Fashion week fun
London Fashion Week is here again, and I’ve been talking fashion over at Shudoo and TK Maxx, both of whom kindly allowed me to share my views on current trends.
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Tube nerds in Islington must be a happy bunch: there’s a goldmine of Underground history in the borough, with all sorts trivia to be unearthed (sometimes literally) at many of its stations. So being partial to a spot of tube-geekery myself, I did a bit of research into Islington’s stations and came back with more fascinating facts than I ever expected…
Article originally published at Islington Pepople
Continue reading ‘Underground Islington: a collection of local tube factoids’
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Cosmo stint
I’m guest blogging over at Cosmopolitan this week, where I’ll be profiling the latest celebrity looks that divide opinion. Visit Love it or Loathe it to voice yours!
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Now Coveting…
‘You can’t always get what you want’, as a choirboy once annoyingly sang. But you can blog about it, and dream of a time when all things are possible. Here’s everything I am Now Coveting.
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A note from Abi
Hi! I’m Abi Silvester, fashion and lifestyle journalist, web editor and blogger.
If you’d like to find out more about the type of work I do, you can check in here any time to see what I’m up to – just scroll down for news on my latest projects
Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have a query regarding any of the following sites:
Islington People
Kiss & Makeup
Shoewawa
The Bag Lady
Crafty Crafty
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The year in shoes
Reckon you can name the designers of each shoe?
If you get stuck (and have an opinion on which one deserves to win shoe of the year 2009) then I’ve got a poll going here.
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Tags: fashion, shiny things, shoes
Brie and Cranberries are not only one of the nicest festive food combos for Christmas – they’re one of the best taste sensations of all time, so I tend to stock up on the runny stuff around this time of year. The bloke and I have a favourite haunt for this type of thing – Le Peche Mignon off Holloway Road – and that’s where I spotted this lovely display.
I was especially grabbed by the rather wonderful idea for making the cheese even more seasonal: chop off a few edges in a classic brie triangle, et voila: you’ve got a brie Christmas tree. Possibly the quickest food craft ‘project’ I’ve ever encountered, but I couldn’t resist including it here as it’s not something I’d necessarily have thought of. Joyeux noel!
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Tags: foodie
It’s a gloomy, miserable day here in London: The rain’s been going at it all day, and I for one feel like doing nothing more than kicking back with a cup of tea and a nice hearty slice of cake. And what could be a better treat on a drizzly day than lemon drizzle cake?
Fortunately, I have just a thing at my disposal, as my good old ma has passed on this wonderfully tangy recipe for me, which goes down a storm on rainy days. It’s great with vanilla icecream, and I recently took it along to a top-notch tea party I attended with the Domestic Sluttery girls.. .So without further ado I’d like to share my lemon drizzle cake, which is adapted from an old Cranks recipe. The defining feature of this heartwarming cake is the warm syrup that’s poured over the finished item at the end, but more about that over the jump…
Read on for the recipe
Apologies for the amount of parenthesis going on here: I believe all recipes should be adapted to taste, and experiments have proven that varying the ingredients can result in very different (though equally yummy) cakes. The choice is yours.
Ingredients
• 100g butter or margarine (I used a 50/50 mix for the best results)
• 150g caster sugar (or brown sugar for a denser, more gooey effect)
• 1 lemon, grated and juiced to within an inch of its life
• 1 to 1.5 free range eggs (the 1 egg version is flatter and denser again)
• 100g self-raising flour (wholemeal works well and gives a nuttier effect)
Method
Grease and line an 18cm loaf tin. Heat the butter/marge in a pan with about two thirds of the sugar, over a gentle heat until the fat has melted. Then take the mixture off the heat and add the grated lemon rind.
Next, whisk the egg(s) in a basin and add the sugar mixture. Fold in the flour and pour the whole mixture into the prepared tin.
Bake in the oven on gas mark 4 (180 degrees) for about 30 minutes until cake is just firm to the touch.
On the hob, warm the remaining sugar along with the lemon juice to make a warm syrup.
Prick cake all over with a fork, then spoon the lemon syrup all over it.
Leave in the tin to cool.
Adapted from an original recipe by Cranks
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Tags: food
What I did on my holidays
Dublin has been on my list of places to visit for longer than I can care to remember, so it was good to get on a plane and actually do that last week. Of course, we had to go and pick the day of the worst conceivable weather to travel in for a person whose fear of flying is legendary, but following a three hour delay that allayed my fears that they’d just fly on through a storm regardless, we finally got off the ground and were touching down before I’d even thought to unfasten my seatbelt. The flight itself was obviously not the smoothest in history, but it was nowhere NEAR as bumpy as my ill-fated returns from Athens and Madrid, so if nothing else it taught me not to assume anything from a certain type of weather!
There were plenty of cafes during the day serving veggie stuff but our fine dining habit was curtailed from day one, when Joe was served bacon in a ‘vegetarian’ risotto at one of the places we’d booked in advance. Ho hum! On our last night we shared a romantic bag of chips on Baggott Street followed up by a 9 inch takeaway pizza in the hotel.
Don’t assume we sat around eating junk food and drinking obvious drinks, mind you: plenty of art and culture was observed, including two art exhibitions, a tour around the Chester Beatty library and its wonders, and culminating in a trip to the Gate Theatre to see a new adaptation of The Birds.. In the unlikely event that any of you ever go and see it, I won’t spoiler the end. But good grief it was chilling! We also managed to catch up with ex Benwell Road resident Nora, take a walk along the canal and buy ghastly souvenirs, so all in all not bad going for a three day jaunt. I liked the city and want to go back, but will be factoring in a day trip to Cork next time where the nearest rated veggie restuarant is situated 
More photos here.
Admin and outings
Joe and I declared Wednesday and Thursday ‘admin days’, which meant that he played computer games while I went out shopping and got my hair cut. It’s quite short now incidentally – I must have got to that age. Oh, we got some boring stuff done as well – I’m looking at a ‘to-do’ list that’s 90% ticked so some progress must have been made but I’d never be so rude as to blog about it.
Brighton break
While I was down there, the urge struck me to equip myself with a new phone, and I finally settled on the HTC Hero, having conducted extensive twitter-based research. Unfortunately I’ve been unable to test out its myriad and apparently wonderful Android features as yet, because the person who served me at T-Mobile was new to the job and of course I was too British to demand that someone else do it despite knowing it would go wrong. I’m still waiting for them to put me on the right data package and may soon have to ‘turn to twitter’ to ensure this happens promptly.
Update: It has indeed ‘gone wrong’. I still can’t access the google android store a week later, despite several despairing calls to T-Mobile. If anyone else can help me out here you’ll be my hero…
home is where the hearth is
On Sunday, I packed my bags and headed up to London to play the drums: you can read about the fantastic time I had banging away on them below.
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Tags: life
It’s back! The biggest craft extravaganza this side of the Atlantic is returning for a big festive bash in London on 12th December when BUST magazine take over York Hall in Bethnal Green.
The Craftacular, which only started to host events in the UK a year ago, has fast become an important fixture in the indie crafter’s diary. Its summer event was a huge hit, and this more tinsel-tastic affair promises to be splendid fun too – with a Christmas tree Tombola; tea and cake at the Lady Luck Rules OK Pop-Up Christmas Party, knitting know-how with Prick Your Finger and Knit & Destroy’s giant knit-along Christmas decoration. And if that’s not enough to get your needles knocking, plenty of very hip-sounding DJs will be in residence, spinning tunes as you craft the night away.
Anyone else planning on going along?
Bust Christmas Craftacular: 12 midday – 7:00pm, York Hall, 5-15 Old Ford Road, Bethnal Green, London E2 9PJ
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- Fashion week fun
- Underground Islington: a collection of local tube factoids
- Cosmo stint
- Now Coveting…
- A note from Abi
- The year in shoes
- Oh Christmas brie, oh Christmas brie…
- Lemon drizzle cake for a drizzly day…
- What I did on my holidays
- BUST is back: roll up for the Christmas Craftacular
- Unlock your potential #2: Drumming up success
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