Riding High

So last week Tuesday, as you well know, it was my birthday. On the Tuesday I spent the day exploring the city filling the space between the mooching/shopping with eating. I started my morning in the Flatiron District with a gorgeous brunch at Nomad. Followed by afternoon tea at the new Laduree Teahouse in Soho, ending with dinner at Tertulia in the West Village. It was a fantastic day.

The Saturday before Hipster Dufus' friend very generously offered to take us on a plane ride to celebrate my old age. However it turned out to be somewhat of a disaster. While I'm starting to settle in very well, every so often the city throws me a curveball and reminds me that I still have a long way to go. So what happened? Well I allowed myself to think that I could invite enough people to my house for drinks. This gathering was supposed to follow a quick whiz in the plane, making for quite an epic day. The morning of, it decides to snow. So the plane was out. And during the day the inevitable cancellations started pouring in. Feeling like a Susie-no-mates and NOT dealing with the whole "it's my birthday" thing very well, I decided to do everyone a favor and cancel. By this point I was waiting on 3 people...

However this weekend Hipster Dufus' friend followed through on his offer and off we went. This time the route would take us all around New York. Starting in Coney Island, circling the Statue of Liberty ending up in a full on approach towards Manhattan. I think the photos really speak for themselves, there 's no better way to see the city. The view from up above is breathtaking. It's like seeing your very own opening credits to a film set in New York except this time, after two hours the screen doesn't fade to black.

Off the beaten track

Either Hipster Dufus and I don't really listen to each other or it's the best thing about our relationship. That after almost eight years together we are still discovering new things about each other. My money is on the former... So we discovered that he doesn't mind hiking but that I actually love it, and just (and now this will make me sound stupid) didn't know what the name meant! I just assumed it meant climbing while I prefer more of the getting "lost" on a trail and feeling like you're exploring the woods.

As you know I always want to explore the city but whenever it's his turn to curate an exploration of New York he immediately gravitates to outside of Manhattan. This is a great balance really, by the time we leave we'll have fully explored the greater New York area. I had so much fun and like I said before, just because I went hiking doesn't mean I gave up on looking presentable! Who said you can't hike in pearls?

From the Bronx

So I realized that I never did tell you how long we were in the Bronx for. Now we're usually explorers. We love nothing more than going to cities and seeing what there is to offer. So far our weekends are still mostly taken up by choosing an area to go to explore. So on this fatal Saturday when we had nothing to do, we impulsively remembered that there was an authentic Italian area in the Bronx. Little Italy. This is where the good stuff is, the little stores with the in-store freshly made mozzarella. I couldn't wait. Then we got off the train. Now in London everything is by area, there are good ones and bad ones. In New York it's very much about streets. You can be on a really amazing street and if you turn right rather than left you suddenly find yourself in the crappiest place on earth. And we turned right.

From the get-go we knew we were in trouble. Immediately we were uncomfortable. It was everything about us. The way we walked, commanded the streets and dressed. Hipster Dufus couldn't have looked more preppy in bright summer shorts with a button up in a sea of below your bum jeans, attitude and swagger. I was holding a giant Lord & Taylor department store bag. Everything was made worse by the fact that the only map either of us had was on the iPhone. Every time he tried to get it out I'd shriek "please put your phone away!". Things got more tense when the map told us to walk down the roughest looking road in history. A cul-de-sac with a little click of imposing teens waiting at the end. "I'm not walking down there", "nah me either, I really need to look at my phone to see where we're going Ney". No matter how much I moaned I knew we were in trouble when I tried to hold Hipster Dufus' hand "you know what?" He started "I would really feel more comfortable if you didn't hold my hand right now". Wow, no Cheerios love here then! Who could blame him, after the fifth head had turned to look at us, we really didn't need more to call attention to ourselves. We struggled with the idea of going home, I really didn't want to be those pissy middle class idiots. But you know what, I wouldn't go and hang out in an estate in Brixton for fun so why should this be any different? When we saw another subway station, we looked at each other and it was mutual. Let's go home. This was 15 minutes later. 

The Jazz Age

We've had a very busy couple of weeks with cultural activities galore, and a whole lot of socialising. This has all left Hipster Dufus to declare himself fully settled in NY. I'm really glad for him as it's really about time I suppose. Unfortunately I've still not got my "yup I'm settled" moment. Anyhoo one of the things we did last week was the Jazz Age Lawn Party on Governor's Island. One of my favourite things about London is the access to vintage, the clothing, furniture and markets. And all the cultural events such as vinyl nights and festivals such as London 60s Week or the Vintage Festival which I worked on a few years back. I haven't had much luck with vintage in NY. It's all super expensive, usually designer and unattainable and really difficult to find. I still only really know where two stores are that I remember how to get to. Usually I see the interesting stores while sitting in a cab and then have to desperately try to remember the crossroad.

So the lawn party was interesting to me as it promised to have vintage music, stalls selling clothing and accessories and lots of opportunities to people watch vintage pieces passing by. I had a really good time but it was not up to the standard that I was expecting. For the ticket price we just felt that it wasn't really worth it. We were all crammed into a tiny little lawn that was fenced off and then had a few little stalls selling vintage goods, but it was probably 10 in total. And actually when we realised that we could have not brought a ticket and still sat and picnic'd on the grass with access to the music it seemed kind of pointless. I felt they were missing a trick, there were so many opportunities to make this something bigger. Admittedly I've been spoilt, the vintage festival had so many different things going on like a pop up cinema, restaurants and tons of vintage stalls. As well as big name brands creating pop up vintage shops, like Benefit and Fortnum & Mason. However unfair the comparison, I guess I was expecting something more along these lines.