Something For The Weekend

The Queen's Dolls House

We all have memories of childhood. Some are good, some are bad; but we definitely all have them. I’m sure that for most of us, many memories feature the school summer holidays. In my memories the colours of green and blue seem strangely vivid and bright and they all seem to feature being outside. It got us all thinking what Queen Liz’s childhood was like. Where did William and Harry play? What did the royals, the rich and famous play with? Did they all have designer toddler specific hummers like Brooklyn Beckham? Or were they (hopefully) a bit more like us?

Free summer stuff in your city

There is some great free stuff happening all over the country this summer and we thought we would give you some pointers on where to look and what could be on offer where you live:

Playing the super spy in Britain’s hidden movie sets

The James Bond exhibition at the Fleming gallery was surprisingly good. It’s only small but it really gives you an idea of the global reach that the James Bond films have. When we came out of the gallery we came across a newspaper advertising the new James Bond novel “Devil may care”. It featured the new book, in a glass suitcase, being held by a leather clad model, in a speedboat on the Thames. Now any one of these things would peak our interest but together they seemed like a blockbuster idea.

The idea then began to form in our minds, where could you play at being Bond (without getting arrested for stalking). We dragged the dinner jacket out of the wardrobe, gave the cocktail shaker a quick wash and then off went off to play super spy!

Visit City Hall for free

Every year we seem to be greeted by more and more consumer polls each time we open a newspaper. There seem to be endless lists of which is the most famous, most visited, most iconic or tallest building in the UK? Most of the ones that make these lists tend to be ones that you visited with your primary school in the eighties or that you always meant to go and see but never got round to. That got us thinking, which buildings are the most mysterious or least visited? Which ones do you never visit because quite simply you can’t?

A few beers later, and as normal, this discussion was still raging and we boiled it down to two main groups: Those buildings belonging to the Armed Forces and those belonging to Government.

Skeletons from the closet, where those famous bones were buried

Since the 17th century Britain’s reigning King or Queen has attended the trooping of the colour parade. While today’s festivities are largely ceremonial, they are still one of the highlights of the monarchical calendar with thousands turning out to see Queen Elizabeth and the other senior members of the royal family.

The ceremony takes place on Horse Guard’s Parade and the mall and it’s one of the most popular free events in London so try and arrive early, The main events start at 10:00 with the RAF fly-past scheduled for around 13:00. With London waiting in expectation for the arrival of all the pageantry, it got us here in lastminute.com hq wondering where the bones of the previous monarchs to have the colour trooped for them ended and if you can go and see them. We were particularly interested in the final whereabouts of some of histories most salubrious characters whose fates seemed intertwined with the monarchs of the day.

The best Ibizan summer

   

The summer clubbing season starts with a bang today as the most famous club night in the world opens it doors to the public. In 2007 Manumission moved over the  road from the famous Privilege club that it had occupied since 1993 to it’s San Rafealean neighbour Amnesia.

What to wear to that summer wedding

Like most of the country, we're snowed under with wedding invitations this summer. The big question is what to wear? We've asked our good friends at Look magazine for some help in this most important of matters.

Your London summer checklist

London is not just a big city; it’s a really big city. It has over 8 times more people than Birmingham, 16 times that of Liverpool and a massive 35 times the population of Cardiff. The London metropolitan area is thought to have between 12 and 14 million people, that is over 20% of the population of the UK

It covers over 609 square miles and is one of the largest cities in the world. On your first visit to London it can seem quite daunting but don’t worry we’ll give you some pointers to help you out this summer.

London is split into 6 main areas and in the article below we’ll try to give you an idea of what the features of each one are, what there is to do there and how to get there.

It's not just cricket...

We've heard mention the mythical "summer season", but what is it? Can you get involved if you don't own your own horse, have a knight of the realm in your family or have  more have more than 16 bathrooms in your house? We decided to take on the challenge of deciphering the season and finding ways to join in

Bringing the house down - al fresco theatre

So, you want to catch some theatre this summer but you don’t like the idea of being indoors?  No problem at all.  There are plenty of opportunities to get out there and watch some outdoor theatre.  Don’t go rushing out quite yet.  Here are some pointers that might help to make your experience a little better.