It's a wrap

I went back home from Christmas, like everybody does. Back home with mom and dad, back home with the family and the usual quarterly meeting with what used to be you old room. Quarterly meeting with what used to be your old computer and 6-hour train ride to the North to visit the relatives and time enough for self-reflecting.

It is past 21-12-2012 and we haven't died. This was a far bigger hoax than the stupid year 2K computer crash that managed to sell all sort of fixing crap to avoid a stupid figure disaster that some PhD IT engineer apparently didn't thought about back in the early days.

All and all 2012 has been a pretty good year. In fact, now aged 26, I am enjoying things, little things, even more than before. Seems like this great City has caught me right at the peak of my cultural development, so I have enjoyed every single minute of it.

2012 packed the greatest of celebrations and all that involves them: Queen's Diamond Jubilee and the Olympic Games. Transport for London suffered a major facelift and now is looking better than Mel C post Spice Girls Era. Summer was surprisingly calm in the centre and London was dressed to impress all year long (let's not count Bishopsgate Road, near Dirty Dicks: this bad boy cannot be kept clean, not even putting a bin every foot).

East London has been crowned the official trendsetter and people is not afraid of popping around deep Hackney on the weekends anymore. In fact, hipster media says that you should be seen in postcodes around EC1 and E19, while WC1 to W1 are so 2010... Street Feasts conquered the hearts of us skint Londoners, which now we have forgotten about eating a meal sitting down. A fiver per item, and sitting on the floor of a derelict warehouse is what you have been supposed to be doing this last summer, while testing the new lager or real ale from the microbrewery round the corner. The 'shabby chic' has displaced the Swedish angular white furniture. This year's all new places required a menu written in white chalk in a blackboard, mismatched school chairs, exposed wooden floors and old mattresses as up-cycled lamps.

People in 2012 didn't want to eat small portions in a massive designer plate anymore. People pilgrimed around the city in search of the latest pop-up food joint to eat in cardboard boxes with their fingers. Because just in case you didn't noticed, hot dogs are not in anymore (except Big Apple Hot Dogs or Bubbledogs): the new fast meaty solution is the burrito in all shapes and forms. High end fast food.

But I lied when I said that E* postcodes were the only ones allowed this year. In fact, the dirty South is the alternative for the Dalston Superstars. SW2 is getting strength, and I could really support the fact since I moved to Brickstance (the stone of Brixi, a saxon Lord). I can support this affirmation as i brought with me on my train 4 London-related magazines which, as the season demands, wrap up the year, and all 4 of them affirm that the best Burger in town can be found In the upcoming Brixton Village, really, at Honest Burgers. Really good burgers are now the new fish and chips. We don't want more beans on toast. Because last year, the best burger was crowned up on the East, on a shy school yard, at the Netil Market in London Fields, off a caravan with old school speakers, but people thought it was a bit too much to pay 8 quid to eat the burger under the rain, Lucky Chip.

Before somebody asks, NO, I haven't tried those famous burgers, but I have had dinner in nearby places around the market and both for quality and price, I have reassured myself in the fact that I will never ever set a foot in McDonalds or similar again, as Prima Donna served me a burger in Ciabatta Bread of the size of my head for less than a Whopper menu. However, confessing myself as guilty as all of yours, I will admit breaking the rule when very late at night, after a big night out, the local chippie that offers chips and chicken for 2 quid is an effective reliever and needed cure for the next day hangover.

I must admit that now matter how hip people want to eat, they now and then want to it their buttocks in any sort of horizontal surface for a while. The same way that in spite of trendy burritos and Mussels and chips pop-up, people still adore the good old pizza, and for me there are two choices: South for Winter and East for Summer, and famous reviewers agree. I almost felt down off my communal wooden bench at Franco Manca at the Village but Hackney Wick rocked my socks after a very gloomy day, the sun finally set and showed my path to Hackney Wick and something divine served me Potato and Sage pizza at The Crate that made me forget about the Olympics and my wet socks.

And people back home keep telling me how bad food this in this great City, and I chuckle inside thinking: oh, you have now idea, and it is better it stays that way. People keep telling me about surviving the bad weather, which fair enough, has been a nightmare this last summer, but as cure for it, somebody decided to chuck tons of fine sand on top of the Roundhouse and named it the Camden Beach.

If still not enough, a group of people decided also to start a market down the canal and THAT was absolutely beautiful. Floating market: brilliant. 

I have eaten a two course dinner at a Supermarket and I have discovered secret roof terraces in Dalston

But yeah, living aside Street Food, Food Markets and pop-up shops, in spite of me being fully employed and spending horrendous amounts of time commuting, I managed to see probably all the bands I wanted in the best little venues of London, managed to go to crazy corners of the city: end of tube lines or brand new postcodes to discover derelict bunkers or party in potential festive venues that now have closes for stupid organisation and lack of safety.

Bands, lots of bands: Sleigh Bells, Spiritualized, The Raveonettes, Glasvegas, The Cribs, DZ Deathrays, Dark Horses, Two Wounded Birds, Mika (!!!), The Crookes, Hanni El Khatib, Jack White, Electric Guest, Crocodiles, The Pukes, The Futureheads, The Pukes, The Buzzcocks, La Femme, Dirty Beaches, Deap Vally, Django Django... Even one of the Proms at the Royal Albert Hall, with Imogen Heap included.

And I feel like awarding the venues: The Lexington for value/money and cool for having two floors (but he quiz night sucks), Roundhouse best layout, Shacklewell Arms for being awkward to get there, Birthdays for opening way before Rita's was built, Electric Ballroom for its quirkiness, Heaven for the stinkiest (piss and beer), The Union Chapel for being the most beautiful venue in London, The Old Blue Last for its convenient location and dead chip gigs, Hoxton Square Bar & Kitchen is alright, intimate, Koko never fails but is way too red, Ally Pally for being ridiculously big (and sort of tropical) and Shoreditch Park (interesting story behind it) for being a cool park to host a city festival.

And is not all about music: I have managed to interact with a lot of my favourit artists working around the city and has left me thirsty for more. The annual meeting at White Cross Street Party introduced me to Milo Tchais and Stephen Ball, Rich Mix gave me a massive showcase of Cityzenkane, Tony's gallery showed me that a bicycle rode by Christian Grillitsch can turn out into pretty interesting art pieces, and the list just goes on and on.

Aw, good times.

Happy New Year 2013.

Definitely more stories.

The Wick

On Friday, we all woke up with the news that the London Pleasure Gardens had gone into administration, most probably caused by the big fiasco after cancelling Bloc for yet unclarified reasons (major Health and Safety issues). Shame, because I attended the premature opening the last day of June and I had a blast (most probably because it was the first sunny day of the summer up to that date. In my opinion, the place had potential, and therefore, I decided to design my own t-shirt to mourn the loss, as a thoughtful memory of the place.

The amount of effort put on my tribute t-shirt needed to be compensated with a fair amount of street food and new discoveries around the food, so I forced my friends C and K to Dalston at night, to the highly recommended Street Feast now in Dalston (didn't like it in Shoreditch and didn't tried it when in Camden). Shame that I have no evidence of the murder, but our Rib meat roll was famous on Friday amonst the visitors and acted as an improvised PR for the stall ('The Ribman'). In the twilight of the night, before heading to the parking lot where the market was placed, we, very insightfully, managed to discovered a quite tempting roof terrace. After digesting the 'celebrity' sandwich, we run curious to said building for a sneak peak: and it was totally worth it.

The Print House Gallery in Dalston opens its doors for us to enjoy their roof top, called by them Roof Park. Nice views.

But the hightlight of the weekend was undoubtedly the plan for Saturday. Bravely, K and I decided to adventure ourselves to the far East, where no-one has gone before -lie; it is actually near the Olympic site- (I just enjoy saying it)

Suggested by Le Cool London and apparently sponsored by Fiji Water, the Artesian Wanders (summer edition, because the Winter one, wanders -haha- around Southbank -saves for later-), has its starting point at Hackney Wick. A mere one station away from the, now crowded, Olympic Site but yet unexplored, it is an area surrounded by green and warehouses. Still industrial. The first thing I noticed was a Christiaan Nagel's mushroom (looks like the guy has been very busy lately, for my enjoyment), which certified that I was in the right place, and unprecedented clean streets compared to mine. Oh wow - I thought to my self-, while looking at the map finding the first landmark to find.

A shroom from Christiaan Nagel acting as a Northern Star in our route...

It was there really, hidden between some now up-cycled warehouses, in Prince Edward St turned into studios, the very appealing Hackney Pearl, that unfortunately I was not hungry enough to try and next to it, SEE Studio, hosting a very interesting exhibition about how the locals from the Wick lived the Olympic constructions. Also, thousands of copies of THE WICK paper, created, edited and printed by them, and of which I saved a copy to carefully study at home.

We found a giant shed with a cool exhibition right next to the Pearl. I forgot to ask the guy about his name. Shame on me. Gnosis by RSH, in Wallis Rd.

A quick visit to Imperial & Standard and then we managed to head to the (now I know it's famous) White Post Lane.

First thing to notice: the walls decorated with what looked to me like traditional brand logos from early XX century. After doing my homework and researching more about it, I was actually not far from the truth: It was a regeration project by the arty Bread Collective, to pay some sort of tribute to what Hackney Wick used to be: terribly industrial landmark, house of famous or less famous British manufacturers of some sort (and also land of post-war debri). The result was a really impressive street painted with those logos from the old times from brands (I strongly recommend the reading about each individual one in their blog) most probably are still in the memories of a lot of people. The project is called The Walls Have Ears, and is the sort of thing I really enjoy finding more things about. I think it is a great idea and the execution was brilliant (you gotta love a bit of colour and typography in your street).

And when you least expect it... boom... An unseen CityzenKane

The corner on the opposite side of the road, advertised a cafe called Electric Matchbox but unfortunately, a guy, closed the fence behind us (leaving the door opened) and that and the fact that it look dead from the basement made us walk back to the main street. Had potential though. I had a funny feeling that those stairs could take us to a nice roof top or something like that.

Is somebody in there?

But then we headed towards a sign that announced The Yard but couln't find it very easily (we didn't put much effort on it, must admit), but by looking to our right side, towards the canal, we noticed a big White Building (actually called so).

I toof Hackney Wick and a map of the area + Fish Island (they were included as posters on the last edition of The Wick - just put it on my living room, because I'm THAT cool -). It is a very nice map, though.

Just found it funny. Looked nothing but funny, the place. (**Update. I just Googled the place. I am not going to link it)

It was actually at that moment, when we decided to stop for a bit and take a look at the views of the canal. A dark grey cloud was constantly threatening us, but we couldn't miss the opportunity of sitting al fresco. We were immediately tempted by the incredible smell of freshly made pizza coming from the building. What it actually was: The Crate, a microbrewery slash pizzeria by the canal. 

So we sat in an empty communal table and waited for our Sage and truffled potato pizza (would have never tried the combo myself) and drank the house cider while philosophising about our lives. It was ten minutes after, probably halfway though the pizza and the idea of leaving it all and moving to a warehouse, when the graphite-grey cloud rained on our parade. Literally. Nevertheless, the day was still too beautiful, so we all run inside to keep sharing our tables until the shower was over.

Cyclops, Mighty Mo, Gold Peg and Sweet Toof

The mighty pizza...

Cool lamps. Old dodgy mattress springs and wire.

And we went back to the route

At that point, really overlooking then Olympic site (I refuse to put ANOTHER picture of the Stadium), I managed to find more of my street art heroes in less than 3 meters around, just in a very humble corner in the middle of Hackney Wick.

Jonesy

Another CityzenKane

I think I read somewhere that this was of the most earliest Stik in East London. Should I call it Vintage Stik?

A bit of Kinska, that I though I had lost her. But there she was...

And we kept walking the canal up to Victoria Park. 

And the rest is history...

I ended up on Sunday hunting for Tropical Clusters around Shoredtich, but that's another story.