Here’s what we’ve learned this weekend Pedestrianisation is very popular But so is shopping online Olympic building ambitions are being scaled down due to spiralling costs. Potential 2012 Olympians, though, will be sent to Beijing to soak up the Games and fire London ambitions. Greenwich Old Royal Naval College wasn't quite grand enough for Northern Lights film But the late, great, Tony Wilson gets photograph of the month at the NPG Picture of the......

Hundreds of fans flocked to Leicester Square last night for the London premiere of The Golden Compass. Fans who braved the slightly rainy weather were treated to glimpses of stars Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig, along with the thirteen year old star of the film Dakota Blue Richards and director Chris Weitz. Based on the first book in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, Northern Lights, the film has been the subject of much......

Get thee to Peckham this week, where the good citizens are organising the inaugural Peckham Literary Festival. Apparently Dell Boy moved out a number of years ago…. It is billed as ‘2 shops, 4 days, 8 events,’ although Londonist counted 5 days, 3-4 venues and rather more than 8 events. It is seemingly part of the growing I Love Peckham movement – we have to hand it to them down there in the deep south…they......

Gothamist learned about the craziest urban nightmare come true: A huge python found in the bathroom pipes. It was also a nightmare for some Yankees fans, as manger Joe Torre declined to come back and manage the Bronx Bombers. At least the city's attempt to give some direction to subway riders was interesting, pranksters went shirtless at the Fifth Avenue Abercrombie & Fitch and the I Heart Brooklyn Girls calendars came out. And just......

London Lights, by James Hamilton Londonist, as you know, can be as erudite as the next person when it suits, and so it has given us great pleasure in the last week to wade through James Hamilton’s splendid new oeuvre, LONDON LIGHTS. This book is a great little number for anyone who is suffering from urban angst, or who has forgotten why they love London so. It perfectly encapsulates one of the most industrious and......

Lights go on... lights go off... lights go on... lights go off... Contemporary life hums, buzzes, whirrs and recharges with electricity that we take for granted. It's always there - coming out of our wall sockets, stored in our batteries and flowing around us in cable after cable, concealed in every wall and under every floor. BOiLEROOM is a theatre company with a fantastically eclectic line-up, bizarrely well-suited for the kind of stories and......

It's not a bad photo by a hasty tourist - it's a key London landmark in darkness. Finally, someone remembered to turn the lights off before they locked up for the night. Courtesy of the Lights Out London campaign organised by Capital 95.8, Londoners turned off all non-essential lights between 9pm and 10pm in order to show how much energy can be saved and how well we can function without a dozen different lamps......

>>Stop the Press Book Slam is at The Big Chill House this Sunday 2pm – 11pm. It's free and perfect refuge for those dodging Glastonmuddy… Just out the Van: Literary High Tea launches in the heart of Bloomsbury on Sunday, featuring readings from Toby Litt, Heidi James, Kate Ansell and Jeremy Sheldon accompanied by a menu of tea and scones. 4pm-6.30pm Sunday 24 June, £12.95/£8.95, The Great Russell Suite, The Montague on the Gardens,......

Capital 95.8 have launched its Lights Out London campaign. Blatantly plagiarising Sydney's 'Earth Hour', the radio station is busily garnering support from celebrities like Kim Wilde for the campaign, which encourages the whole of London to turn off all lights and non-essential appliances between 9 and 10pm on 21 June – the longest day of the year – as a way of promoting awareness of green issues. Al Gore apparently called for a similar......

We do, don’t we? We really do. Well, from Sunday you can show you really care by paying some attention to London Sustainability Weeks which runs from 3–17 June. Kicking off this Sunday at the Camden Green Fair and Bikefest, there are hundreds of events happening across the capital varying hugely in size, message and concept. What all have in common is that they are helping to make a cleaner, greener, healthier London. We......

Spring is when we get busy here in the Ist-A-Verse. Very busy. But, after staying bundled-up indoors all winter, it's nice for us to be out, about, and collecting things to write about for you. Here's a glimpse at what's been keeping your favorite citybloggers busily away from home and out of bed. For LAist, strong winds attacked LA on the same day the Feds raided the Crips. Not to fear, though: the Japanese version......

Just out the Van: Lights, Music, Words, Action - It’s Book Slam time again with Guatam Malkani, author of the Londonstani, Salena Godden, writer, singer, and raconteur, and Iman, winner of the National Music Award. This Thursday at Neighbourhood, 6.30pm till late, 12 Aclam Road, W10 5QZ, £5 in advance or £6 on the door. Fresh Next Week: Michael Palin leads a reading from Another Sky, a new collection of work by writers whose lives......

Austinist gets arty with an interactive guide to SXSW, loved some local art galleries and a new art exhibit and lamented the possible loss of "Friday Night Lights" production to New Mexico. Bostonist was happy they finally found an Anna Nicole Smith connection to their fair city and that an Apple Store was opening up. They were less happy that new rules have been established limiting underage shows and that their Governor spending a......

We have to admit that we don't sit around watching the information change on TFL's realtime travel news so we weren't aware that the service had been taken over by the General Oblation Board. Good job they're so on the ball otherwise commuters this morning would have been rolling around in original sin: WATERLOO & CITY LINE: Suspended due to excessive dust on platforms. Odd then that there's no general alert concerning armoured bears......

If you're hiking, consider charging up your iPod, as Seattlest finds out that a man lost during a hike was found by the glow of his iPod. That cleverness seems to be devoid in cops who were using police cruiser instant messaging clients - although we imagine IMs "so are you nakie" to be included in cop shows, just for realism. If only the cops were busting the Hummer-driving jerk who made a poor......

This Day In London’s History 1975: The Sex Pistols play their first gig at Saint Martin’s College. After Johnny Rotten joined The Swankers as their new vocalist, the band changed its name to The Sex Pistols under the guidance of its new manager Malcolm McLaren. Shortly afterwards, on this day 31 years ago, they played (or attempted to play) their first gig at Saint Martin’s College. Their debut was not exactly an overwhelming success......

The Londonist Literary List appears every Tuesday. If you'd like to bring an event to our attention, please email londonistlit@gmail.com. You’ll have to forgive this week’s list for being so slight, all the cool literati types are on holiday, it’s only the hacks like us that have to keep plugging away... Thursday One of Africa's greatest writers, exiled from Kenya for 22 years because of his highly political and acclaimed work including the bestselling......

For once we're giving you more than five hours notice on clubbing tips for this weekend, mainly because we've been planning this particular Friday night for weeks and weeks. We've always been a fan of industrial-styled superclub Fabric and their ecletic line-ups, spending many a night down in the former meat-cellar dancing to the likes of Jacques Le Cont (before the Madonna years) and discovering cool new bands like Clor (*sob*) before they hit......

Last night two secret gigs took place and we're feeling more than grumpy that we weren't there. For starters the Arctic Monkeys played a tiny secret gig at Shoreditch's Old Blue Last pub on Great Eastern Street. A warm up for their Canadian tour this was the first gig where new bassist Nick O'Malley performed as part of the band replacing original member Andy Nicholson who is missing from the tour due to fatigue......

A couple of months ago, we wrenched open the doors of the Londonist Demo Dungeon and invited you keen musician types out there to fill our vaults with your tracks. If you missed that post, fret not - the Dungeon's still open for submissions (amongst other things). If you want to send us your demo for review, read this. We promise to be nice. Time now for the inaugral DD review...brace yourselves. First to email......

The Londonist Literary List appears every Tuesday. If you’d like to bring an event to our attention, please email londonistlit@gmail.com. Among the treats available to lit lovers this week are a reading in a cemetery, a reading in Shakespeare's Globe, and if you're willing to travel to Oxford, a whole slew of famous faces over the next couple of days... Events Around London (and Beyond): The Oxford Literary Festival continues through tomorrow (the 29th),......

Happy New Year to everyone from the Music Dungeonistas. We trust you found solace in some decent music while 'Best ofs' and Reality TV Rubbish polluted tweeters, woofers and sub-woofers over the break. In a bizarre collision of mainstream and alternative, we spent New Year's Eve doing a karaoke version of Run DMC's It's Tricky on Singstar. Still, it's the start of a new year and the start of the Music Dungeon's resolution to focus......

Keep your head down and hit the doors running, a quick 360 around the foyer... nothing. You're safe. Check behind the counter for supplies. Take what you can carry and leave the rest in case you have to double back. Sprint forward towards the escalators. Keep moving until you get to the 4th floor. Another set of double doors in front of you. Slowly this time, edge your way in. Stealth. There's something moving......

Blanchard Jerrold and Gustave Doré London has been home to more double-acts than Great Yarmouth pier. Just off the top of the head, there’s Johnson & Boswell, the Adam Brothers, Holmes and Watson, the Krays, and recent North-London comedy duo Henry and Pires. Add to the mix the little-known Victorian pairing of Blanchard Jerrold and Gustave Doré, whose minor classic ‘London A Pilgrimage’ has just been re-released by Anthem Press. Londonist has wanted to......

Just a quick follow up to the Lambeth 'Christmas' lights story everyone was talking about last week. If you remember, the council had begun to refer to the the festive displays as ''Winter Lights' or 'Celebrity lights' in adverts for the switch-on event, the assumption being that they were somehow attempting to extract all the religion out of the event. Conservative councillor Bernard Gentry then went and opened his gob to the Beeb, announcing......

Londonist was incredibly disappointed when the Daily Mail announced that they had succeded in snaffling Richard Littlejohn from the clutches of the Sun, as we'd actually put in a bid for his services ourselves. We knew that we couldn't hope to offer him the same kind of financial packagae he'll be picking up at the Daily Hate, but we'd hoped that our promises of the best seat in the Londonist dungeon (between Greg and......

Londonist Recommends: Sons of Genius Play Works Of Genius We might be looking forward to the bank holiday but not half as much as we are to being in the Royal Festival Hall on the 2nd November. We'll let the press release speak for itself...Subjecting themselves to mastering QUITE A BIT of the most challenging repertoire ever conceived for a Rock & Roll stage, warble-monster Ahmet and shred-fisted Dweezil will be taking ZAPPA PLAYS......

When Mark Oliver 'E' Everett decided to share his thoughts and fears with us on 1994's Beautiful Freak he set a template of off-centre, fuzzy lullabies for the chronically frightened which he would follow succesfully for another 2 albums until 2001's jarring Souljacker. 2003's Shootenany! saw them heading back to familiar territory but it never quite hit the mark. So a celebratory Londonist Album of the Week award then for the satisfying 33 track......

Looks like the sudden change in the weather has led to the nation's broadsheet music reviewers ignoring the bulk of this week's new releases and heading out into the sunshine, or writing up some of next week's records ahead of time, obvioulsy hoping to bag a long weekend out of it. Anyway, we'll bring you these next week when they come out, although we're going to be slighlty biased towards the Eels: Blinking Lights......