Harrow's booze-hounds aren't having a good time of it. WIth Boris decreeing that it's no longer lawful to sup a Pale Ale while rattling up northwest-wards on the Metropolitan Line, the borough is now mulling a total ban on drinking in public. Killjoy councillors are debating whether to extend a public booze ban, which already exists in parts of Wealdstone and South Harrow, to cover the entire borough. But fear not, Pimms quaffers! The......

Have you heard? Boris is banning booze on all London transport come the first of June! Do you care? Many of your fellow Londoners do! And they’re planning parties to prove it. Grassroots campaigns both to bid adieu to booze cruising on the Tube and to openly flout the new ban are sprouting up all over – where else? – Facebook. Garnering the most attention is James Darling’s Last Orders on the Underground. The......

He may be new to office, but that hasn't stopped new mayor Boris Johnson from jumping in with both feet and whipping London into a more Boris-pleasing shape. As of Sunday 1st June, there will be no drinking on all London public transport. Well, no drinking alcohol, that is. (Can you imagine if Boris banned drinking water on the tube? Every other passenger would be fainting come summer.) But there will be no open......

Another faith school is ruffling feathers, following on from yesterday's news about the JFS - and this one hasn't even opened yet. The Hindu Krishna-Avanti school is due to open next year in Harrow, north-west London and is causing a certain amount of concern in stipulating that at this point, the school authorities will prioritise applications from Hindu families practicing the religion regularly, mainly needing proof of regular worship at home and at temples,......

This weekend column is brought to you by the founders of Niceties Tokens, Liz and Pete of Team Nice. 25. Fancy that Last night was the third niceties tokens party. Our one-year birthday. It was a really fun night, and because Team Nice teamed up with Bring Stuff (meet ups and social events with a fancy dress theme) guests where requested to bring hats and wigs to wear and share. The atmosphere in the......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 15th October 1881: The Royal Comedy Theatre (now simply known as the Comedy Theatre) opens in the West End. Tuesday – 16th October 1987: In the early hours of the morning, a huge storm of hurricane intensity wreaks havoc across London (and much of the rest of southern England). Wednesday – 17th October 1814: At the Horse Shoe Brewery on Tottenham Court Road, a colossal vat containing......

Just in case you haven't yet turned on the tv, a radio, glanced at a newspaper and this is the first internet page you've opened since yesterday, it's true. The might Led Zeppelin are reforming for a one off benefit show in aid of Ahmet Ertegun, the founder of Atlantic records who signed them way back at a time when dinosaurs really did rule the earth and died last year. Tickets to the November......

An occasional column on the forces behind the capital’s economy. Potemkin, a Russian-themed vodka bar on Clerkenwell Road, has unveiled an intriguing set of five cocktails whose recipes will be tied to stock prices. It’s not an entirely new idea. We (barely) remember a night at the Dax bar in Hannover, and there’s the near-famous Dow Jones in Barcelona. The twist this time around is that Potemkin will adjust the alcohol content of its drinks......

It would seem that Mayor Livingstone, famous for courting the unusual, is at it again. He is new-best-friends with the Polish community in London. His jolly japes this time include a Polish reception at Town Hall, replete with pierogi and pickles, and a trip to POSK, the Polish Community Centre in Hammersmith. He is quite the darling of the Polish press, by all accounts. Of course only the very cynical would suggest that it has......

LAist was comped front row seats by the Dodgers due to Malingering being struck by a foul ball last week, and she came back with some great photos, and earlier made fun of 4th of July on Venice Beach. But the biggest stories of the week was that the Mayor's Hot Tamale was revealed, and that a Kwik-E-Mart was erected in Burbank. Phillyist was busy doing the Fourth of July up right, exercising their......

It’s a constant problem. Where to combine your love of buying alcohol with your love of looking at models of doomed luxury cruise liners. But, as of today, you are in luck. If you’re in the Bushley area, check out The Local, on Harcourt Road, which is proudly displaying a model of the Titanic resting on cans of beer. It’s creator, Mark Diggins, shifted the 5,000 piece model to the off-licence when he realized......

It's all too easy to miss the tasting rooms of the Scotch Malt Whisky Society in London. After all, it is a private members' club that happens to be tucked away off a main street in Farringdon. Don't worry if you're not a member though, as knowing someone who can get you inside is part of the challenge and fun of it all. Unlike the rather grandiose entrance in Edinburgh, the London branch of......

What's your name and which part of London do you live in? My name's Tim Jude and I live in Acton, West London. How long have you been running for? I started running 3 years ago when a friend persuaded me to take part in a 5k race (which at the time felt like an impossibility). For many years previously I'd tried out running on various occasions, only to give up after the first......

Just when you thought London might be a city safe from domination by Americans getting paid heaps of cash to do absolutely nothing … … enter former CIA employee (in movies they always say "The CIA's like the mafia; you never leave" - but that's probably just movies) Bob Kiley. Kiley joined the CIA in 1963 after involvement in the anti-communist National Student Association. Bob came to the UK in January 2001 – within......

A few weeks back we brought you the tale of a man who, out of the kindness of his own heart, takes people's broken iPods, fixes them for free and passes them on to others. Could there be a nicer man in the whole kingdom? Well, yes there could. His name is Richard Burdett, and he edits a free magazine for homeless people. The Pavement has no big charity backing and is almost entirely......

Just when you thought you were done with Christmas and New Year celebrations, marking the end of the festivities by shredding your tree and wassailing your last wassails to the Green Man on 12th Night then along comes a few more New Year celebrations. It's the Russian Old New Year this weekend, by which we mean New Year according to the old Tsarist calendar which was abandoned after 1917. Still observed in Russia, the......

Some people find it difficult to eat Christmas pudding - it's loaded with mysterious wobbly bits and even more mysterious chewy bits; if it's a well-cared for pudding it will have been fed a reckless amount of strong alcohol over several weeks so it reeks like a tramp. And burns like one too. Some may find it easier to put a Christmas pudding on a tray and run around Covent Garden with it instead.......

Goddamn kids with their scary hoods and slang that makes us feel old. In our day we were happy with Manic Miner, but these days its all PSP this and GTA that... and now the little buggers are popping pills and driving all over the place without the proper documentation: Nearly one-in-five young people in London and the South East have driven without a licence, a survey from road safety charity Brake has shown.......

A tribute to the capital’s alleys, ginnels and snickleways. 14. New Turnstile Where? Refurbished shortcut at the back of Holborn Tube station. What? The most recent and blandest of several 'turnstiles' in the area - Great Turnstile and Little Turnstile are the others. These alleys once contained gateposts to prevent livestock escaping from the grazing areas now known as Lincoln's Inn Fields. No sign of the posts, or the sheep, remains today. In fact, there's......

A portrait by Pablo Picasso has gone on display at Christie's ahead of an auction which, if it goes as expected, will make it one of the top 10 most expensive paintings ever sold. We've spotted the first 'London Fashion Week isn't as good as it used to be' article - do we get a prize? Paul Gasgoigne went on a seven hour 'alcohol fuelled gambling binge' in London this week. London is facing......

Well this is kind of a blow: remember the 'ravers' in the £15m (or £14m depending on which paper you read, buy hey it's expensive and that's all you need to know) house in Primrose Hill who were doing evil things like playing loud music and leaving empty beer cans in their doorstep? Well they're going to get evicted next week. In a statement Camden council said: "We have had three complaints from neighbours......

This week started well - Wednesday night was Regina Spektor at Shepherds Bush Empire. I'll be posting a proper gig review soon but let's just say she didn't disappoint, and proved even more alluring live than on record. For me gigging this week was all about the covers. The weekend saw another trek across the country to deliver rock and pop tunes to the party people, this time at a rather posh corporate do in......

It might sound like a stereotypical thing to say, but really, really, it is very hard to find a girl who doesn’t love Dirty Dancing with all her heart, or at the very least like it enough to watch it whenever they’ve got time. If you don’t win anything on our Somerset House competition and can’t afford to go, then you’re in luck because tomorrow night new soft-drink Shloer is putting on a free......

New evidence has been uncovered linking July 7 bomber Mohammad Sidique Khan to Omar Sharif and Hanif Asif, who killed three people and injured 50 in 2003 with a suicide attack on a bar in Tel Aviv. A 20-year-old man has been charged with murdering a commuter by pushing him in front of a Tube train during rush hour at Highbury and Islington station on Friday. Police are still looking for people who were......

If you ever wondered what happens when a group of Londonists get together in the evening we can reveal it generally revolves around pizza, alcohol and looking for Londony eye candy on the Internet. In between belching and dipping our crusts into each others garlic sauce we stumbled across Yutaka Loves London. If you're still using Windows 98 and IE then give up now. This is one Flashy website. We're still learning things about......

Let's be honest, there's something of a North-of-the-river bias to Londonist (on the rare occasions South London gets mentioned, it tends to be something stupid happening in Croydon), so it's nice to tell you something nice about a neglected (by Londonist) part of London: Elephant and Castle. The reason? Corsica Studios, a brilliant labyrinthian space beneath a railway arch in Elephant & Castle in which to experience art, music, performance and film, have just......

Good news for fans of the Union Chapel in Islington as a music venue come about today, as the venue announces that they will be re-opening on May 4. Last year, the chapel shut down as a music venue following arguments between the Church and the promoters about the consumption of alcohol within the holy building. Added to this major problem, were complaints from neighbours about the noise levels. A compromise has been sought......

The Londonist Literary List appears every Tuesday. If you’d like to bring an event to our attention, please email londonistlit@gmail.com. It seems to us that the only literary reading series that ultimately survive are the ones that encourage a fair amount of alcohol consumption. With that in mind, the new series Through a Glass Darkly (this Thursday, also pictured to the right) has done one better by hosting a reading in a pub, on......

There is always plenty for the football fan to think about when news reaches you of the passing of another great from generations past. In Peter Osgood's case, we might think of the swagger in the image of a young man that we never saw play, but understood that he was supposed to represent an idealised point in this city's history, when everyone swanned down the King's Road looking like Alfie or Twiggy. We......

This week: Capote, Lucky Number Slevin, and The Fog. Plus all the usual film news and rumours and Trailer of the Week. This week sees the release of one of Londonist's most highly-anticipated films of 2006: Capote, and boy did they pick a good week to release it. Everything else out there is pretty much dross (we had to make a decision this week whether to look at The Fog remake or Date Movie......