Meet the team ‘churning out’ authentic Vietnamese food in the Square Mile September 17, 2025 We speak to the finalists for our first ever Toast the City Awards, celebrating the very best of the Square Mile’s culture. Banh Mi Keu Deli City’s Vietnamese food is nominated twice – so it must be great! Why do you deserve to win a coveted Slice of Toast?For almost 30 years, we have been [...]
Toast the City: Steel Yard founder tells us why his venue should win September 15, 2025 Our Toast the City Awards are celebrating the City’s top spots and takes place this October. This week: The Steel Yard music venue. The finalists have been announced for the inaugural Toast the City Awards, with the finest restaurants, bars, green spaces and more being whittled down to just a handful of names. Now it’s your chance [...]
Lunchtime Tourism: The beautiful, elegiac Gilt of Cain at Fen Court September 2, 2025 The biblical story of Cain and Abel explores dark themes. Cain is enraged by God’s favouritism towards Abel. In his fury, he kills his brother. Jealousy, guilt, violence, forgiveness, and how we humans treat each other are themes explored in the Book of Genesis story. In Fen Court, Michael Visocchi’s sculpture is paired with Lemn [...]
Try this City of London rooftop bar to cool off after boiling hot office days August 26, 2025 Our Toast the City Awards are celebrating the City’s top spots and takes place this October. This week: Wagtail rooftop bar and restaurant. During some months there are more Google searches for ‘London rooftop bars’ than ‘new London bars’ – and that’s true even in winter. It’s just one sign that the capital’s intense love-in with sky-high [...]
Toast the City: Dine in a former bear pit at Libertine at the Royal Exchange August 21, 2025 Our Toast the City Awards are celebrating the City’s top spots and takes place this October. This week: Libertine at the Royal Exchange. The newly-opened Libertine restaurant at the Royal Exchange is allegedly where bears were kept. I was skeptical until the lady behind the bar told me the whole story, then a waiter corroborated it, and [...]
How the Barbican Theatre has rivalled the West End for four decades August 21, 2025 Our Toast the City Awards are celebrating the City’s top spots and takes place this October. This week: the Barbican Theatre. Think of the Barbican Centre and you might picture the lakeside suntrap or Brutalist passageways that feel purposefully designed to get lost in. You might not immediately think of the Barbican Theatre, but here’s why you [...]
Lunchtime Tourism: London’s amazing Temple of Mithras August 20, 2025 The City of London is one fifth Roman. The Londinium that was founded 2000 years ago lasted just over 400 years, and gave us (amongst other things) London’s first private members’ club, The Temple of Mithras. And it’s still here. The Walbrook Club is one of the City’s most exclusive hangouts but right opposite is [...]
Eat, Drink, Sleep, Repeat: The best London and New York restaurants August 20, 2025 Our Toast the City judge Martin Williams gives his bi-weekly opinion on all things dining. This week he splits his time between London and New York. There has been a good amount of excitement in the hospitality sector as of late, with JKS and Dishoom both heading to America on expansion trails. Last weekend I, [...]
Inside Finsbury Circus Gardens, the City’s biggest green space August 20, 2025 Our Toast the City Awards are celebrating the City’s top spots and takes place this October. This week: the redesigned Finsbury Circus Gardens. If the Square Mile were to be designed today, it would feature a lot more green space. It wasn’t until the middle of the last century that architects realised the importance of nature in [...]
Why Artillery Lane is the City of London’s most charming street August 20, 2025 Our Toast the City Awards are celebrating the City’s top spots and takes place this October. This week: the bars and restaurants of Artillery Lane and Passage. Broadgate’s skyscrapers are so tall and imposing that it can feel overwhelming casting your eye upwards. Head from here into the bowels of Victorian London by way of Artillery Lane, [...]