The London Traveler

I wonder if the London Sales have lost their cachet.
Everywhere in England, from the High Street to the great out of town hypermarkets, bright red stickers proclaim up to 90 percent off. In this recession, many retailers are slashing their stock, trying to get enough cash through the tills in the next few days to pay the rent bill.
Go down Oxford Street and you’ll see many of the same stores you can visit anywhere else. There’s nothing so special about that.
But that’s only one side of the story. In fact, London’s big department stores still provide the best shopping you …read more

1 Comment

Okay, maybe not drugs – but certainly socks with a rock and roll attitude!
This time of year my legs start getting cold. Tights are not enough. And trousers are boring. So Tabio is your answer – socks, dayglo tights, and leg warmers to die for.
I particularly liked the angora bed socks and furry leg warmers – something a bit different. Patterned socks aren’t so much my thing, but they have a good selection of those, too, as well as lots of over knee socks, plain, ribbed or even decorated with knitted chevrons and lozenges.
It’s a bright …read more

Comments Off

 
I was near Victoria the other day and had a spare few minutes – so I went into a shop that wild horses usually couldn’t drag me into. The Royal Mews Shop, at the back of Buckingham Palace.
Some of the merchandise confirmed my worst fears. Horrible royal tat. There might not have been any corgi covers – but there were tapestry bell pulls (you need one, obviously, to summon your servants) and a book of royal family photos from the 1920s I can’t imagine anyone except my flag-waving grandma being interested in.
But there were also some rather nice souvenirs. China …read more

Comments Off

 You can get Italian food (of sorts) in practically any supermarket these days. Spaghetti, pesto, thin slices of parma ham, even taleggio cheese or pecorino if you’re lucky.
But the pasta may not be the most authentic. And you might not be able to get panettone, or the rich and calorie-laden panforte di Siena,  or squid ink black pasta, or mixed seafood salad.
When you want authentic Italian, visit Clerkenwell – home to London’s oldest Italian community. And specifically, visit Gazzano’s, at 167-9 Farringdon Road.
Even the tomatoes are the real thing – not Dutch grown watery cotton wool things but rich  dark …read more

Comments Off

Frugality is the new ‘in’ thing.
First of all there’s the credit crunch which is making many people tighten their belts. My friends all know I’m the kind of person who loves finding a nice bit of Betty Barclay or Paul Costelloe in a charity shop – but up till now they’ve regarded it as rather infra dig. Now, they’re all up to it too!
And secondly, of course, there’s global warming, and a lot of people are now thinking about living more sustainable lifestyles.
So a lot more people are interested in sewing or customising their own clothes.
Junky Styling is  just the …read more

Comments Off

 
Everybody knows Harrods. The post Christmas sale is world famous, and still attracts massive queues. The famed Egyptian food hall, the celebs who come to shop here (and are occasionally thrown out for wearing clothes considered too casual for the store), ridiculous luxuries… if there’s one department store you have to visit as a tourist, it’s this one. Go to gawp – you don’t have to buy anything.
But if it’s designer clothes you’re interested in, you’ll have a much better time at the other store on Knightsbridge, Harvey Nichols. ‘Harvey Nicks’ to its friends, it’s a serious fashionista store.  Not …read more

8 Comments

Cecil Court is one of my secret London shopping places. Only for the stagestruck and booklovers – but if you’re either of these (or perhaps both) it will quickly become one of your favourites.
David Drummond’s bookshop specialises in theatre and opera – including ephemera such as playbills and posters, as well as books on the performing arts.  For music, try Travis & Emery – full of music scores as well as books on music, mostly old but some new. There’s a specialist Italian bookshop – this is where I bought my guidebook for hiking the Apennines (in English) – and …read more

Comments Off

Everyone knows the Knightsbridge Two – Harrods and Harvey Nichols. But for my money, particularly if you’re food shopping,  Fortnums is much more fun.
The shop’s reputation rests on its food hall. And the food really is tremendous. Of course nowadays you can get chorizo in every supermarket and canned olives from the corner shop. But peruse any of Elizabeth David’s cookery books and you’ll get a feel for how difficult it used to be to get such things in England – in one of them she actually gives the addresses of the two (only two!) shops in Soho where you …read more

Comments Off

This is a lovely shop to visit. And it’s not just a shop – it’s a working studio as well.
Lots of space, lots of light, no clutter, make you think ‘minimalism’ at first. But the lushness of the floral patterns on the bags, the flower-printed screen, and the curvy lines of the chaise longue give the environment a sense of drama. (And if you like the furniture, you can buy it – Susannah’s launched her own furniture line.)
I don’t like flower prints. I don’t like tea dresses. I don’t like that kind of ‘English rose’ femininity which is …read more

Comments Off

Don’t you just love it when you go down a little alleyway and right at the end of it, you find a lovely little shop you dind’t know about, with the kind of owner who knows absolutely everything about what they’re selling, and you manage to find that little widget you’ve been looking for for the last ten years, and at half what you thought you were going to have to pay?
Now of course that’s the kind of thing you used to have to put down to good luck, or sometimes you’d hear about from a friend who’d shopped there. …read more

Comments Off