London

Nestled on the banks of the River Thames, with a commanding view of Tower Bridge, Le Pont de la Tour is a landmark restaurant that intertwines French cuisine with the dynamic backdrop of London's skyline. This culinary destination has been at the forefront of London’s high-end dining scene since opening its doors in 1991. I was offered a job there as a Sommelier around 1996, but declined as I wasn’t ready to move to London. I am not sure if I regret this or not. I think retrospectively I would have thoroughly enjoyed my time there. 

Meandering along the streets of Clerkenwell, I found myself pondering why it had taken me so long to dine at Luca, a stalwart of Italian food with a distinctive British twist. Owned by the Clove Club, this Michelin-starred restaurant disguises its culinary skills behind a façade reminiscent of a local trattoria, with its inviting green exterior and modest double wooden doors.

The exhibition, inserted like a ship in a bottle into the domestic proportions of the Osborne Studio Gallery, comprises a collection from the sixty of more Climping beach scenes,  and one eight footer of the Arctic, following Baker’s Cummingøya expedition.  

Located in Walthamstow, Burnt Faith is the first brandy distillery in London for over 200 years. This exciting venture promises to bring the art of brandy production to a community steeped in history, full of craft beer producers and even an urban winery. 

Lincoln Seligman has an almost umbilical link with India. His family is connected with some of the great names in the country’s history and literature, from Mahatma Gandhi (a close friend of his paternal grandmother Hilda Seligman) and Rudyard Kipling (his mother’s godfather) to the shepherd boy Chandragupta, who became the first Emperor of the Indian Mauryan dynasty around 320 BCE. A bronze sculpture of the boy, created by Hilda Seligman, now sits in majesty on a red sandstone plinth in front of the Indian Parliament in New Delhi.

The Whisky Event brings together some of the finest producers and enthusiasts in central London later this month. Held in the ballroom at the Grosvenor House Hotel on Park Lane, it is set to be one of the highlights of the year.

Romania can count back in millennia, when it comes to experience in wine making; in fact it has one of the world’s oldest winemaking traditions and is even one of the world’s largest producers.  

Frippy Jameson (born 1978), who now lives and works in the Scottish Borders, studied Fine Art Sculpture at Camberwell College of Art and Design, but, as she explains when telling her own story, she didn’t follow the mood of that moment in the early nineties, when YBAs such as Hirst and Emin were generating all the critical excitement, controversy and headlines, with their conceptual new art.  

Daniel Crane, born in Norfolk in 1969, is the youngest son of a farming family, always surrounded by animals and the countryside, with a respect and love for them both. 

A tenth solo show celebrates one of the world’s most admired and collected equestrian artists. Joie de vivre, draughtsmanship, and brilliant colour in the paintings of Hubert de Watrigant shine out of thirty new works at Osborne Studio Gallery, in London’s Belgravia.