The Time Out London blog team

If you’re a fan of chic utilitarian domestic goods, we have some huge news. Labour and Wait has opened a new store in London. If you haven’t heard of this bougie boutique that opened in Shoreditch in 2000, it’s essentially an all-sorts shop, selling high-end classic items that are designed to last. That means anything from coffee pots, to hardware tools, work jackets and good quality knitted jumpers. It’s also on Time Out’s list of the best shops in London.  Labour and Wait’s Covent Garden outpost opened its doors on November 15, coinciding with the original store’s 25th anniversary. At 3,000 square feet, the new shop on 12 Dryden Street is three times the size of Labour and Wait’s east London flagship on Redchurch Street.  Photograph: Labour and Wait Fittingly, the new shop resides in a mid-19th century building that has previously served as a chapel, a warehouse and a seed merchant. Inside its as utilitarian as the goods it sells, with vaulted arches, exposed brick and ironwork.  To mark the occasion, Labour and Wait will hold a special celebration on Saturday, November 29 across all three of its shops in Shoreditch, Marylebone and Covent Garden. Shoppers will be able to sample goods from the Labour and Wait larder while doing a bit of Christmas shopping and perusing the seasonal items on offer.  Photograph: Labour and Wait ‘When we started, we really wanted that feel of a general store, almost like a village shop or a community shop. We like the idea of selling a...

One of London’s finest shopping streets – Regent Street – hasn’t been pedestrianised since the pandemic. But this Christmas that’s about to change, because the road is going car free. For one day only, on December 6, customers will be able to do their Crimbo shopping without the risk of being hit by a double-decker, black cab or Lime bike.  The West End is going to be transformed into a festive shopping paradise, with entertainment, refreshments and plenty of photo opportunities.  The road will be closed to traffic between Oxford Circus and Piccadilly Circus, with festivities starting at 2pm and continuing through to 9pm. Three vintage London buses will be parked along the ‘Festive Mile’, each offering a different Christmassy experience.  RECOMMENDED: The best Christmas lights displays in London. One bus will be set up entirely for taking ‘elevated’ seasonal selfies, another will be the Choose Love Disco Bus, with live music from choirs and DJs keeping the party going, and then there’s festive crafts bus, which will host wreath-making workshops and a free gift-wrapping service.  There will also be roving entertainers including stilt walkers, juggling jesters, festive butlers and Hamleys elves. For refreshments, there will be a variety of hot booze-free tipples, including hot chocolate and non-alcoholic mulled wine up for grabs.   A variety of Regent Street’s shops will have special offers on on the day, including Marc Jacobs, Ziggy Green and Neom. And the Choose Love...

When the Royal Court recently announced that it would stage the UK debut of the hugely hyped Broadway smash John Proctor is the Villain, I’d wondered if the show’s UK lead Sadie Sink might come over with it. The answer, it would seem, is a resounding ‘no’ as the Stranger Things star has, delightfully, announced she’ll be doing a totally different play in London at the same time, starring in a new production of Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet directed by Brit auteur Rob Icke. The youthful Sink will, naturally, play Juliet, one half of Western literature’s most famous doomed couple with Romeo, who’ll be played here by the even younger Noah Jupe, who is probably best known for playing Marcus, the middle child in A Quiet Place and its sequel. He makes his stage debut opposite Sink, who is more of a theatre veteran: the flame-haired actor made her own debut over a decade ago in the title role of a Broadway production of Annie. What can we expect? Although Icke is an enthusiastic rewriter of the classics, he rarely touches Shakespeare’s language, but does often impose quite radical new interpretations of the action onto the likes of Hamlet and Player Kings (his mash-up of Henry IV parts 1 and 2). His productions are always modern dress, and generally artsy but in an accessible way, and tend to be stacked with a recurrent core crew of British stage actors (though expect more fresh faces for the play’s sundry teenage characters). Though always popular, Romeo & Juliet is definitely...