Bumblebee film review: After the nightmare of Michael Bay, the Transformers franchise has finally come good January 7, 2019 It’s difficult to think of a franchise with a more wretched legacy than Transformers. Despite five films filled with puerile humour, sexism and disinterested performances, the robots in disguise have been a hit with audiences, grossing over $4bn in box office, providing all the motivation needed for continuation. So, we come to Bumblebee, a prequel/soft [...]
Desert X is Coachella’s lesser known contemporary art festival and it’s drawing 200,000 art lovers to the area January 4, 2019 The locals were… curious. For the past few weeks, as they’d gone about their business around the nine cities that make up Greater Palm Springs, or hiking in the San Jacinto and Santa Rosa mountains, strange things were afoot. A deep hole was being dug into the desert floor close to the small resort town [...]
New Year’s honours 2019: British sporting heroes recognised in awards December 29, 2018 England football manager Gareth Southgate, model Twiggy and actor Michael Palin are among those that have been recognised in the New Year’s honours list. Southgate, who led the the English team to the semi-final of the World Cup this year, has received an OBE, while Palin, who appeared in Monty Python, received a knighthood and [...]
Chinese city leads global house price growth as Europe lags behind December 20, 2018 The Chinese city of Xi’an recorded the highest level of house price growth this year as Asia pulls ahead of a sluggish European market. House prices in Xi’an, which is the capital of Shaanxi Province in central China, grew 20 per cent in the year to September, according to Knight Frank’s Global Residential Cities Index. [...]
Waterfront London properties take 30 per cent premium, a bargain compared to Paris December 18, 2018 London waterfront homes come with a hefty price tag, but the 30 per cent premium to inland properties still falls well below equivalents in Paris and Sydney. While homeowners with a view of the water can expect to pay a hefty premium in London, they are fetching bargains compared to Paris and Perth, where the [...]
Focus On Bow: A population boom and the commercial success of nearby Stratford is boosting plans for new homes in E3 December 17, 2018 It may seem like a distant memory now, but the London 2012 Olympic Games promised a lot in the way of legacy. It anointed six east London areas – Newham, Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest, Greenwich, Barking & Dagenham and Hackney – ‘Growth Boroughs’ and predicted that the money pouring into Stratford would emanate out to [...]
2019 Property Forecast: Here’s what the experts are predicting will happen to house prices next year December 17, 2018 It’s that time of year again, when people guess what’s happening next year. Only, it’s particularly entertaining this year because no one really knows what’s going to happen next week. Still, most of the UK’s big estate agencies have had a go, looking at house price growth in the UK and abroad, what effect Brexit [...]
The Merry Wives of Windsor review: The RSC’s bubbly production at the Barbican is Shakespeare for the TOWIE generation December 17, 2018 If you don’t think Shakespeare comedies are, well, a laugh, then this version of The Merry Wives of Windsor is for you. Derided by critics as the time Shakespeare phoned it in, this production by the Royal Shakespeare Company takes those toffee noses and rubs them in smut. And it’s delicious. It begins with a [...]
Men’s fashion retailer Blue Inc victim of high street carnage as it enters administration December 16, 2018 Men's fashion retailer Blue Inc has become the latest victim of the carnage on the high street as it crashed into administration last week. The chain appointed turnaround specialist Begbies Traynor to find a buyer last month after a string of cost-cutting and restructuring measures had failed to take it into the black. However, no [...]
Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic tourist spaceship successfully touches the edge of the world in today’s test flight December 13, 2018 Rocket man and Virgin billionaire Richard Branson's commercial space programme successfully reached the edge of the world's atmosphere for the first time in its fourth test flight across the US today. The Virgin Galactic Spaceship Two rocket, which was carried up to a height of above 12,000 metres by a specially-designed plane before igniting its motors, reached [...]