India Knight's Blog

I'm tentatively blogging at indiaknight.tumblr.com, for the very shallow reason that I prefer the way it looks. Unfortunately, I can't import any of the content of this blog, so you may want to bookmark this page if you found it useful. But all future posts will - I think, unless something goes very wrong - be on Tumblr, so come and find me there instead (it's teeny at the moment, sorry). And thanks for reading. 

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This is so great. Dave Eggers started a shop in San Francisco called the Pirate Store, aka 826 Valencia. It stocked all kinds of piratical goods - marvellous enough it itself. But! if you went through to the back of the shop, you found young people writing stories, being shown how to write stories, receiving one-on-one help from grown-up writers who volunteered their time. (Don't know why I'm using the past tense - it's still very much going and growing - theyre in other US cities too now).

Now there's an equivalent in London. Started with Eggers's blessing and led by Nick Hornby, The Ministry of Stories is in Hoxton High Street. You go through Hoxton Street Monster Supplies - which, as per the pictures above, stocks everything a monster might require - and find the secret entrance to the Ministry of Stories itself. Children aged 8-18 can drop in to the writing sessions on Thursday afternoons from 3.30-6.30, or on Saturday mornings from 10am-12pm, and get help writing anything from a book to a poem to a CV. Completely genius idea. Teachers can also book in their class for a visit. You can volunteer to be part of it right here (I am). Comprehensive, detailed info on their site. 

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Here is a marvellous Paris Review profile of Bricktop, née Ada Smith in 1894, 'legendary saloonkeeper' and African-American performer in Paris some time before Josephine Baker. In Paris, she drove F. Scott Fitzgerald home from the club every night, taught the Duke and Duchess of Windsor to dance the latest dances (also the Aga Khan, who was very fat and said 'How does it feel to have royalty kiss this little freckled hand of yours?') and hung out with Cole Porter. I'd never heard of her before.  

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And here's some bedding from Horrockses. The label used to make fabulous dresses in the 1940s and 1950s (see here) and now a revival is underway, using the original designs - bed linen, cushions and bedspreads, so far. Stockists include House of Fraser, or buy directly from them here. 

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I was moaning on Twitter the other day about hideous lightbulbs - the big stores are stopping selling old-fashioned ones tomorrow - that make every room look like a particularly bleak and demoralising institution, when @dbrown_esq, who's a tv and film production designer, told me about Filament Lightbulbs, who import and sell beautiful Swiss-made, er, filament lightbulbs. 

These are lovely objects in their own right and make *the* most beautiful, flattering golden light - the kind of light you'd imagine glowing from a wonderful house in the distance if you were a weary traveller in a story, or the kind of light you can see in every other hip restaurant in London. They are not at all cheap, but I'm told they last ages. I just took delivery of mine and honestly, they've transformed the rooms in question. 

I realise this is a bit niche, but I'm obsessed with lighting. Also in a way they are economical, since I'm not going to leave the house again (very good effect against skin, these bulbs. You really need a chaise-longue to go with them, and maybe a satin gown).

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Congratulations to Quadrille publishers for its fantastic 'New Voices in Food' series of cookbooks, which are wonderful and which I've been cooking from for the past fortnight ("Comfort and Spice" isn't out until September, but you can read its author's excellent blog here. James Ramsden's site is here.). Congrats also for recognising that much of the best food writing is currently found online, and for producing really lovely, user-friendly books. Nothing cheffy in any of these - just massively delicious, relaxed home cooking, but with a big and welcome dose of zing, freshness and enthusiasm. 

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This is the funniest, sharpest, truest thing anyone's written about Twitter. It is incredibly funny - proper "Oh no, I made a noise like a pig" funny - and because she doesn't pull any punches (this is an exquisite understatement), it also had me cringing like mad as I recognised some awful Twitter behaviour or other. Out on the 14th, published by Faber - here's the Amazon link (for usefulness. Personally I like my local independent bookshop). Here's an extract. 

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London never ceases to amaze me. There's an absolutely enormous - 700 stalls - antiques market at Kempton racecourse (just past Twickenham/Richmond) that takes place twice a month and has been there for 20 years, and I'd never heard of it. A friend dragged me along in the early hours of this morning and I was totally blown away. If you enjoy brocante and the more charming flea-markets, you'll think you've died and gone to heaven. 

It doesn't feel like being in England, partly because lots of the vendors are French and Belgian - wonderful furniture, linens, china, chandeliers, objects - and there is properly fabulous stuff on offer, whether you're after a sofa, a kitchen table, a plaster Jesus or some lovely old lace. Bonkers, showpiece items too. You could furnish a whole house in about three hours and make it look *incredible*.

Get there at the crack of dawn - things kick off at 6.30am and go very quickly. The place is rammed with dealers  - we saw the whole of Camden Passage go filing past - and smart girls from West London who have little boutiques and 200% markups: all those vintagey one-offs you see and can't afford are sitting there in Kempton, waiting to be snapped up. Indoor market also, jewellery-heavy. And haggle! It works. 

All details here. (Sorry about the pics - I'd have taken a proper camera if I'd known how fantastic it would be).

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For Luna sell fantastic, Fifties-y swimsuits and bikinis that work best if you have tits and an arse, that are really well-made and that are *incredibly* flattering - I mean, optical illusion flattering. Flatteringissimo. They were featured in The Guardian last weekend and have had a bit of a run on their stock as a result, but hang in there - more on the way. It's not often I try on a swimming costume and practically want to snog myself. 

Edited to add: I thought the label said "Esther Williams" as a sort of camp tribute, but no. It's the real Esther Williams! She's alive! She makes amazing cozzies!

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I know I drone on about Mimi Berry's bags with wearying frequency, but this one - it's called Big Mae - really particularly floats my boat, and the boats of a number of people who've stopped me and asked me where it's from (I have it in tan, top. Also available in camel, middle, and a really dark, 95% cocoa solids chocolatey brown, bottom; also grey and black). It's beautifully made and completely plain, you can shove all your stuff in it and still have room, and the straps are long enough to wear it cross-body. 

Even better, it's in the sale, down from £228 to £160. More Maes imminent as part of the A/W collection, including some rather chic studded numbers. 

PS All Mimi's bags age beautifully, which isn't a given generally. They go all conkery and patinated, as explained here on her blog.

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