Category Archives: London

October 23, 2013

Shoreditch – The Coolest Neighborhood in London’s East End

by Steven Brenner

 

There’s something about the East Side of many cities that sounds unsavory.  Who knows why – maybe historically it comes from the wind’s direction, blowing bad smells from nearby industry toward the East, or maybe it has something to do with the current of the Thames and the crap it would wash up down shore to the have-nots.

Whatever the reason, the East End has typically been considered the less salubrious part of London – and perhaps many East Sides worldwide have inherited that same reputation.

 

 

But these are also the areas that have the wealth of ethnicity and the youthful artistic flair to be transformed into the kinds of fashionable neighborhoods I hunt for – neighborhoods with small, non-corporate businesses; artistic industry and the people who work in them.  In London, this is what you find in Shoreditch, the area just north of the City of London’s financial district which has been undergoing gentrification since the late 1990′s.

 

 

Shoreditch (the name may even come from a variation of “Sewer Ditch”) is technically in the borough of Hackney, and includes Old Street Tube station, Shoreditch High Street, Brick Lane (the Bangladeshi area made famous by Monica Ali’s novel of the same name), and Hoxton.  At its borders are Islington to the north and Liverpool Street station in the south, which is right at the edge of the City of London.

Here’s some of the great things about the area:

 

 

Boxpark, a pop-up mall made from shipping containers.  Ok, it’s a mall, but I have to appreciate how much it deviates from the typical model of a shopping mall.

 

 

Columbia Road flower market.  On Sundays this outdoor market is as alive as can be.  Again, it’s lots of shopping, but mostly vintage, food, flowers and it’s all outside and convivial with lots of great people watching.

 

 

Brick Lane.  Once the slums (and apparently the scene of Jack the Ripper’s murders), it’s now an entire universe of ethnicity.   This is the place to come for a Bangladeshi curry.  It’s punks, street art, music, street food, vintage, and sometimes so crowded you can barely walk down the street.

 

 

People watching.  There are some people in Shoreditch who are so cool, there isn’t even a name for their fashion sense.

Old converted warehouse buildings make the best lofts and restaurants.  Nearby, an old Framery from the 1920′s was converted into a group of funky flats:

 

Flat 1 – £125 a night

Flat 2 – £125 a night

Flat 3 – £125 a night

Flat 4 – £159 a night

Flat 5 – £142

Flat 6 – £142

Flat 7 – £142 a night

Loft – £301 a night up to 8 people

 

Vietnamese food. When Shoreditch High Street becomes Kingsland Road you’re in Vietnamese heaven. If you have yet to be completely converted to the wonders of Pho – a Vietnamese noodle soup, you’ll need to plan a little visit here.

 

  

 

Shopping. Yes, there is plenty of vintage, but there is literally everything else too. If you’re looking for something unique, something you can say you bought in London and not just anywhere else in the world, you’ll probably find it here. There’s also a number of semi-outdoor markets, such as the Spitalfield Market.

 

 

More cool places to stay in the area:

Shoreditch Studio for £119 a night

Shoreditch 1 bedroom for £165 a night

Victory Chambers 2 bedroom from £160 per night

Broadway Market from £95 per night
October 14, 2013

Getting around London

by Steven Brenner

London is a big, spread out city.  Much of it is walkable, but there’s no one area you can stay in where everything will be close by.  Luckily, the variety of transport options are easy to use and reliable.  So let’s get familiar with them:

Walking

I’m not particularly athletic but I can walk around a city all day.  It’s definitely the best way to see things, but also the most tiring.  In London, I use a combo of an actual paper map that you can buy at any newsagent for under £2; the Map app for iPhone; and the Citymapper app, which tells you not only how far it is to walk, and how long it ought to take you, but how many calories you’ll burn. When you stuff your face like I do when traveling (ok, I do it at home too), this added incentive really makes an hour walk seem more reasonable.

 

Cabs

These are, of course, the best way to get around if you just want to get to your destination with as little effort as possible.  For such compact cars, they are very spacious – the back of the cabs have a bench seat that sits 3 and two “jump seats”.  They face each other, limo-style.

They can either be booked in advance or hailed on the street or from designated taxi ranks.  There’s also the Hailo app for iPhone.  It’ll figure out where you are through GPS and get a cab to that spot with just a few clicks.  Payment can either be done in cash or you can set it up with your credit card and pay through the app.

Here’s numbers for the different taxi dispatchers:
One-Number Taxi:    0871 871 8710  All London
Call-A-Cab:    020 8901 4444  All London
Computer Cab:    020 7908 0207  All London
DataCab:    020 7432 1540  All London
Dial-A-Cab:    020 7253 5000  All London
London Black Taxis:    07779 336 612  Pre-booked trips for all of London
Radio Taxis:    020 7272 0272  All London
Taxi Call Wimbledon    0208 099 7711  Wimbledon and surrounding areas
Xeta:    0845 108 3000  All London
There is a charge when booking by phone and other terms and conditions may vary so please check when booking.

You can also book a taxi using Twitter at @tweetalondoncab – more info at http://www.tlctaxi.co.uk

 

Buses

I get car sick easily, so I usually avoid buses, but I love London’s iconic double-decker buses.  Sit up top right near the huge windows in the front and get a great bird’s eye view (low flying anyway) of the city.  Buses use the same ticket system as the underground (see below).  You can also buy them on the bus itself, but it’s a bit slow and makes me feel like I’m holding everyone up.  Some stops have machines right outside at the bus stop as well.

 

Underground (Tube)

Over 400 kilometers of track, the London underground can boast being the first underground railway, opened in 1863. The lines are all color coded and have names, such as the Central Line (red) and District Line (green).  The direction you want is not necessary designated by the last station.  Instead, you have Eastbound, Westbound, Northbound and Southbound trains.  Sometimes, if the train changes direction, you might have to rethink whether it’s Northbound or Eastbound, but for the most part it’s pretty clear when you get to an intersection in the tunnels and have to chose which direction you want to go in – the stations are listed on the wall so you can figure out which way to go to get to the right track.

The best way to tackle the Tube is to buy an Oyster card.  Once you enter an underground station, go to a self-service machine and select a “new card”.  Put on however much you want – 5, 10, 20 pounds, for example.  Five pounds will be used toward a deposit on the card, and the rest will be applied toward bus and subway rides (which vary depending on where you’re going).  You can pay with credit card, or in some cases, cash (it says on the machine at the top what it accepts).  The card will then work to get you through the turnstiles until you run out of credit (at that point the light will flash red instead of green).  When this happens, simply return to the self-service machine and swipe your card and top it back up.

Here’s the awesome bit – when you’re done in London you can return the card and get any unused money back, plus your £5 deposit.

You can get more info and figure out which lines you need and the prices here:  http://www.tfl.gov.uk/modalpages/2625.aspx

 

Citymapper

This app really is the best thing ever.  Put in the address you’re going to and it’ll calculate every possible way to get there from wherever you are (including fun ones like “jetpack” or “catapult”). You’ll get a breakdown of how long it would take, and how much it would cost, either on foot, cab, bus, or subway.

Select the one you want and it’ll give you detailed instructions.  Once you arrive at the end of the public transport route, it’ll give you walking directions the rest of the way.  And it’s free!

 

Airport to City

London Heathrow (LHR) is connected to the city by the Underground.  London Gatwick (LGW) is connected by a commuter train called the Gatwick Express which runs every 10 minutes or so to Victoria Station (travel time 30 minutes).  You can buy the tickets from money changers at the airport too and will get a discount if you buy round trip (£31.05 r/t if you buy online in advance).

December 13, 2012

Tips for Enjoying London in the Wintertime

November through February can be pretty bleak in London, but also an invitation to enjoy London at its coziest.  There’s no shortage of inviting pubs, tea-houses and coffee shops to keep you dry and happy. Try the Builders Arms in Chelsea for a glam version of the enduring squishy sofas/giant fireplace combo. Or if you fancy lingering over your hot beverage, LJ’s on Soho’s Winnet street has classic board games like Scrabble and Wit’s End to while away some time over. Just around the corner, Dean Street Townhouse instead offers the slightly more grownup enticement of international newspapers.

Either way, one can’t have Ying without Yang- so after some happy and aimless coffee housing, it’s all but compulsory to search out a bit of higher Culture. Look no further than the river’s South Bank, London’s hub for all things “The Arts”, with its cluster of behemoths housing national venues for Theatre, Music and Cinema (National Theatre, Royal Festival Hall, British Film Institute).  Make the BFI your first stop, with its free and fascinating Mediateque Film Jukebox – you can drop in and explore the national archive of vintage film on literally any subject under the sun. Be warned, it’s compulsive.

England’s notorious weather (rain much?) is very possibly what prompted ministers to maintain entrance to our biggest national museum collections free. Head directly to South Kensington tube station and dive right in to the biggest three – Science, Natural History and of course the V&A. But for something less obvious, Somerset House in Mayfair – only free on Mondays – will allow you to enjoy your Manet without the throngs. And the Hunterian museum, a small enclave within the Royal College of Surgeons, allows silent and riveting access to the dissected animals, insects and yes – babies. Not for the faint hearted.

Short days require neon refuges after five, and they don’t come much brighter than the Westfield shopping centre near Shepherd’s Bush. From high end designer (Versace, Louis Vuitton) to ordinary high street chains, there isn’t a purchase that can’t be made in this mecca to consumerism. Go with an appetite, the restaurant selection is pretty broad too. If that seems far too modern an escape, travel through time and play spot-the-academic at the British Library, home to almost three hundred years and eight million volumes of books. When you’re done with the dusty tomes, enjoy some underground Bands, Bowling and Karaoke just five minutes walk away at the old-school Bloomsbury Lanes. Adored by the university students, guilty pleasure to large swathes of thirty-somethings too.

Green spaces lose their focus in these darker months, but do remember how romantic the cafe on Hyde Park’s Serpentine lake can be when the rain is lashing down outside. Definite contender for a Valentine’s moment, and with February also being LGBT history month, it’s the perfect time to search out some cut-price accommodation. Check our London apartments and B&B’s for last minute deals and rates.

February 2, 2012

Insider view on London’s Chelsea neighborhood

by Marina Camilletti

Chelsea may currently be better known for housing slick European bankers and their über-coiffed wives, but at its heart it remains one of London’s most beautiful neighbourhoods, steeped in history. You can eat anything from high-end alfresco Italian (Manicomio, Duke of York’s Square), to mid-priced Lebanese (Al Dar, corner of Lincoln Street), to the classic “Full English Breakfast” for under five pounds (Mona Lisa cafe – cheap, a little grotty, but one hundred percent authentic).

Sylvia Pankhurst's house, Cheyne Walk - geograph.org.uk - 263337

There are a few boutiques amongst the mid- to high-end shops: Austique specializes in hand-picked accessories, and French Sole, founded in a Chelsea basement, originated the ongoing trend for ballet flats. But the more adventurous shoppers are to be found stalking the cluster of charity shops (thrift stores) at the World’s End, for the best rich-lady castoffs in town.

Parallel to the Kings Road, the embankment to the River Thames houses hidden delights, most especially for those with a penchant for architecture and juxtaposition. From outside Chelsea Old Church, which dates from the twelfth century, one can directly gaze at one of Norman Foster’s modern international headquarters, one of the first glass buildings of its kind in London. Farther toward Sloane Square, past the hidden gem that is the Chelsea Physic Garden, Christopher Wren’s magnificent Chelsea Hospital (home to old war veterans, whom you’ll see walking about proudly in their traditional red uniforms) stands opposite Richard Rogers’ house on Royal Avenue – a perfect Georgian facade which the architect himself gutted and refurbished.

Chelsea Old Church, Cheyne Walk - geograph.org.uk - 1569945

The Kings Walk Mall, directly opposite on the bustling Kings Road, has the perfect drop-in manicure bar and speedy hairdressers. Yoga classes can be found at Triyoga (corner of Beaufort Street).  And for a quick burst of nightlife, The Pheasantry houses a rather recherche’ jazz club in its basement music room, beneath its pretty decent pizza restaurant.

WhitelandsHouseShops

For a little taste of Chelsea life at its most typical, one of its original 1960s denizens, Dina Wheatley, houses paying guests in her charming period house on Smith Terrace.