My London Summer Wish List

Every summer I have grand ambitions of making the most of the city I call home and London seems to be one of those places that sparkles all year round…

If you’re lucky and suitably wearing your rose-tinted glasses; in winter it’s slick puddle soaked streets reflecting the twinkle of Christmas lights, shopping bags tessellating on packed steamed up buses and hot chocolates walking past houses that you’re pretty sure you’ve seen once before in a Richard Curtis film.

In summer it’s balmy evenings, where the sun paints everything in the kind of warm glow that you could never quite capture on camera. People spilling out of pubs into the streets of Soho; with the chatter of friends fizzing around like the buzz of bees dancing in the parks, and dinner eaten kerbside watching the city come to life as the evening draws in.

And because sometimes it really can feel like this, I’m someone who regrets it when I haven’t squeezed all the juice out of summer in a city like London come September time. And although admittedly this year has left little to be desired when it’s comes to warm summer evenings (ahem), I thought I’d put a little list together of things I love, or long to do before the back-to-school feeling creeps around, even if just to re-inspire myself to not sit sadly at the window watching the rain throughout the last days of July…

Nice things to do in London in Summer

• Spend a slow Sunday morning at Columbia Road flower market, before heading to Lily Vanilli for cake and then Brick Lane for a smoked salmon and cream cheese bagel for the road (and the bus journey back to the station).
• Finally tick off the RA Summer Exhibition (and also catch some of Lucy Mahon’s and Frankie Thorp’s beautiful work at their ‘Common People’ exhibition).
• Find a rare sunny afternoon and go for a walk in Hyde Park, and then hire a boat on the Serpentine for an hour (and this time try not to get stuck).
• Go for a leisurely canal-side breakfast one Saturday (or, actually any day really) at Towpath Café and maybe bring a book to read to really soak it all up (oooer)!
• Nice weather almost essential for my measly self, but I’d love to swim again at Beckenham Place Park one morning (or at Brockwell Lido if the weather is less forgiving).
• Pay a visit to Forza Wine (only about thirty years after everyone ahead of the curve/moderately trendy) and soak up the sunset from a picturesque Peckham rooftop (look at this gal catching up with the whole of south London)!
• Go for lunch at the delicious-sounding Garden Museum cafe (I also love the sound of their Wild Life drawing workshop).
• Reserve a sandwich at none other than Chatsworth Bakehouse and take them for a picnic at Crystal Palace Park (boats/dinosaur spotting welcome afterwards too).
• Thanks to Bre, I’ve had a strong hankering to travel back in time to pink-table-clothed heaven at Oslo Court; and a days-gone-by dining experience here sounds pretty dreamy.
• Head to one of London’s iconic backdrops (or even the river) for an outdoor cinema evening (but vow to pack appropriately for once and not end up cross legged and shivering).
• Finally, what’s a summer Sunday morning without a mooch around a car boot? Hayes Lane and Battersea are top of the list.

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