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The Rumfest will keep liquor lovers happy with over 400 blends from around the world, the Chocolate Show's got everything a sweet-toothed city dweller could ever ask for and Discover Dogs has cute pooches galore! Take a look at the list below for a cracking weekend.
Things to do
Urban Outfitters x adidas Hyke Shopping Night, Urban Outfitters, TONIGHT. To snap up new styles from adidas’ latest collaboration with Japanese label Hyke, head to Urban Outfitters’ Oxford Street outpost this evening.
Late at the Library: Felabration!, British Library, TONIGHT, £25. This late night happening at the library marks the birthday of Fela Anikulapo Kuti (1938-1997), a pioneer of the funk, jazz and rhythmic sounds of Afrobeat that came to prominence in Nigeria during the 1970s.
Strung With Poets' Sinews, King's College London, TONIGHT, free. The Centre for Modern Literature and Culture has commissioned three composers to set words by contemporary poets to be performed by the renowned Greek mezzo-soprano Angelica Cathariou.
Autumn Ambles, various, Sat-Sun, free. Get outdoors and breathe in some crisp autumnal air on one of 40 walks taking place over this active weekend organised by Transport for London.
Pallet Paradise, Eade Road, Sat-Sun, free. A team of eight artists have been working for over a year to create Pallet Paradise, which sees 629 recycled pallet boxes turned into an immersive installation in a Tottenham carpark.
Discover Dogs, ExCeL London, Sat-Sun, £16, £13 concs, under-12s free; £14.30/£11 adv. There's tail-wagging, face-licking, stick-chasing potential aplenty at the annual Discover Dogs show, with more than 200 different breeds of pedigree dog – some 3,000 pooches – eager to be admired.
Kensington and Fulham Artist Open Art Spaces, various, all weekend, free. Artists across Kensington and Fulham open their doors to the public this Autumn, providing visitors with a unique look at the spaces in which they make their work.
Mademoiselle Privé, Saatchi Gallery, all weekend, free. This exhibition promises an ‘enchanted journey’ through the Chanels’s haute couture history.
Re:Form, Southbank Centre, all weekend, free. A showcase of arts by prisoners, offenders on community sentences, secure psychiatric patients and immigration detainees. The exhibition is curated by prison arts charity the Koestler Trust and Southbank Centre and includes fine art, design, literature, music and applied arts.
Stylist Live, Business Design Centre, all weekend, £25. Edith Bowman and Dawn O'Porter host this four-day festival curated by Stylist magazine. There'll be Q&As and appearances by the likes of Caitlin Moran, Nigella Lawson, Salman Rushdie and Yotam Ottolenghi.
Dulwich Literary Festival, Dulwich College, all weekend. Celebrate stories of all genres at this three-day festival curated by Dulwich Books of West Dulwich. The impressive line-up of authors includes Kate Mosse, Melvyn Bragg, Huw Edwards, Vince Cable, Prue Leith, Denis MacShane and Helen Lederer.
. …or check out more events happening in London this weekend.
© Addie Chinn
Eating and drinking
Cocktail Masterclasses at The Zetter Townhouse, Clerkenwell, Sat, £40-£50. The cocktail masters at Clerkenwell's The Zetter Townhouse have persuaded their favourite drinks experts to share their expertise in a series of masterclasses.
The Rumfest, ILEC Conference Centre, Ibis Hotel, Sat-Sun, £49.95-£75. The RumFest returns to London for its ninth year, showcasing over 400 blends from around the world and the best brands on the market. Rum lovers can attend tastings, masterclasses, seminars and cocktail making sessions, with experts on hand to recommend the perfect bottle.
The Chocolate Show, Olympia London, all weekend, £15, £10 ages 4-12; £12.50/£8 adv. A grand and tempting tribute to the world's favourite sweet treat featuring leading international chocolatiers and an edible fashion show.
…or check out the latest restaurant reviews.
Comedy
Jessie Cave: I Loved Her, Soho Theatre, Fri-Sat, £12.50, £10 concs. Jessie Cave – who 'Harry Potter' fans might recognise as Lavender Brown in the films – lays bare her insecurities (and social media stalking) in her new show, 'I Loved Her'.
Kieran Hodgson – Lance, Soho Theatre, Fri-Sat, £15, £10 concs. A beautifully written hour, with Hodgson focusing on his teenage hero Lance Armstrong who helps the Yorkshire lad through the tough times of mountain bike races and going to university.
Richard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre Podcast, Leicester Square Theatre, Sun, £15.50. Another series of RHLSTP ('RHLSTP') – Richard Herring's superb, interview-based podcast – records at the Leicester Square Theatre.
…or check out all the critics’ choice comedy shows.
Oxjam Islington© Guy Stephens
Live music
Four Tet All-Nighter, O2 Academy Brixton, TONIGHT, £5. The electronic music genius hosts another all-night party with some ace guest DJs.
Oxjam Islington, various Islington venues, Sat, £12, £5-£8 adv. Oxjam takes over a clutch of venues along Islington's Upper Street for a day of live music. This is the last year running the Islington Takeover for Barry Causton, the all-time record Oxjam fundraiser.
A$AP Rocky/Wiz Khalifa, The O2, Sat, £41-£48. Harlem-born-and-raised hip hop hero A$AP Rocky teams up with fellow US rap heavyweight Wiz Khalifa for what promises to be a huge show.
…or take a look at all the live music events in London this weekend.
© Jasper Brown
Nightlife
Fabric's Sixteenth Birthday Weekend, Fabric, TONIGHT, £20, £14-£19 adv, £14 mems/NUS, £10 after 3am. The first part of Fabric's sixteenth birthday weekend. There's a Kurupt FM/Champagne Steamrooms takeover in Room One, featuring Oneman, Chimpo, Barely Legal and Madam X, plus a Spor party in Room Two with Ed Rush & Optical, Logistics and Loadstar.
Dance Party 4000, Bethnal Green Working Men's Club, TONIGHT, £8. Hyperactive, interactive party fun from the ever-inventive Hot Breath Karaoke crew.
Cratediggers, The Woods, TONIGHT, free. Taking place at intimate new Shoredtich boozing den The Woods, the weekly Cratediggers series features a series of vinyl-led showcases, hosted by record labels, party crews, music publications and other hip industry bods.
Guilty Pleasures Presents The Mighty Hoop-La, Scala, Sat, £10. A huge, fun-focused party co-hosted by various alternative London club crews, involving DJs, karaoke and performance.
…or see all the parties planned this weekend.
© Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
Film
Love & Basketball is 15, York Hall, TONIGHT, £10-£30. This immersive pop-up experience is the first from new kids on the block Amacoast Cinema, an experiential cinema company with a focus on black film. They will be working alongside events company We Are Parable to transform the already impressive York Hall into an all American basketball experience.
The Thing, Prince Charles Cinema, Sat, £12.50, £10 concs. A rare chance to catch this masterclass in clammy terror on an original 70mm film print. Like many future horror classics, John Carpenter’s film was hated on first release, dismissed as an ‘Alien’ clone more interested in pushing the boundaries of SFX than in character or tension.
Classic Cinema Club: ‘The Blues Brothers’, Questor’s Theatre, Sat, £10, £7 concs. Soul-stirring celebration or crass cultural exploitation? Truth is, ‘The Blues Brothers’ is a bit of both, lending exposure to rhythm and blues legends who might otherwise have faded into silence while at the same time treating black culture as a colourful pantomime backdrop for the antics of two white comedians.
Kinema and Kocktails: ‘The Conformist’, Cellar Door, Sun, £12. Bernardo Bertolucci’s beautiful, idea-laden and thrilling film noir opens with a Paris hotel sign flashing on a man with a fedora, a gun and a naked woman. But this late-’30s-set adaptation of Albert Moravia’s novel examining Italy’s fascist past was no exercise in black-and-white nostalgia.
Or at the cinema...
The Program ★★★★☆ Ben Foster's Lance Armstrong is like something from a horror movie in Stephen Frears's eerie biopic.
Crimson Peak ★★★☆☆ Guillermo del Toro's latest is a fun but predictable Gothic ghost story starring Tom Hiddleston and Mia Wasikowska.
…or see all of the latest releases.
Theatre
In the Heights, King's Cross Theatre, Fri-Sat, £22, £18 concs. The hottest ticket on Broadway right now is ‘Hamilton’, a hip hop musical about the life of founding father Alexander Hamilton in which cabinet meetings are staged as epic rap battles.
Master of the Macabre, The Vaults, Fri-Sat, £10-£29.50. There’s a layer of cobwebs and mystery hanging over Benedict Barber, the Master of the Macabre, a spooky magician supposedly plucked from the obscurity of Covent Garden and prodded into the spotlights by his ‘magical consultant’ Chris Dugdale.
French Without Tears, Orange Tree Theatre, Fri-Sat, £10-£25, £15 concs. A rare revival for Terence Rattigan's blockbuster first comedy.
…or see our theatre critics’ choices.
This week's best new art
JR: JR, Lazarides, Fri-Sat, free. Coinciding with the release of his in-depth Phaidon monograph, JR, who is known for his distinctive large-scale photographic works that are pasted in urban environments or on the exteriors of buildings, presents two on-going projects.
Art is Your Human Right: The Artistic Campaigns of Bob and Roberta Smith, William Morris Gallery, all weekend, free. Patrick Brill, aka Bob and Roberta Smith makes polemical artworks about the democratic importance of art and most recently campaigning for better art education.
The Hyundai Commission: Abraham Cruzvillegas, Tate Modern, all weekend, free. The first Hyundai Commission transforms Tate Modern's monumental Turbine Hall in a most unexpected way.
The Other Art Fair, Old Truman Brewery, all weekend, £8, £6.40 concs. Celebrating the tenth edition of this artist-led fair, who over the years have worked with over 1,100 artists who are not represented by a gallery, The Other Art Fair returns to the Old Truman Brewery.
Moniker Art Fair, Old Truman Brewery, all weekend, £8, £6.40 concs. The contemporary art/street art crossover fair returns to the Old Truman Brewery for its sixth year. Known for its experimental approach to showcasing art through immersive gallery spaces, Moniker presents works from over fifteen galleries rooted in urban culture.
…or see all London art reviews.
And finally
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