Tag: jane austen

The Secret Garden + The Witchery by the Castle Edinburgh

Post author By Lavender's Blue
Post date November 29, 2025

Know Your Stuff

March 2016. Getting stuffed. Maundy Thursday, quail’s eggs on a watercress stuffing nest at Mayfair regular Hush. Resurrection Sunday, fried duck eggs at Holborn favourite The Delaunay. And so a procession of lunisolar led lunches, moveable feasts, begins. An extended Easter Triduum. When a man is tired of London, there’s always Edinburgh. Easter Wednesday, squared hen’s eggs on board Virgin. York, Durham, Newcastle, Berwick-upon-Tweed … everywhere looks better when viewed from the 1st Class carriage. Rows of distant gambrel roofs punctuated by chamfered dormers announce to the visually aware the proximity of the Border.

“Oh yes I stayed in The Witchery by the Castle years ago,” a brave journalist whispered to us during the recent Making Africa press briefing in the Guggenheim Bilbao. Admittedly an unlikely moment for such a muted conversation. It was undoubtedly a memorable stay. “I woke up in the middle of the night in the most frightful sweat! It was like the bed was on fire! I was boiling alive!” She got an uninvited roasting, so to speak. The next day at breakfast the journalist voiced her concern to a waitress. “That’ll be the witches,” came the nonchalant reply. “They used to burn them at the stake on Castlehill right outside.” Presumably it wasn’t the effects of a wee dram nightcap.

Our Easter Thursday lunch in the restaurant turns out to be slightly less steamy but still hot stuff. Dr Samuel Johnson and his biographer James Boswell used to eat here. Well if it’s good enough for Sam and Jamie, both made of stern stuff … The schlep up the Royal 1.6 Kilometres past winding wynds and claustrophobic closes to the foot of Castle Rock is so worth it. We’ve arrived. Physically and metaphorically. Bewitchingly charming certainly; hauntingly beautiful definitely; ghoul free hopefully. Think Hunderby (Julia Davis’s pricelessly hysterical period comedy) without Dorothy. Or Northanger Abbey’s Catherine goes to town.

Owner James Thomson, Scotland’s best (known) hotelier and restaurateur, is evidently a follower of the Donatella Versace school of thought: “Less isn’t more. Less is just less.” An eclectic dose of ecclesiastical remnants, Gothic salvage and Jacobean antiques is healthily apropos for this 16th century building. Candlesticks galore flicker flattering light across The Secret Garden, a space even with its panelled walls and trio of fanlighted French doors and timber beamed ceiling would still induce the envy of Frances Hodgson Burnett.

The interior may flurry with wild abandon but thankfully the service and place setting don’t. Our Milanese waiter makes sure of the former. Tradition takes care of the latter. Linen tablecloths, phew. China plates (slates are for roofs), double phew. Unheated pudding (always a dish best served cold), triple phew. After a bubbly reception, the feast unfolds. Palate seducing grilled sardines followed by lemon sole with brown shrimp butter preceding chocolate orange marquise with espresso jelly raise spirits further. The huggermugger harum scarum of a prowlish ghoulish night owlish postprandial prance on the mansard tiles of Edinburgh’s Auld Toun awaits. The only way is down (hill).

November 2025. Still not sweating the small stuff. Random Friday, sôle poêlée aux graines de moutard in Mayfair’s La Petite Maison next to music producer Mark Ronson en famille. Remembrance Friday, baked Ragstone goat’s cheese gnocchi up the BT Tower in Soho. And so a procession of dinners towards the waxing crescent moon, moveable feasts, begins. An extended Advent. When a man isn’t tired of London but needs a weekend change of scenery, there’s always Edinburgh. Feast of Christ the King of the Universe Eve, double devilled hen’s egg on board LNER. Newark-on-Trent, Doncaster, Northallerton, Darlington … everywhere looks better when viewed from the 1st Class carriage. The snowcapped Cleveland Hills announce to the observant the proximity of the North York Moors.

Nine years ago the three course Table d’Hôte Lunch Menu at The Witchery was priced at £35. Today, we’re after the two course Light Lunch Menu, £34.50. Packed agenda: so little time, so many galleries. After a bubbly reception (déjà vu; déjà ivre; plus Bourgone Blanc Domaine Leflaive Burgundy 2017 – a good year), the feast unfolds. Appetite satisfying basket of bread rolls with smoked butter accompanying celeriac velouté then salmon, cod and smoked haddock fish pie. We’re stuffed. But as the great Scottish aristo actress Tilda Swindon (first seen in three dimensions dining at L’Ambroisie Paris; last seen in two dimensions in her ex partner John Byrne’s painting in the Edinburgh National Portrait Gallery) would say in her hushed dulcet tone, “This lunch is delicious!”

Our driver Eleftherios Galouzidis pulls up outside on Castlehill. The only way is downhill. We’re just in time for the brilliant recital of Moonlight Sonata by Candlelight in St Gile’s Cathedral. British impresario Ashley Fripp’s fingers dance across the grand piano. He opens with Johannes Brahms’ Intermezzo in A Major. “Next I will play a pair of Chopin Nocturnes – tone poems,” he states. “E Flat Major which was influenced by the Irish composer John Field followed by C Sharp Minor. The latter was fortunately discovered by one of Chopin’s students after he died.” There’s wild applause for Sergei Rachmanioff’s Prelude in D Sharp Minor, the Moscow Waltz. “And now for the one you’ve all been waiting for!” Ashley takes a bow after the dramatic third movement of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata climaxes to its conclusion. Nothing quite completes an evening of culture like prawn toast and chilli tofu at Jimmy’s Express Chinese Restaurant on South Bridge.

At last week’s St Martin in the Fields London Informal Eucharist the Right Reverend Oliva Graham preached, “Holy omnipresence is not a casual knowing. It is impartial and unconditional. We are called to live fully and love faithfully.” We’ll soon discover Chessel’s Court, a rare survival of 18th century tenements hidden behind Canongate on the slope from The Witchery by the Castle. The mansion blocks, to use a befitting but more southern term, were assertively restored in the 1960s. A heart shaped ivy enlivens the ground floor of one of the blocks. Always living more fully, loving more faithfully.

Architects Architecture Art Design Developers Luxury People Restaurants Town Houses

The Goldens + The Lisantis + The Circus Restaurant Bath Somerset

Post author By Lavender's Blue
Post date November 8, 2024

Golden Ratio

“They arrived at Bath. Catherine was all eager delight,” Jane Austen enthuses in Northanger Abbey (1818). Between the architectural ring of perfection that is The Circus and the arc of joy that is Royal Crescent lies the uncurved stretch of beauty that is Brock Street. This artery linking major works is mostly residential except for The Circus Restaurant which fills the ground floor and basement of a house between one of the two Beau Nash antiques shops and Cobb Farr estate agents. Brock Street is exceptionally pretty but this being Bath prettiness is actually the norm. The architecture is still grand Georgian but taken down a notch in formality compared to its heavily parapeted and haughtily pilastered geometrically daring abutting addresses. Charles Robertson notes in An Architectural Guide to Bath (1975), “John Wood the Younger deliberately kept the Brock Street elevations relatively plain.”

The owners of Beau Nash know all about chips as well as Chippendales and sherry as well as Sheratons. The Food Guide (2024) prepared by dealers Ron Pringle and Cynthia Wihardja states: “We haven’t eaten everywhere but we have tried many places. When we recommend a place it’s not only about the food. We also rate the sincerity of the service. We believe the two are essential for a memorable dining experience.” The Circus Restaurant gets their approval, “You can’t go wrong. Good food, honest prices, seasonal menus. Lovely service and very good value for money.” And The Dark Horse sounds too tempting to miss: “Our top place for pre dinner cocktails! A vast array of concoctions to suit any palette. Cosy quality atmosphere.”

The West Country’s first culinary power couple Head Chef Allison Golden and her husband Geoffrey opened the restaurant in 2007. She recalls the warm glow of that golden era, “Our busy independent restaurant served modern European food accompanied by Old World wines in a relaxed atmosphere. We cooked sincerely and straightforwardly to ensure everyone experienced the authentic taste in our ingredients. You’d never find any of the big names that turn wine into an industrial product. Each wine on our list was the individual expression of expertise.” It was the golden age of dining but time moves on and Ally and Geoff have driven off into the sunset in their gold coloured Lamborghini.

It was a gilt edged opportunity for Chef Matt Lisanti and his brother Mike to take over the restaurant – one they couldn’t resist. The staff were retained and the new golden boys are serving up the same type of modern European food and independent Old World wines. Autumn Menu highlights include Sharpham Brie Croquettes (mustard mayo, black garlic ketchup) starter for £9.30 and Cashew Massaman Coconut Curry (sweet potato, pineapple, lemongrass ginger sushi cake, puffed rice noodle) for £21.30. House White is Claude Val Pays d’Oc (fresh, green apples, tropical, creamy) priced £26.50. The food and wine are easy on the tastebuds and wallet; the service is easy on the eye. After a busy day buying first editions from George Baytun bookshop and handmade Italian jumpers from Gabucci (moda per uomo) it’s straight up from the bottom of Gay Street for dinner at the top. Squeezing in a cocktail in The Dark Horse en route of course. Friday evening in The Circus Restaurant is buzzy with a D4 (Dublin 4) feel to it. “What a delightful place Bath is,” cries Jane Austen’s Mrs Allen.

In his essay A Sense of Proportion John Julius Norwich writes, “Bath is a city of superlatives. First of all, it is the most beautiful in Britain. Next, it is the most appropriately named [unlike Bognor Regis which despite name boasts an elegant Victorian seafront] … Finally, and most gloriously of all, it is the one city in this country where fine building and inspired town planning go hand in hand, together creating an atmosphere of Palladian elegance and civilised refinement without equal anywhere.” That was 49 years ago. But as Jane Austen’s character Mr Tilney asked 206 years ago, “Oh, who can ever be tired of Bath?”

The 2nd Viscount Norwich, son of the socialite Lady Diana Cooper, continues, “The Circus, with its three splendid superimposed arcades loosely based on the Roman Colosseum, is a triumph. Still unfinished when John Wood died in 1754, it was completed by his son, who went on to create an even grander concept, the Royal Crescent, the first crescent in English architecture. In the work of both Woods we can see the principles of Palladian landscaping being followed just as much as those of Palladian proportions. In The Circus, the streets leading in are carefully arranged not to bisect it; in the same way the Royal Crescent, though less than 300 yards away from The Circus down a dead straight street, is actually invisible from it – which makes the sudden discovery one of the great dramatic moments of European architecture.”

He ends, “Yet the beauty of Bath and its uniqueness lie less in these individual triumphs than in the ensemble – in the squares and crescents and parades, ranging from The Circus to many a secluded, unpretentious street behind. The life they were built to sustain was vacuous, vapid and, one suspects, quite shatteringly dull; but they themselves embody very different values – strength, reason, humanity, permanence. This is the paradox of Bath. When the guidebooks call it ‘a monument to bygone elegance’ they are wrong. Only the perishable has perished. The elegance remains.” People come and go; the golden hued architecture is still on show. “The bright genius of Bath is hardly more than a beautiful display, the whim or flourish of an era,” argues Jan Morris in the introduction to Charles Robertson’s An Architectural Guide to Bath. “Edited to the smallest detail of perfection,” to use a phrase of Min Hogg, Founding Editor of The World of Interiors.

Architecture Hotels Luxury Restaurants Town Houses

The Rutland Arms + Castle Inn Bakewell Derbyshire

Post author By Lavender's Blue
Post date October 23, 2022
3 Comments on The Rutland Arms + Castle Inn Bakewell Derbyshire

Last of the Summer Viognier

Jane Austen visited Derbyshire prior to the publication of Pride and Prejudice, and likely stayed at The Rutland Arms in Bakewell. She is said to have revised the final chapters of her novel with fresh material from her holiday including a visit to nearby Chatsworth. A tall commanding presence dominating the landscaped roundabout at the heart of Bakewell, The Rutland Arms was built at the turn of four centuries ago. The author, if correctly reported, would have been staying in a new hotel. It’s a serious looking building of warehouse-like proportions: three tall storeys tower up to high pitched parapet-free hipped roofs. The maximalist interior decoration – school of Martin Brudnizki – is very jolly with a picture hang in the dining room to rival any art gallery. More is more; less is a chore.

Another sandstone hostelry in the pretty town is Castle Inn. On a more modest two storey scale, it is close to the picturesque bridge arching over the River Wye. The adjoining wing of outbuildings has been converted to additional guest accommodation. Overlooking the town on a hill – this is after all the Peak District – is All Saints Parish Church. Dating from the 12th century, the Norman style building was restored between 1879 and 1882 by George Gilbert Scott Junior. Cute cottages line the laneways between these landmarks. Bank House, Bank Mews, Coulsden Cottage, The Cottage, Haven Cottage, The Old Forge, Spire Cottage, Splash Cottage, 1820 Cottage.

On the same hill as All Saints Parish Church is The Gospel Hall. The local history is recorded as, “The Gospel Hall was originally The Oddfellows Hall. It was built in 1872 by the friendly society The Loyal Devonshire Lodge of Oddfellows as a meeting room for its members. The Primitive Methodists rented the building for worship from 1879 until about 1892 when they built a new church in Water Street. Around 1800 some Christians in Bakewell also began meeting on New Testament lines in the home of a Mr Sellars in The Avenue, Bakewell. By 1895 they were holding their Sunday Services in The Oddfellows Hall. In 1949 the Christians bought the building and renamed it The Gospel Hall. Between 1982 and 1987 the Hall was progressively altered and extended by converting the two basement garages, formerly stables, into an additional meeting room.”

The moist morning mist lifts to reveal an unclouded blue sky.

Tags all saints church, castle inn, chatsworth, george gilbert scott junior, gospel hall, jane austen, last summer wine, lavenders blue, martin brudnizki, oddfellows hall, pride prejudice, river wye, rutland arms hotel bakewell derbyshire, stuart blakley

Design Hotels Luxury People Restaurants

Lasarte Restaurant + Monument Hotel Barcelona

Post author By Lavender's Blue
Post date March 3, 2019

Nonsense and Sensibility

Déu n’hi do! Lavender’s Blue is a release of pure joy. Visiting a metropolis to explore just one neighbourhood concentrates our minds. A new tourism. We’re on it like a Jane Austen bonnet. Especially when the met is Barcelona; the hood is Eixample; and the local is Lasarte. “Work, strive, feel, listen, talk, taste, observe, thrill, improve, excite, think, imagine, inspire, decorate, reflect, research, work, pamper.” So declares Chef de Cuisine Paolo Casagrande.

In an Ecclesiastical moment, away from lives crowded with incident, taking an initial step toward the Examen later, we’ll go for pamper. Three Michelin star pampering, if you will. Putting the gas in gastronomy we’ve enjoyed Everglades Hotel’s colcannon gnocchi (City of Londonderry) and the Capital Club’s Guildhall power breakfasts (City of London dairy) not forgetting the East India Club’s potted shrimps in seaweed butter plus we’re not averse to Hakkasan Mayfair’s finger lickin’ stir fry black pepper veggie chicken, but when in Rome the Continental foodie capital…

Lasarte is managed by the renowned Basque chef Martin Berasategui. His restaurant in San Sebastián is also called Lasarte. Guess what? It’s got the Red Book’s top accreditation too. The Barcelona outpost is on the ground floor of the luscious five star Monument Hotel, once the home of industrialist Enric Battló. Josep Vilaseca i Casanovas was the original 1890s architect. Lasarte is reached through the open plan bar, beyond the Michelin starred Oria restaurant, secreted behind enigmatic herringbone oak doors. Architects Carles Bassó and Tote Moreno, architect interior designer Oscar Tusquets and interior designer Mercè Borrell and have delivered a modern monastic aesthetic. An inner sanctum of sorts. Its cocooned in herringbone oak floors and panelling.

Martin’s signature looms large over the restaurant. Literally. It’s scrawled across clerestory height mirrors above the panelling. Paolo combines Martin’s fiery signature dishes with his own fearsome foray into Catalan cuisine, from ginger to jalapeño. He’s got range. Don’t you just love folded linen napkin trays? Synchronised pouring? Cork presenting? A wooden wheelbarrow piled high with special artisanal reminiscential original regional bread? Lasarte is the embodiment of brilliance. The Lasarte Menu is €215 a head. Time to raid the Lazard family vault again. Fotem un café?

Catalan fished stew? Suquet. Petit fours balanced on a candelabra? Candy-labra. Mim cava. Mmm cava. Ah cava. Colm Tóibín records in Homage to Barcelona, “In Barcelona the poets and the professors, the designers and the rest of the generation of 1992 have taken Champagne to their hearts. In Barcelona they call it ‘cava’, and they take it as seriously as they take most things. Codorniu and Freixenet are local brews, for everyday use like wine from a barrel… Drinking cava is an integral part of being a Catalan.”

We’re not leaving this block. Period. Homage to Eixample. Micro travel is all about discovering what’s next door. Imagine our surprise, and dedication to the cause, to discover – in a city that brims with power shopping strips – that Passeig de Gràcia, the strip that easily outstrips all others, is at the foot of the hotel’s marble steps. Colm says it has “a glamour to be found nowhere else in Barcelona, in the faces, the clothes, the hairstyles.” This is no cursory peep behind the faded Iron Curtain. These days we’re all about intense western festoons. After such sweet, salt and umami sensory satisfaction, now’s the time to join the style savvy and go spend the next two generations’ inheritance. Eixample: it’s an extension to our very existence. Salut i força al Canuti!

Tags carles basso, chef de cuisine paolo casagrande, chef martin berasategui, colm toibin, everglades hotel city of londonderry, hakkasan, homage to barcelona, jane austen, lasarte restaurant, lavender's blue, merce borrell, monument hotel barcelona, oria restaurant, oscar tusquets, passeig de gracia, san sebastián, stuart blakley, tote moreno

Luxury Restaurants

Royal Albert Hall + Aquavit St James’s London

Post author By Lavender's Blue
Post date January 21, 2017
2 Comments on Royal Albert Hall + Aquavit St James’s London

School for Scandi

It is a truth universally acknowledged that life is better experienced from inside the box. Especially if said box is the most columned, curtained, cushioned, closeted, contained and catered for one at the Royal Albert Hall. “Anyone for sheep’s milk ricotta and elderberry jelly on potato tuile or sweet garden pea soup with poached quail’s egg and truffle foam?” asks our in-house in-box in-the-know waiter.

A few days later, suddenly, sharing a waiter with other guests seems rather déclassé, or would be if we weren’t dining in classy Aquavit. Lady Diana Cooper once described Vita Sackville-West as “all aqua, no vita”. Not so this restaurant: aptly named after the Scandinavian spirit, it’s full of life. We’re here, for starters. Not just desserts. A Nordic invader of the New York scene in the 1980s, sweeping up two Michelin stars, it opened an outpost in Tokyo and has now come to Mayfair.

Shepherd Market is the foodie haven west of Piccadilly. St James’s Market, Aquavit’s address, is a new or at least reinvented Shepherd Market hopeful east of Piccadilly. It’s a discreet location on The Crown Estate, but more luxury restaurants and flagship stores are due to open shortly. “The location is coming,” we’d been told. Cultural additions to this heralded “new culinary hub” include a pavilion opposite Aquavit styled like a cabinet of curiosities. The disembodied voice of Stephen Fry reading an 18th century ballad “The Handsome Butcher of St James’s Market” floats above stacked dioramas.

In 1989, Country Life reported: “Until quite recently London lacked continental style brasseries. There has always been a wide choice of restaurants but the alternative to an expensive meal has been the ‘greasy spoon’ café, the pub or various questionable ‘takeaways’. Traditionally the City provided dining rooms, now almost extinct, together with a diet of boisterous restaurants such as Sweetings, the catering world’s equivalent of the floor of Lloyds or the Stock Exchange. But greater sophistication was demanded by a new generation keen on modern design, New York and cuisine, as opposed to cooking.”

That all changed with the arrival of Corbin + King and Richard Caring who have filled Mayfair and beyond with brasseries. Aquavit fits into the higher end of that mould. CEO Philip Hamilton says, “Our aim is to create a relaxed morning to midnight dining experience.” Handy, as we – the Supper Club (Lavender’s Blue plus) – all have Mayfair offices, from Park Lane to Piccadilly Circus. Scandi style has been ripped off so much by hipster hangouts but this is west, not east, London. Pared back lines allow the quality of the materials to shine (literally in some cases) through: marble floors climb up the dado to meet pale timber panelling, softly illuminated by dangling bangles of gold lights.

The airy double height interior with two walls of windows was designed by Swedish born Martin Brudnizki, the creative force behind Sexy Fish, and showcases works by Scandinavian designers such as Olafur Eliasson. Furnishings are by Svenskt Tenn; photographic art by Andrea Hamilton; silverware by Georg Jensen; uniforms, Ida Sjöstedt. Wallpaper* meets Architectural Digest. We’d been warned that “it’s a bit of a fishbowl” but we’re down with that. See and be seen. Duchamp shirts and Chanel dresses at the ready. This glass box is Nighthawk without the loneliness; The London Eye minus the wobbliness; Windows on the World missing the dizziness. A mezzanine over the bar contains two very private dining rooms named ‘Copenhagen’ and ‘Stockholm’.

The menu is divided into Smörgåsbord, Starters, Mains, Side Dishes, Desserts. It’s tempting to overindulge on the smörgåsbord – really, a return visit is required for that course alone. So it’s straight onto the starters. Scallops, kohlrabi and lovage (£9.00) in a light citrus dressing demonstrate Nordic cuisine does raw well. Dehydrated beetroots, goat’s cheese sorbet and hazelnuts (£9.00) – we’re getting citrus, nectarine and dill – prove there’s life beyond seafood.

Sourdough bread and knäckebröd (Swedish rye crisp bread with a hint of aniseed) come with whey butter. “The whey butter is from Glastonbury,” explains our waiter. It’s all singing all dancing. Chillout music is playing in the background. We’re experiencing what the Scandinavians call ‘hygge’, that cosy relaxed feeling you get when being pampered, enjoying the good things in life with great company. All the more reason to sample Hallands Fläder (£4.50), an elderflower aquavit. A continuous flow of sparkling water is (aptly) plentiful and reasonably priced (£2.00). Ruinart (£76.00) keeps our well informed sommelier on her toes.

Monkfish in Sandefjord Smør (Hollandaise type sauce named after the city) trout roe (£28.00) tastes so fresh it transports us like a fjord escort to the Norwegian coast. Landlubbers be gone! Purple sprouting broccoli and smoked anchovy (£4.00) is a sea salty side grounded by the flowering vegetable. Chestnut spice cake with salted caramel ice (£8.00) is a slice of perfection revealing tones of vanilla and orange. Swedish hazelnut fudge provides a waistline enhancing end to dinner.

Right now, Aquavit is hotter than Lisbon in July and cooler than the Chanel party in Peckham. And that’s just the beautiful staff. It shares Executive Chef Emma Bengtsson with the New York site and Head Chef is fellow Swede Henrik Ritzén, who previously cooked at The Arts Club in Mayfair. Emma, who is visiting England for a television appearance, believes, “Everyone has their own flavour profile – how they like things. I’m very intrigued with keeping flavours to highlight the produce itself. It’s very pure. The flavours are understandable… You gotta keep trying. Never stop trying.”

Aquavit isn’t cheap but this is a high end establishment in Mayfair with form. It’s The Telegraph’s How To Spend It territory. After all, the person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good meal, must be intolerably stupid. And as Lady Diana Cooper once quipped, “money is fine”. Blink and you’ll miss daylight but that doesn’t mean January has to be dull or dry. We’re full and full of the joys. It’s not a school night and round the corner in Soho, Quo Vadis isn’t just a restaurant… Time to cut loose under a garish sky.

Our dedication to reportage ever unabated, is it a dream sequence or the following day do we return for a smörgåsbord of diced and smoked mackerel tartare, sorrel and lumpfish roe (£7.00) in a salad bowl, sitting at a timber table on the polished pavement? Not forgetting the unforgettable Shrimp Skagen (£9.00)? Skagenröra isn’t just prawns on toast, y’know. Named after a Danish fishing port, other essential ingredients are mayonnaise, gräddfil (a bit like soured cream) and some seasoning. Grated horseradish, in this case, adds a bit of spice. Best crowned with orange caviar. It’s Royal Box treatment all over again as we have a dedicated waiter to our table. Or maybe that’s because we are the only alfresco brunchers braving the elements outside the box. By Nordic winter standards, it’s a positively balmy morning. We’ve a love hate relationship with Aquavit. Love here; hate leaving.

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