Happy and proud to have launched this love letter to the city where I grew up: Athens. It was a privilege (and a challenge!) to be invited to create the first official guide to this manic, maddening, glorious, messy, vibrant city that never fails to surprise.
To find out what’s happening, what’s hot, and what’s new in this wonderful city, check out This is Athens.
The brand new, updated edition of Secret London, Unusual Bars and Restaurants has just been released, with a fresh new design and dozens of new discoveries.
Conde Nast Traveller has picked 11 of the most eccentric, surprising, and delightful new entries in our guide to weirdly wonderful places to eat and drink in London – and a few old favourites, too.
Read on for insider tips on where to go on your next night out in London.
I get frustrated that I’ve been typecast as a Greece expert, but sometimes that’s not such a bad thing. I’m happy to be counted among Korres beauty brand’s favourite philhellenes. If you read Greek, check it out.
Here it is at last. The brand new edition of Secret London, Unusual Bars and Restaurants with 70 new under-the-radar, underground and deliberately elusive venues to delight the intrepid urban explorer.
Updated and expanded, with new entries by the indefatigable Hannah Robinson, our brand new edition reveals where you can have lunch with the inmates of a high security prison, stroll through a sex shop into a Mexican restaurant, sing your heart out in a clandestine Korean karaoke club, tap your toes in a gypsy swing club, get pickled in a marooned Irish pub, drink cappuccinos made by murderous bikers, play petanque in a central London cellar, and tap an oak-tree trunk for whisky…
The countdown has begun: this spring, Assouline publishes a gorgeous ode to Mykonos. I am so excited to be part of this beautiful book.
I spent every summer there in my teens and twenties, so it was a bittersweet pleasure to revisit the island where I came of age. In some ways, Mykonos has changed beyond recognition. But the wild, free spirit of the island is still there, if you know where to look…
Like this hilltop retreat of the jeweller Minas, whose sensual curves echo his smooth, wearable works of art.
As the Greek architect Aris Konstandinides once wrote, on Mykonos, “Every building, every structure is like a thought, a deep meditation, a poetic act.
So thrilled to be featured in the extra special 20th birthday edition of Conde Nast Traveller. Especially since this was my favourite assignment for the magazine, in the joyous company of the supremely talented Jenny Zarins.
Read all about my encounters with shaggy goats and wise-cracking shepherds in the latest issue of the world’s best travel magazine, on newsstands now.
Yes, it’s busy – too busy, some might say – expensive, and over-developed. But in the right light, and the right month (avoid July and August at all costs), Santorini can still knock your socks off.
From must-see sights to secret spots where you’ll have the sunset all to yourself, this is my take on the very best of Santorini.
This has to have been one of my all-time favourite assignments: hanging out for a week on the far-flung Greek island of Amorgos with the sublimely talented Jenny Zarins. That lady just radiates good energy. I’m sure that’s why we were swept along by the winds of good fortune at every turn. Even navigating high-altitude hairpin roads in gale-force winds was a breeze.
There were so many unforgettable vignettes, but the best bit was surely sharing raki and prickly pears at 8am with these two grizzly old guys.
The best collaborations happen by chance. A long-lost school friend introduced me to Kostis Tsounakis, a phenomenally insightful career coach who recently moved to London. He was looking for a copywriter, I was looking for a change of direction – and a great friendship flourished as we exchanged ideas.
Kostis coaching business, AHUM, is named after Charles Mingus’ seminal jazz album. I had so much fun delving into the jazz archives for inspirational quotes and orchestral manoeuvres to add texture and depth to the AHUM website.
It’s easy to understand what a client wants to say when they are as articulate as Kostis. And everything seemed to flow naturally from the elegant design by Beautiful Everything.
It took a while, but our tip-top new edition of Secret London, An Unusual Guide is out now. Fully updated, with heaps of delightfully odd discoveries, it’s also got a very fetching new look.
Can anyone guess where the cover image by Peter Scrimshaw was taken?
Paola Navone can do no wrong, as far as I’m concerned. Her first hotel project in Greece, Erosantorini, is a witty little number that sums up her playful style. Eschewing stereotypical blue and white for black, white and grey, Paola has magicked up a simple, modern look that’s completely Greek in spirit.
Less DIY than a rental villa and more intimate than a hotel, Erosantorini has really upped the ante on Santorini. I was lucky enough to be one of the first guests to stay at this fully staffed villa dangling on the rim of Santorini’s caldera.
Next up? Paola Navone is designing two new hotels in downtown Athens. I can’t wait…
I’m delighted to be included in the first issue of Fine, a quarterly journal about the art of fine drinking. Issue No.1 is a rollicking read – from Peruvian piscos to Barbados rum shacks, how to mix the perfect martini and where to try the new breed of mead.
As editor and rum aficionado Thanos Prunarus puts it, this handsome new magazine is also about ‘the bliss of being offline’. I’ll drink to that.
That would be Sifnos, my cover story in this month’s issue of Conde Nast Traveller.
Exciting sneak preview of the new Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Centre in Athens.
Renzo Piano and Co. prove that green design can also be great design.
In late October, with my two-year-old in tow, I took the Toast team to Symi to shoot their S/S 2015 catalogue.
The sea was luminous green, the locals curiously unfazed, the harbour town pretty as a peach – even in the rain.
But the biggest revelation were the monasteries, as old as the hills that hide their secrets.
So happy to receive an award for giving Greece a good name at the Greek Tourism Awards 2015.
Now I guess I’m officially an honorary Greek.
I didn’t realise how much a little slap could improve appearances, until the glamorous photographer Calliope shot my portrait for a profile in Greek Vogue.
Of course, the setting on the Greek island of Spetses makes everyone look prettier.
Great to be part of a story on Greek destination experts, published in K, Greece’s best Sunday supplement.
Thrilled to see my beloved Greece featured on the cover of Conde Nast Traveller.
There’s nowehere in the world I’d rather be right now…
A nice little review of Secret London, Unusual Bars and Restaurants from London Visitors:
‘What is refreshing about the guide is that it reflects the reality of the dining experience which is often a mixture of wonderful and not so wonderful experiences.
Even if the establishments are worth a visit for reasons other than the quality of the food and service, the guide does not gloss over some well known underhand dining tactics like over charging or serving virtually inedible food…’
