz, a painter who inflicts deliberate damage on her canvases, is worth her nomination for the Turner Prize as announced this week. THEATRE: Posh The Royal Court’s cracking show offers a satirical look inside the privileged [...]
Live and let drive… Bond-style May 5, 2010 FIRST: a confession. I probably should have told the good people at Lotus that I have a slightly unlucky history with James Bond. The first 007 film I ever saw was Moonraker. Dressed up smartly in my white broderie anglaise blouse, I sat with my family in a rather grand former theatre in Auckland, New [...]
Don Draper’s old fashioned drink of choice May 5, 2010 IT’S probably a little too easy for us to be dismissive of bourbon in this country. After all, with all the world-beating malt whisky painstakingly produced up in the most northern parts of our little island, what do we need with the harsh, corn-based yankee equivalent? We’ll gulp it down in the odd cocktail – [...]
OUT OF OFFICE May 5, 2010 WHERE TO WATCH ELECTION NIGHT Soho’s den of fine dining and decadence, Quo Vadis, (www.quovadissoho.co.uk) is hosting an election night party in its naughtily-named Petting Room, with coverage broadcast live and drinks flowing. Alternatively, head for the refined gentility of the American Bar at the Stafford Hotel in St James’s (www.thestaffordhotel.co.uk) or Mayfair’s home of [...]
Korea Progression May 4, 2010 IF any car proves Korean manufacturer Kia’s star is in the ascendant then it must be its compact car, the Venga. It’s something of an illusion because it’s clear from the moment that you get in it that this is not really a compact car at all, in fact it’s what is known in the [...]