Category: London

Maida Vale is our Local

If you must leave someplace, you should leave it sad to go. After we left our Randolph Avenue flat, we were desperate to stay in Maida Vale. It isn’t the best place in London, just as any single person isn’t the best person in the world. No. Just like a person,

The Bell Ringers of Westminster Abbey

Aimee came to visit me and, so, I did what I do when people come to visit… I made plans. Came across a listing in Time Out London magazine (the website is useful, but nothing beats the actual publication… it is original, poignant and catches the exact tone of London’s edge. Not just a calendar.)…

Treading Water at the Warrington

God, it’s gorgeous right now in Maida Vale… I just glanced down Clifton Gardens one afternoon and, suddenly, every tree is in leaf and the air is full of the smell of hyacinths in bloom. Ahhh, spring… a time for freshness, renewal, of kicking open doors, shaking out rugs, polishing windowpanes, letting in the light.…

Ben’s Thai London… Now Dang!

For those still looking for Maida Vale’s favourite Thai restaurant, Ben’s Thai, formerly of the Warrington Hotel, don’t worry, it hasn’t gone far. Under the new name, Dang at Ben’s Thai, Dang and her clan have moved above another pub, the Robert Browning, on Clifton Road. This gritty old man’s boozer, situated on a properly…

Gordon versus the Empire

Bill Buford’s recent article on Gordon Ramsay’s slog in the U.S. (“The Taming of the Chef: Can Gordon Ramsay make it here?” April, 3, 2007 ) has me thinking again about the sins and virtues of the Ramsay Holdings pub venture, and the exhausting drive my darling head chef is taking into my homeland. I…

Anyone Seen Ben’s Thai???

Despite the fact that Ben’s Thai in the Warrington closed JANUARY 31, and Ramsay Holdings have owned all of the Warrington Hotel since October 31, 2006, many guests are still caught unawares, wandering up the stairs of the saloon bar for that reliable local Thai in Maida Vale. If you are one of the many…

In Love with the Warrington

It’s a good time to be sentimental about the Warrington. After all, the bar staff hasn’t changed much. The regulars like Bill and Tony and Stan are still propping up their ends of the bar. It’s smoky and that one ceiling fan always looks like it is ready to fly off and shoot across the…

Hyde Park in Winter

Colin and I went for a walk to Hyde Park last weekend. We’ve been having beautiful sunny weather here so far for most of the winter. Temperatures in the 40s and 50s . We can’t complain. It’s hit or miss, of course, as some days it pours with rain and there is even the occasional…

The Big Issue

Why do I get up early on Friday mornings? Am I gunning to save my soul? What do I really LIKE getting up early on Friday monrings? It’s a good cup of tea, really. At The Passage. Now that two years or more have passed here in London, I can say one thing I love…

Warrington Days

It’s been three months since Gordon Ramsay Holdings took over the Warrington Hotel and everyone still seems to be on pins and needles about the changeover. Last night was packed to the gills with regulars, neighbors and new friends, everyone trying to catch hold of a piece of what they fear might be lost as…

Oxford Circus, Never Be Lonely

Oxford Circus is undergoing major renovations, modernisations, refurb, refit… whatever you want to call it. Lately that just means not much to look at or read on the platform if you forgot your Metro or Ipod. On the Bakerloo Line platform there is accidental art: the best use of years of advertising posters, scraped to…

London Snow 2007

It snowed in London overnight… the first time Colin and I have seen it in three winters. The view out my office window, over the tennis courts at the Paddington Sports Club. Guys were playing tennis just yesterday, in the 34 degree temps. The tree and the BBC studios out the front window. The cars…

Bound for Glory: America in Colour 1939-1943

Where: Photographer’s Gallery, 5 & 8 Great Newport Street, London, WC2H 7HY When: Through 28 January 2007 How Much: Free In my mind’s eye, The grapes of wrath are not purple or red or green. They are always charcoal grey. I must have imagined that the days before color television the whole world was an…

Christmas Trees in London

Christmas in London is here… though it isn’t quite what I am used to from home in Iowa. This weekend, my sister and her family (and likely my parents too) are out on the hunt for their Christmas tree. They do it the way you see in old movies: out to tree farms in their…