Penny Blood's Black Book - My Independent Guide to London

Redchurch Street

Penny Blood — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 15:01:36 +0000

I had been noticing recently that quite a few new places had popped up on Redchurch street and that I was totally out of touch. So I decided to cycle down and see what was new and while I was at it tell you about a few of my already existing favourite spots around there. Over the past few years Redchurch street has gone from having lots of quirky little art galleries behind doors covered in graffiti and funny little restaurants where you’re never quite sure if they’re open to Aesop and Aubin and Wills. However along with this came a lot of great new independent places too, it’s not totally commercial just yet. Redchurch Street is particularly classy without being too posh although you’ll still find a few of the old fixtures such as Sick (you’ll be tempted but DO NOT go in here, it’s sooooo creepy, when I last went in, there was a person asleep or maybe dead on a mattress on the floor in the basement) which remind you that it’s not Notting Hill just yet.

123 Store

This is a great shop spanning three floors dedicated to menswear, womenswear and gifts, although I don’t really like the word ‘gifts’ unless ‘gifts for me’ counts as I just buy this sort of stuff for myself. They have an interesting selection of clothes and it’s reasonably well priced too. In the basement there is a space which may develop into a cafe or perhaps a dining room to hire, so watch this space.

123 Bethnal Green Road, London, E2 7DG
0207 729 8050
Monday-Saturday 12pm-7pm, Sunday 12am-6pm
www.123bethnalgreenroad.co.uk

Brick Lane Bikes

Ahh Brick Lane bikes, ok so perhaps not so exciting to all of you if you’re not really into bikes but if you are and you like to have everything colour coordinated from the hubs to the handlebars and you can’t stand to have branding slashed over every part of it then you should check this out.

118 Bethnal Green Rd London, Greater London E2 6DG
020 7033 9053
Monday-Friday 9am-7pm, Saturday 11am-6pm, Sunday 11am-5pm
www.bricklanebikes.co.uk

Labour and Wait

Labour and Wait sell old fashioned household things, beautiful stuff that just doesn’t age as it’s made with proper materials not just plastic…
READ FULL POST

85 Redchurch Street, London, E2 7DL
020 7729 6253
Monday Closed, Tuesday – Sunday 11am-6pm
www.labourandwait.co.uk

Carosel

Run by a glamorous lady who looks like Louise Brooks, Carosel is a great little vintage clothes store with both men and women’s wear. The collection is nicely edited so you don’t have to go through rails of the same thing to find something good and they have a few other bits and pieces like nice mugs, jewellery, pictures and lampshades for sale too.

1A Turnville Street, London, E2 7HX
Monday Closed, Tuesday-Friday 12pm-7pm, Saturday-Sunday 11pm-6pm
www.facebook.com/CarouselEmporium

Cafeand

Cafeand is a minimalist and intriguing place serving a small but good and imaginative menu such as orange and mint cake including properly made coffee and you can read all their graphics and fashion magazines while you drink it.
READ FULL POST

77 Redchurch Street, London, UK, E2 7DJ
02034870980
Tuesday – Saturday 11am – 7pm, Sunday 11am-6pm
www.cafeand.co.uk

Random Graffitti

I thought I would take a picture of some random graffiti I think is good, they will probably clean it off soon, although the councils do often leave stuff they think is decent, anything Banksy has done gets encased in Perspex. Actually this isn’t good really I just find it vaguely amusing.

Speedies

Awesome retro furniture store, so crammed full of cool stuff mainly from the 1960’s and 1970’s you can hardly move. I certainly managed to knock over a few things with my giant backpack.

81 Redchurch Street, London, E2 7DJ
020 7739 4798
Monday-Sunday 11am-7pm
http://speediesvintage.blogspot.com/

Aubin Cinema

This is such a cute little cinema with big comfy chairs it’s like watching a movie in someone’s private living room, they serve great snacks and drinks too.
READ FULL POST

64-66 Redchurch Street, London E2 7DP
0845 604 8486
Monday-Saturday 3pm-12am, Sunday 10am-11pm
www.aubincinema.com

Allpress

Probably one of the busiest cafes in London but I can see why, it’s the sort of place that suits all, as although very nice, it doesn’t reek of any particular theme and the food is great.
READ FULL POST

58 Redchurch Street, Shoreditch, London E2 7DP
020 7749 1780
Monday-Friday 8am-5pm, Saturday-Sunday 9am-5pm
http://uk.allpressespresso.com/#

Les Trois Garcons

This must be the most stunningly cool and beautiful restaurant in London, serving modern French food.
READ FULL POST

1 Club Row, London, E1 6JX
020 7613 1924
www.loungelover.co.uk

Lounge Lover

Equally the most stunningly cool and beautiful bar in London, serving cocktails and Japanese food.
READ FULL POST

1 Whitby Street London E2 7DP
020 7012 1234
Monday – Thursday 6pm – 12am, Friday 5.30pm – 1am
Saturday 6pm – 1am, Sunday 6pm until 12am
www.loungelover.co.uk

The Painted Lady

A quirky 1950’s hair and nail salon, where you would want to get something done just for the hell of it.

65 Redchurch Street, London, E2 7DJ
020 7729 2154
Monday- Friday 11am-8pm, Saturday 11am-6pm, Sunday 12pm-5pm
www.thepaintedladylondon.com

Walluc Bistrot

This is a really cute French restaurant and possibly the only place in London that serves Raclette. I did a ski season in Val d’isere, a right of passage for all private school kids from Edinburgh and got really fat eating a lot of Raclette (which is just melted cheese), I thought with all the exercise I would get really skinny but this was not the case.

40 Redchurch Street E2
07864219140
Tuesday to Saturday 6.00pm/11.30pm Sunday 12.00am – 11.30pm
www.walluc.com

Hostem

Yeah don’t get too excited, they may stock some of the coolest menswear brands including Mastermind Japan and Rick Owens (and where pretty much everything is black or nearly black) as a beanie will set you back £285. Great window displays though.

41-43 Redchurch Street London E2 7DL
020 7739 9733
Monday-Saturday 11am-7pm, Sunday 12pm-5pm
www.hostem.co.uk

Albion

Part owned by Terence Conran, Albion is a British ‘caff’ style restaurant, grocery store and bakery.
READ FULL POST

2-4 Boundary Street, London E2 7DD
020 7729 1051
Monday – Sunday 8am – 11:30pm
www.albioncaff.co.uk

Shoreditch House

A private members club for creative people only! Very rich creative people mind you and of course TV presenters.

Ebor Street, London, E1 6AW
020 7739 5040
Monday-Saturday 7am-3am , Sunday 8am-12pm
www.shoreditchhouse.com

Story

A quirky pizza restaurant where the pizzas are so light you won’t be left feeling bloated (you’re wallet will be a lot lighter too though).
READ FULL POST

3 Redchurch Street, London, E2 7DJ
07918 197 352
Monday – Sunday 12pm-10:30pm
www.storydeli.com

Maiden

A great little shop full of all kinds of great and useful toys you never knew you wanted. I can spend ages here just looking at all this colourful stuff it’s like being in Tokyo.

188 Shoreditch High Street, London, E1 6HU
0207 998 0185
Monday-Friday 11am-7.30pm, Saturday-Sunday 11am-6.30pm
www.maidenshop.com

Pizza East

Part of the Shoreditch House complex, Pizza East is a really nice spacious restaurant serving plenty of good food other than pizza, it’s booked up every night though.
READ FULL POST

56 Shoreditch High Street, London, E1 6JJ
020 7729 1888
Monday-Wednesday 12pm-12am , Thursday 12pm-1am, Friday 12pm-2am,
Saturday: 10am – 2am, Sunday: 10am – 12am (Kitchen open until 1 hour before close)
www.pizzaeast.com

Box Park

Having taken over a disused space it’s made up of a series of shipping containers which house a whole bunch of shops, cafes and casual restaurants.

Boxpark, Shoreditch High Street, London, E1 6JE
0208 133 0182
www.boxpark.co.uk

No related posts.

Pizza East

Penny Blood — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 18:30:01 +0000

The thing I find with pizza is, I can never find exactly the one I want on the menu. I usually buy a frozen pizza from the store, a nice thin crust margarita pizza and pile on all sorts of ingredients, peppers, onions, mushrooms maybe extra cheese, that’s how I like my pizza. Pizza East does do nice pizza using imaginative ingredients to come up with old favourites though. I mean most of us know what prosciutto and pancetta are, but soppressata, burrata, puzzone, san daniele and scamorza? Good thing I looked this all up before hand, it’s basically all cheese, salami or ham. The menu ranges from pretty weird such as Veal meatballs, prosciutto and cream to good old margarita and three cheese pizza (provolone, tomato, stracchino and caprino fresco to them of course). It’s not just pizza though, you can also order the likes of baked salmon and steak so unless you’re a vegan there’s something for everyone. Despite being booked up every night of the week it’s very relaxed and informal, with an industrial look complete with exposed brick walls, concrete pillers and ventilation pipes running across the ceiling which I’m not sure are fake or not, anyway it looks good and it’s cosy despite being so big.

www.pizzaeast.com

PIzza East, 56 Shoreditch High Street, London, E1 6JJ
020 7729 1888
Monday-Wednesday 12pm-12am , Thursday 12pm-1am, Friday 12pm-2am,
Saturday: 10am – 2am, Sunday: 10am – 12am (Kitchen open until 1 hour before close)

Ante

Penny Blood — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 09:38:17 +0000

Discovered totally by accident as the front part of the shop sells some pretty interesting looking clothes, I wandered in to discover a brilliant café right at the back with a stylish Japanese woman talking animatedly on her phone. It has all the things I love, space, quiet, framed portraits of Victorians, antique furniture, a lone fashion person. There are quite a few of these shop/cafes popping up around East London, quite a good idea really as it doesn’t take too much to make a cup of coffee or a cup of tea but could potentially mean that if one fails the other might succeed and it’s always good to have a good choice of places to go.

Ante, 222 Brick Lane, London, E1 6SA
11am-7.30pm

Wilton Way Cafe

Aubin Cinema

Penny Blood — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 18:29:19 +0000

This is a really cute little cinema with big comfy chairs, just like how you might have a cinema in your house if you could and the lounge area is very stylish too. Be careful to get there early though as they have rammed in one row too many so the front row will make you go crossed eyed. They don’t have the usual yuck cinema food either, instead you can get honeycomb, wasabi peas and spiced ginger cookies and they have a really good drinks list, I love to take hot chocolate into the cinema.

www.aubincinema.com

Aubin Cinema, 64-66 Redchurch Street, London E2 7DP
0845 604 8486
Monday-Saturday 3pm-12am, Sunday 10am-11pm

Les Trois Garcons

Penny Blood — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 16:39:35 +0000

Run by the same people who own Lounge Lover, Les Trois Garcons is equally impressive, serving very good, very sophisticated French food, with lovely attentive service. As a refurbished old Victorian pub it has most of the original features, an old heavy wooden bar, painted glass mirrors and tall ceilings, several stuffed birds and other animals including a stuffed bull dog with wings, it’s on every best London interior list. All sorts come here, city workers, a guy in a hoodie slouched over the table with his girlfriend and me, looking like one of those girls who never goes anywhere expensive so has dressed up like I’m going to a ball, in other words totally overdressed. I agreed to go on a date and for some ungodly reason agreed to wear a dress, I mean who says “I’ll take you out as long as you wear a dress” and then turns up wearing a t-shirt from Gap. I cringe when I write this, anyway I got my choice a bit wrong, I don’t own many dresses so decided to borrow one from a glamorous friend who makes Persian princess look casual and was wearing heels too big thus struggling to keep them on, giving myself cramp while I did it. Anyway my dreadful date for the night was one of those awful types who tastes the wine mulling over it like he has a clue what he’s doing. I imagine he probably knew the difference between wine and beer but that’s about it. Over the course of the evening, not wanting to get too drunk as I kept reaching for my glass to get me through the night, I would top up my wine with water. Near the end of the evening having finished the bottle of wine, he reached for my glass as it was nearly full (I know classy right, it’s still my wine) I winced, although after drinking half the glass he didn’t even notice, what a pro. The food though made it worth it, it’s not cheap but on that occasion I wish it had been more expensive. Afterwards we went to Lounge Lover where he asked me to buy him a drink. Don’t worry I didn’t see him again.

http://www.loungelover.co.uk/

Les Trois Garcons, 1 Club Row, London, E1 6JX
020 7613 1924

No related posts.

Boxpark

Penny Blood — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 15:46:56 +0000

Boxpark is a pretty weird set up. Having taken over a disused space next to the fairly new Shoreditch station, it’s made up of a series of shipping containers. Pretty ingenious I think. That area used to be nothing and could have been turned into another glass skyscraper. The container units are all painted gloss black and house a whole bunch of shops, cafes and casual restaurants. It all varies considerably, there are a fair number of streetwear brands, alongside a Phaidon book shop, lingerie shop, worlds most hideous shoe shop and lots of different restaurants from Vietnamese to Mexican. It’s pretty useful, most of the businesses that are there are well known shops, nothing too left wing, it’s basically just a mall, but at least it’s a mall that looks good and doesn’t take over the size of a small country.

www.boxpark.co.uk

Boxpark, Shoreditch High Street, London, E1 6JE
0208 133 0182

No related posts.

Lounge Lover

Penny Blood — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 15:36:51 +0000

Lounge Lover is the sort of place you might wander into thinking what the hell is this? You probably wouldn’t nip in here to get a quiet drink, it’s too spectacular for that. It’s a menagerie of stuff, taxidermy, giant champagne glasses holding exotic flowers, weird and wonderful furniture, strange paintings and mirrors covering every inch of the walls, antique birdcages, chandeliers, red tinted windows and neon signs. It’s a stately home crossed with a burlesque ballroom, crossed with a Japanese spa, complete with wooden decked bathrooms, pebble water fountains and bamboo. They have a lengthy list of cocktails all of which are pretty reasonable for cocktails and they’re good too, lots of sweet and interesting ones. I’ve been here a few times, each time bringing someone I thought might love it, Lounge Lover never fails to impress that’s for sure and if the person you’re with is really boring (the last time I came here was with a spectacularly boring person) there are enough weird features about the place to talk about. You will get many different accounts of Lounge Lover, some are that there are too many hen do and city types, some that there is too much superfluous service, some that there are too many rules on where you can sit, what you can book and so on. I’m not really all that fussed though as I just think it’s great a place like this exists, even if the clientele doesn’t reflect the creativity and style of the place.

www.loungelover.co.uk

Lounge Lover, 1 Whitby Street, London, E2 7DP
020 7012 1234
Monday–Thursday 6pm-12am, Friday 5.30pm-1am, Saturday 6pm-1am, Sunday 6pm-12am

Dennis Severs’ House

Penny Blood — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 18:22:00 +0000

Let me start by saying that I generally hate museums. I find things in glass cases painfully dull. Whenever I visit a new city I’m honestly more inclined to check out the supermarkets. On a recent trip to Washington DC, from the wealth of museums on offer I only went to the Smithsonian to see Jerry Seinfeld’s trainers. However the kind of museum I love is the likes of the Dennis Severs’ House. Dennis Severs took on a Mary Celeste approach, designing the house to appear as if the family living there just ceased to exit one day leaving plates of half eaten food and unmade beds. Back in 1979 an eccentric American by the name of Dennis Severs bought a Georgian townhouse in the heart of Spitalfields. A former home of Huguenot silk weavers, he went about turning it into a sort of time capsule of a typical family home, each room in a different historic style, mainly from the 18th and 19th centuries. The house is bursting at the seams with amazing stuff including antique furniture and knick-knacks, a four poster bed adorned with gargoyles, old photographs and every day items. It has countless cosy but elegant rooms all lit by candle light and open fires and has a great atmosphere smelling like Christmas, it’s really Gothic and totally brilliant.

To read more about Spitalfields which I find to be the most fascinating area of London, check out this website http://spitalfieldslife.com/

Photo Credit James Brittain and Roelof Bakker

http://www.dennissevershouse.co.uk/

Dennis Sever’s House, 18 Folgate Street, London, E1 6BX
020 7247 4013
Every Sunday between 12-4pm last admission 3.15pm, £10 per person. No booking required
Monday following the first and third Sunday Between 12pm and 2pm last admission 1.15pm, price £7 No booking required.

Story

Penny Blood — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:59:05 +0000

It looks like a page out of Vogue, old mirrors piled against the wall are covered in torn out pages of photographs from fashion magazines, white painted floor boards, enormous country wooden tables and reinforced cardboard stools show how little it can take to make a place look great, it’s a wonder why so many places get it so wrong. The menu is basically pizza, it’s expensive pizza but it’s great pizza and they do a wonderful salad too. The pizza’s are so thin that they bubble up and are drizzled with olive oil and pilled with delicious and fresh ingredients. It’s really too expensive for me to come as often as I’d like but the owner is very welcoming insisting that it’s absolutely fine just to have a cup of tea. There are two large tables inviting communal sharing downstairs, which I’m a big fan of and an upstairs area which looks like a dining room in a palace with additional seating.

www.storydeli.com

Story, 3 Redchurch Street, London, E2 7DJ
07918 197 352
Monday – Sunday 12pm-10:30pm

No related posts.

Full Stop

Penny Blood — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 13:54:01 +0000

What was once a really good little antique shop is now an even better café. Full stop has gone right to the top of my list of favourites. I like it because it’s been designed to look like a sitting room from another decade, complete with 1960’s kitchen cupboards, blue Formica table tops, couches, wall lamps and old photographs. They keep it simple serving a few pastries and cakes to go with your coffee and in the evening stay open late serving alcohol, a treat in London where a café rarely stays open past 6pm. I like cafes that lack that air of professionalism where getting a flat white right is a matter of life or death, which as I’m not actually a big coffee drinker is lost on me. What I like is somewhere were the furniture has all been hand picked, as if the owner was decorating their own house and where the menu is simple but good. It’s a good spot for working as the back area doesn’t get much natural light so good for working on a computer but as an antidote there is a nice little window spot up front to watch the world go by.

www.facebook.com/pages/full-stop/130525277050160?ref=ts&sk=wall

Full Stop, 202, Brick Lane, London, E1 6SA
Monday-Friday 8am-11pm, Saturday-Sunday 9am-12.30pm

No related posts.