An intelligent mix of culture, style, travel, food and property, as well as where to go and what to see.
Ferrets at Buckingham Palace, swearing at Wimbledon and the real-life incident that inspired Del Boy’s fall through the bar – it can only mean that our trivia tour of London’s postcode areas has reached SW… The Clermont was the first hotel in London to have lifts. The ‘ascending rooms’ (as they were known when the
Of all the money we’ve spent on our barn conversion since we moved in 13 years ago, the wood-burner we installed in our living room trumps bathrooms, oak flooring and even a beautiful garden room extension as our best investment. At £2,000, the neat cast-iron stove was worth every penny – and never more so
What difference does the internet make? Critics blame it for a range of ills, from social collapse and child abuse to obesity. So shouldn’t we greet with some caution and even sadness the recent announcement that Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite broadband is to reach tiny Pitcairn Island in the Pacific Ocean, home to the handful
December is here and it’s going to be murder out there from now until the new year. Spectactor Life writers explain how to get through it – from swerving bores and turning down invitations to lining your stomach and crashing with panache… Swerve bores Celia Walden When trying to escape the party bore, pick an
This week, in homes across the land, there is one guarantee: somewhere, someone will be watching one of the Indiana Jones films, and it’ll likely be the first or the third in the series. Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade are little less than perfect seasonal comfort food: witty, exciting, stuffed full of indelible
I’m bad at Christmas. I hate turkey, wrapping presents and the idea of forced, planned fun. My family – mostly – shares the same view. Extra shifts are picked up and presents are sent with time to spare to avoid actually having to see each other. Fortunately, even if I’m no fan of Christmas itself,
It’s getting hard to escape low emission zones. In Birmingham, Oxford and Bristol – and pretty soon the whole of London – unless your vehicle is squeaky clean, you are going to have to pay every day that you drive. London–based readers probably know by now of Transport for London’s plans to expand its £12.50-a-day
If you think your life is stressful it’s good to reflect on what poor René Artois went through each week in ’Allo ’Allo!, the 1980s BBC sitcom set during the German occupation of France. RAF pilots hidden in his mother-in-law’s cupboard upstairs, German officers in the café downstairs, Herr Otto Flick of the Gestapo likely
Most football fans have had their attention riveted on Qatar for the past couple of weeks, but for those of us who support Queens Park Rangers there’s been an unwelcome distraction at home. Our manager Michael Beale, who’s only been in charge for 21 league games, announced on Monday that he’s leaving us for Rangers,
When did it become an inalienable human right to have a shower every day? I ask the question because pretty clearly it wasn’t always so. Yes, the Romans had showers – of course they did (they probably had the internet, too, but archaeologists can’t see it). A potter about online will tell you that we got the
Even though being a right-centre comedian accords me default outsider status, I am not in any way an edgy bloke. Consequently, I find myself surprised at just how unnerved I’ve become by the drift towards a cashless society. I’m not yet at the stage where I’ve started using phrases like ‘the great reset’ or renaming
Those overstuffed shelves of the latest releases aren’t always the best place to start when you’re shopping for a book to read (or to give as a Christmas gift). You can find plenty of out-of-print books with timeless appeal that are worth snapping up – if you know where to look. Elizabeth von Arnim’s
The image of the single, childless ‘career woman’ is drawn so sharply in our minds, so deeply ingrained in culture and overused in media, it obfuscates the real story. Contrary to popular belief, most working women are not putting their careers ahead of love, marriage and motherhood. Never mind that there are no ‘career men’
It is 122 years this week since Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde died – in exile, poverty and disgrace – at Paris’s shabby St Germain Hôtel d’Alsace. His last words were said to be: ‘My wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. One or the other of us must go.’ Despite Wilde’s precipitous fall from
‘What breed is he?’ is the question I hear most when I’m walking my six-month-old Sealyham terrier, Murray. Most of the time my answer is met with blank looks or ‘I’ve never heard of that’. But just once in a while, someone will recognise the breed – and when they do, they usually have a
Turn down an alley off St James’s Street (the east side), lined with old painted panelling, and you are in Pickering Place, which pub quizzers say is London’s smallest public square. It is certainly charming, with stone paving, wrought iron railings, Georgian windows and a sundial on a pedestal. A gaslight on a wall bracket
One recent estimate claims there are 4.732 billion buildings on Earth, but it’s difficult to establish a credible methodology to count them. Is Manhattan’s Rockefeller Center, created out of swaggering pride and ambition, in the same category as a shanty hut in an Algerian bidonville? Unless you live in a desert, buildings are unavoidable, making
A few months ago I wrote a piece for The Spectator about the surge in popularity of Elf Bars and the potential health risks of these colourful e-cigarettes. But disposable vapes are now posing a different kind of problem – for the planet. These single-use devices, which last for around 600 puffs, head straight to landfill after users suck
When the Queen’s granddaughter Zara Phillips married the rugby player Mike Tindall in 2011, the shallower among us wondered what she saw in him. We’re not wondering now. Watching the monstrous regiment of muppets and divas competing in the latest series of ITV’s I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! and seeing Tindall’s equable nature –
With the Chancellor confirming that the energy price cap will rise in April, it seems we won’t be taking our eye off our electricity usage any time soon. But while energy saving tips have become a staple of breakfast television shows and small talk, how many of them really add up in practice? The Spectator’s
When England line up against Iran in Doha today, the VIP seats should be studded with former players from both sides. But one who almost certainly won’t be present is a player with a solid claim to having been the greatest Iranian footballer in history. Because Ali Karimi is a wanted man. The 44-year-old is
There is one footballer who will be under particular scrutiny at the Qatar World Cup – but not because he’s playing in it. David Beckham retired as a player, aged 38 in 2013, but nine years on his stature has continued to grow. The former England captain’s profile is so high that those tasked with
‘It is impossible for a Brummie to open his mouth without making some other-accented Englishman hate or despise him.’ I am misquoting George Bernard Shaw, of course – but maybe the great man had the much-maligned Birmingham accent in mind when he made his famous pronouncement. In a recent study more than 2,000 people were asked to listen
We live in a dog-crazy land. You know it’s true. There are 12.5 million pet dogs in Britain, and no fewer than one in three households have one. Which is, by any measure, a lot of dogs, especially when we’re confronting a cost-of-living crisis. Most people, of course, will already know why we have quite
Next month I will be 60. It’s an unwelcome landmark birthday as far as I’m concerned but they say that taking up a new hobby or pastime is a good way to combat the advances of old age. So I’ve decided to take up smoking. It was either that or something physical such as cycling
In the past five years I’ve met many people who’ve had direct, sometimes horrific, experience of communist rule. But I was more excited about doing a recent interview than I had been about any of the previous ones. It was going to be with a nun in a convent in Lithuania. I had imagined the
The Lord Mayor’s Show is a mix of traditional buttoned-up pageantry and let-your-hair-down carnival. A bit like the state opening of parliament without all the MPs, and Notting Hill without the jerk chicken. I am a Freeman of The Worshipful Company of Merchant Taylors, one of the ‘Great 12’ livery companies of the City of London. The Lord
Last Saturday was pure sunbathing weather. I mention this because a) I’m writing from the Falkland Islands, where such occurrences are not exactly regular, and b) I spent the whole beautiful day, with two or three dozen other volunteers, drilling through rock to stake out a couple of hundred 6ft metal figures. I even had
I’ve just given Elon Musk $8 a month to get a blue tick by my name on Twitter. The fact I haven’t been able to secure one of these ticks on merit like so many other nonentities has been a source of near-constant irritation for the past half decade, particularly given how much time I
