Inside the Travel Lab

There are hotels. And then there are hotels. Places so imaginative, so extraordinary and so unusual that they stand out as experiences in their own right. The Egerton Hotel in Knightsbridge, London, is one of those hotels…

Like many a hotel in London, a Union Jack flag hangs over the doorway of The Rubens at the Palace, the fabric swaying with all the haste of an oak tree expanding its roots. Unlike many hotels in London…

A clock plods through its strict rhythm as the clink of china echoes through the drawing room. A Union Jack plays hide-and-seek at the window when the teapot isn’t watching and a platter of cucumber sandwiches make themselves comfy for afternoon tea.

In the aftermath of the London riots, a group of volunteers decided to show the world what social media could really do. This is their story, told by Sophie Collard.

Ask many people where London’s cathedral is and they’ll confidently point to Westminster Abbey – which isn’t a cathedral and isn’t even in London (at least not the City of London). The correct answer, of course, is St Paul’s… except that it isn’t. Not quite. London has…

It’s my birthday this week so you’ll have to wait a day for the next travel update. I have some urgent cupcakes to attend to…

Emerging from Clapham Junction’s grey and predictable train station, I saw him straight away. A scarlet Mini Cooper, unflappable sixties gear, a glamorous assistant and the promise to show me London in a whole new light.

“Mental salvation,” Jean-Marc tells me when I ask why he left his banking job to run a charity full time. He talks about his dismay at the practices in the City in the run up to the crisis. Then he tells me about his son…

The true City of London, or the Square Mile, forms the financial heart and hub of London. It’s a place of steel and glass, of suits and speed and the habit of gambling on the future rather than rambling on about the past. Yet among some stunning new buildings, the…

After Namibia, the London Underground took my sense of proportion, dragged it through the proverbial hedge backwards and then left it in a crumpled heap on an escalator. All while urging me to…