This is what it’s like to party on the new Virgin cruise ship Scarlet Lady September 25, 2021 At the London launch of Richard Branson’s new cruise line, Virgin Voyages, the British DJ and producer Mark Ronson played a raucous set. It was all very cool and glamorous, and promised a new hip addition to this most buoyant travel sector, with more than 100 cruise ships on the order books. So when the [...]
Learn how to DIY your decor with these five London interior design courses March 6, 2020 Think of the times you’ve stood in one of your rooms at home that’s driving you mad – is it cluttered, or the paintwork’s dated, or the lighting terrible? Perhaps you’ve just moved and you’ve got a whole house to redecorate? There’s always the big-bucks option of hiring a professional designer. But why not get [...]
Designers Guild at 50: A joyful journey through the doyenne of design’s bold, bright creations February 21, 2020 Tricia Guild OBE doesn’t do same-y; she doesn’t do greige and she doesn’t do minimal. But looking back at the influential interior designs, fabrics, wallpapers, paints, upholstered furniture, homewares and books her company Designers Guild has produced over the past 50 years, it’s clear that what she does do, is happy. Guild conceived Designers Guild [...]
Want to buy art but don’t know where to start? Try Collect, the more accessible design fair February 14, 2020 Kicking off the calendar of high-end art fairs of 2020, Collect is still London’s only fair of contemporary craft and design presented by gallerists. This year, it’s moved from the Saatchi Gallery to its new home in the softer and more decorative venue of Somerset House, swapping stark white walls for the charm of 18th-century [...]
Drinks, scraps and weaves: Meet the couple turning plastic bottles into sustainable homeware February 7, 2020 It looks like wool, it weaves like wool, it’s soft like wool and you can wash it like wool. So how can these cosy rugs, cushions and throws be made entirely of recycled plastic bottles? The husband-and-wife founders of textiles company Weaver Green know the answer because they invented the thread – re-processing tons of [...]
Ikebana: We tried out the Japanese art of ‘mindful’ flower arranging January 24, 2020 As Londoners wholeheartedly embrace houseplants, you might be trying to keep alive forests of greenery. But what about flowers? In our mindful age, flower arranging has finally come out of the shadows of the WI. It allows us to slow down and consider the fragrance, touch, colour and form of each stem as we design [...]
Could a high-tech bed help you get a better night’s kip? Laura Ivill tries out ‘sleep engineering’ January 17, 2020 People say you should change your mattress every seven years. This time, though, I decided to go a step further, and upgrade my whole bedroom environment to incorporate the latest in sleep technology. I headed over to West London for a look around the Sleep Loft, the showroom at Rested. They are in the business [...]
History, views of Nelson and a speakeasy: Inside the new Great Scotland Yard Hotel January 10, 2020 To kick off the new year, a visit to the new Great Scotland Yard Hotel in Whitehall is a great way to see some of the emerging trends in the London design and going out scenes. It is the latest in a series of renovations of civic buildings (police stations, town halls, courthouses) into hotels, [...]
A festive trip to Harrods reveals Insta-ready windows and a new Homes section December 6, 2019 For a special Christmas treat, when I was a child we always went to see Santa in his grotto in a department store. If Harrods is your go-to grotto (he’s been there since 1955), your children will encounter the bearded one in a Secret Forest decorated with Swarovski crystal (a girl’s second-best friend). Visiting last [...]
Fancy a Christmas tipple? Here are London’s best-dressed festive bars and hotels November 29, 2019 Since writing this column my bah humbug feeling about the run-up to Christmas has been transformed. Now that I am blissfully untouched by Christmas jingles bombarding me from shops and TV (thanks, internet), Christmas cheer is all around me as London slowly lights up. We are spoilt for choice in terms of where to gather, [...]
