Portraits session with Philippa.
Keith & Angus
My friend Keith visited my Studio yesterday with his boyfriend for little portrait session.
Picnic with Mercure at Somerset House
Mercure Hotels organised a Gigantic Picnic at Somerset House and i was invited to cover the event on their Instagram account. Forecast for Friday wasn't really looking good, storms, rain, pretty much British Summer but lovely food prepared by Toms Kitchen, great Prosecco, live music, wine tasting and plenty of other entertainment was set on place to make the day great and fun. There was also a competition where you could win Mercure special Hamper by posting your picture from event on social networks.
Music kicked off around noon with Jazz performance of amazing Estée Blu while in the VIP tent Susie and Peter had lovely wine tasting session. If you like more Smoothies than wine, then there was a special Smoothie Bike stand where you could make your own only by peddling on the bike. Great idea :)
Later on sky get darker and rain started, luckily there was plenty of umbrellas and blankets to get everyone covered. Rain didn't last long and sun came back just about in time for totally awesome Acapella AfterParty performance.
What a great day, thank you Mercure for inviting me and everyone who came down to Somerset House to enjoy Picnic with Mercure.
Instagram takeover - Mercury Hotels
This Friday at Somerset House, Mercure Hotels together with National Picnic Day organise "Mercure Hotels Picnic at Somerset House" and they asked me to takeover their instagram account during the event.
So if you are free, come over to this Gigantic Picnic at Somerset House! It's free and there are slots available throughout the day. There'll be fantastic range of Picnic goodies from Tom's Kitchen to purchase on the day and plenty of Mercure "Perfect Picnic" Prosecco.
For more info how to secure spot click here.
See you there...
Win a stay in Hotel for two with @ThompsonHotels
Do you have your holidays booked? Are you still thinking where to go and what hotel? Don't think any further and join the competition to win a 2 night stay in Thompson Hotel of your choice and i can tell you that they look awesome!
There are three simple steps.
1. Follow @ThompsonHotels
2. Tag a friend you want to take with you in comments
3. Share your best summer travel or summer eats image with the #SuiteSummerWithThompson hashtag
Good Luck!
Winners will be announced June 17th, June 24th, and July 1st
Pitchfork Radio & Tribute Portfolio - #independentmoments
Pitchfork Radio was broadcasting live from Great Northern Hotel in London this weekend. I was lucky to be invited to shoot and cover the #independentmoments event on snapchat and instagram on Saturday. It was pretty cool afternoon party with DJ's and live music. Fancy cocktails and food couldn't miss there, my favourite was Cuppa Rosie Lee cocktail and that little egg in egg something. Was also nice to meet and talk to familiar faces who came down to party. Well done Tribute Portfolio!
Urban Decay - Vice lipstick
I was approached by agency to shoot pictures for Urban Decay Cosmetics and their Vice lipstick scavenger hunt campaign in London. It was pretty fun :)
Thomson Cruises TUI - Paradise Islands #notforme Campaign
One of the best trips of this year so far was organised by Thomson Cruises. Their NotForMe campaign was accompanied with cool webpage and launched early February. With main focus to bring younger customers to their cruise ships, they hired several photographers, bloggers and other influencers and sent them to a different cruises. Mainly around Caribbean but also in to Greece.
Mine trip was most likely the best one, it's called Paradise Islands and started in Barbados and then we've been cruising for next seven days around Caribbean islands.
The flight from London to Bridgetown in Barbados was supercool on it's own, we flew in beautiful Boeing 787 Dreamliner and except very comfortable seats we had also champagne served during flight to make it even more pleasant. I had free plus one so it took my colleague and friend Alex with me and in place we met the rest of our influencer group. I was happy to see again Sean, Patrick and to meet finally with Ady and Sophie. Probably mostly because of the bubbles, flight was smooth and fun.
Once landed in Bridgetown, we've been transferred directly from Airport to the Cruise Terminal and for a first time had opportunity to se our ship Thomson Celebration in real life. It's not one of the gigantic Cruise ships but was still with it's 9 decks and capacity of 1250 people big enough :) We got into our suits and then the evening we embarked from Bridgetown towards British Virgin Island. Our suites were the best on Ship and exceeded my expectations. Celebrations is not a new ship but it has been recently refurbished and as Sean said and we all agreed, it had "character". The only issue was as expected with WiFi connections.
Second day of our trip was on boat, we had chance to look around and as i mention earlier, it wasn't the largest ship but for me it was first time on Cruise Ship so there was a lot to explore. Several restaurants, shops, coffee bars, fitness & beauty facilities and obviously as the sun was shining Sun decks, pools and Jacuzzi. Also i don't normally suffer from motion sickness however after couple of hours on board everything was moving and my stomach wasn't happy. Luckily some sea sickness pills worked well and then i stick with recommendation from staff and i was drinking for the rest of the trip mostly ginger ale. Not sure if it was placebo but it worked :)
Oh i almost forgot to mention dinner with captain as they called it and even actual Captain wasn't sitting at our table, (we met him and was introduced before) we had dinner with lovely Staff Captain Alex. It was spectacular culinary experience and we had lovely chat about ship and our next couple of days on board of Celebration.
On the morning of day three we arrived to Tortola, largest of British Virgin Islands. We haven't got any excursions for that day so plan was just find beach and light down to white sand. Long Bay beach was perfect fit. Sea was really rough apparently there were some storms in US and that caused quiet huge waves. There wasn't more needed for me and Pat and we jumped straight to the sea. It was really powerful but also a awesome fun. After lunch on beach we had small walk around trip around capital Roadtown.
Day four and island i was looking forward to visit for a long time, St Maarten. We arrived in Philipsburgh and went first to Mullet Bay beach. Beautiful white sand and blue ocean, still pretty rough. Again, me and Pat jumped straight in but this time Ady and Sean joined us too. It was great fun again, very powerful waves again :) Plan for afternoon was Maho beach, yes, that's the beach where planes are landing and taking of just above your head in incredible proximity while you swimming in the ocean. It's something that's hard to describe with words. The only down was that in the internet age, beach was packed with tourists with every kind of cameras so it was hard to get nice clean view :) I would stay and shoot there for all day unfortunately our ship wouldn't wait.
Day five, St Kitts and Nevis, weather was a bit overcast so we went to explore capital city Basseterre. It was quiet small and while it was still cloudy, we decided to visit Sand Bank Bay beach, so we jumped to taxi that took us there. On the beach was small rusty shipwreck but absence of sun make it less attractive at least for me. Late afternoon we had pre booked snorkelling trip. Two guys on speed boat picked us together with another few from our ship and we wen't to place where "sometimes" you can spot large sea turtles. No matter how hard we tried, we couldn't spot them. This island was probably least attractive for me personally, but i'm sure that sun will makes a big difference.
On Friday early morning we arrived at Antigua's port St John's. This was another island i was looking forward to visit mainly because we had booked 30min helicopter flight above Antigua and Barbuda! Weather looked promising in the morning so myself, Pat and Sean went for walk around city. People wasn't really willing to stand as models for shots but it was still very bustle and colourful. Back to port and there was already bus waiting to drove us to heliport. Sean, Pat, Ady and Sophie were lucky to go first while there was still quiet sunny. Me and Alex clouds for most of the flight, however it was spectacular experience. It was quiet challenging for me to sit and look through viewfinder for 30min and i won't lie, i was happy when we landed :). We spent some time on Fort James beach but as weather was still against us, we decided to explore island more. Pat used to visit it few years ago so he knew few cool places. We hired a taxi and went towards Dark Wood beach and Shirley's Heights. Quiet spectacular views, be much better on sunny day. I know i'm complaining a lot about weather but c'mon we are in Caribbean :)
Luckily sun probably heard me and we had amazing sunset while we enjoyed private party on the top deck with captain.
Saturday noon we arrived at Kingstown, capital of St Vincent and the Grenadines. This is the island where Johny's Depp Pirates of Caribbean was filmed. Sounds cool, we had also booked catamaran trip to the beaches from movie. Finally sun was out and it was quiet dangerous combination together with Super Strong Rum (85%) that was served on our catamaran trip :) We had great time and visited few beaches, one of them was gorgeous with black sand. Unfortunately we haven't got much time left on island as we had long way back to Barbados.
Our last day was again back in Bridgetown. Last booked trip was also pretty exciting, swimming with sea turtles. Absolutely lovely creatures, and also Barbados is definitely one of the wealthiest Caribbean islands and you can see that. Amazing private beaches and houses that hosted Oprah, Rihanna, Simon Cowell etc. After swimming we went back to ship to pack and get ready to be moved to the airport.
It was amazing sunny day and i shouldn't just sit and wait so used last two hours and went to explore the town. To my surprise it was completely empty, no people, all closed. Finally when i met lonely street jewellery seller and asked what's going on and where is everyone, he just looked at me and with very surprised face answered, it's Sunday, everyone is at the beach having BBQ :)
Anyway, last thing was to get back to the Bridgetown's airport from where our Dreamliner flew us safely back home to London.
Maserati - #monthwithmaserati campaign
Maserati approached my with offer to participate on #monthwithmaserati campaign. One day beautiful snow white Maserati Ghibli parked on the front of my house. It was amazing and also challenging to drive around London in festive season, you can imagine traffic but Ghibli had amazing Bowers & Wilkins audio system built in so it wasn't that bad at all on the end. :) Great car!
Dordogne Valley Press trip
Invitation to Press trip to France, Dordogne Valley arrived in my inbox early September. I've been in France number of times before but never in South West region, so my answer was yes, sure! Trip was just for two of us, me and Sara, travel blogger from Birmingham.
We flew to tiny Brive-Dordogne Valley Airport from London Stansted, where Cecile, our guide for next days was already waiting for us. First place to visit and also our place to stay for a night was little town called Martel.
Our accommodation for first night was in Maison D'hôtes De la Devinie, crazy name that's as hard to type as it's hard to pronounce in French. This place was absolutely stunning, bed, bathroom, everything.. After couple pictures we decided to go for walk around town. It was after the rain and on the end of summer but still gorgeous and charming. All those little streets and flowers everywhere. Dinner was in place called Le petit moulin and steak and wine was both perfect. Tired we came back to our rooms and went straight to beds.
At the morning we packed everything and wend down for lovely breakfast. Plan for the day was to explore some caves around, which didn't sound as great idea considering the weather. However Cecile convinced us that we have to try that. We managed to put wet suits on and with our guide we went to explore Le Virage cave. It was quiet interesting as parts were under water and we had to swim :) Straight after in massive need of shower we vent to another little town called Meyrone where we had booked rooms in Hotel la Terrace which had beautiful views of river Dordogne and surrounded valley.
We didn't stay at the Hotel for long and went to explore more caves, this time Grottes De Lacave, This wasn't as adventurous as swimming through previous one but still it was a cool experience. After quick stop in Eco Art Atelier Karteko and we come back to hotel for a lovely dinner. Did i mentioned that i love Foie Grass? I know it's a very brutal way of preparing food but it's soo good. I think i had it on every meal since we arrived and still couldn't get enough :) Room in the hotel wasn't as cool as previous night but still very clean.
Another day and Cecile insisted that we have to try jump to kayak and go down the river Dordogne. It was actually quiet fun and sun also same out for a brief moment. Highlight was a cave with massive jump that we rather didn't try :) After Kayaking we stopped at Chateau De Castelnau Bretenoux for lunch and when i spotted Escargot on the menu, i knew this place be good. It was delicious i have to say.
Plan for afternoon was to visit four small villages called Bretenoux, Carennac, Autoire and Loubressac. My favourite was Carennac with tiny streets, flowers and lovely people. Our place to stay for third night was Hotel Le Pont de L'Ouysse in Lacave that we visited day before. This place was absolutely spectacular, with it's Michelin star restaurant of same name, sitting next to ruins of od bridge, hence the name in French. We had dinner with wife of head chef Stéphane Chambon who also joined us for drink and chat after dinner. Food was unreal, totally well deserved Michelin Star. Hotel room was very beautiful again.
Last day we decided to visit famous Rocamadour and to make it more fun, we did it through hills on mountain bikes :) Super fun and i have to say Rocamadour castle is beautiful and very picturesque. All what left then was to stock up with foie grass and went back to Brive Airport and back home to London.
Weather wasn't with us but food and those little villages was absolutely amazing and i'm sure i'll come back to this part of France sometimes again in the summer. Thank you again Brive-Dordogne Valley Airport
Singapore Tourist Board - #SGinsideout campaign
One day, invitation landed in my mailbox from Singapore Tourist board, inviting me to a press trip to Singapore. Singapore: Inside Out campaign is showcasing Singapore's contemporary creative talents and they want us to support it on our social media channels.
Invitation mentioned, that there are another two instagramers going, Jiri @jeera and Allan @chaiwalla who i know both very well. It does sounded as pretty exciting Asian Trip. My first ever, i've never been on that side of world.
Flight from Heathrow with Singapore Airlines was long, 13 hours, but as Jiri asked for extra leg room, our seats were quiet spacious. I was looking forward to see Singapore's Changi Airport as it was voted several times Top Airport of Year. I have to say Changi Airport was as expected, beautiful terminal building, but we haven't got much time to explore it. First thing we noticed when we walked out of the terminal was super high humidity. Our guide was waiting for us and dropped us to Naumi Hotel that will be our place to stay during our trip.
Naumi Hotel's infinite pool
Hotel completely blow my mind, room was huge, and very modern. Every room had Apple TV and massive TV screen, shower walls were made from smart glass that changes transparency with a touch of a button and i can go on and on. I can't not to mention small infinite pool on the top of the hotel. What do you think was the first thing we've done? :)
Marina Bay
Our program was packed with events every day and it was perfectly organised. at the morning we went to explore super Hip Haji Lane with little shops and coffee places, then we visited design Studio Grafunkt that had some pretty cool stuff there. At the afternoon we've had organised excursion around Marina Bay Sands Hotel. It's one of the most beautiful Hotel I've ever visited. It's a state of art building offering awesome views to Marina Bay or on other side Gardens by the Bay and you'll feel luxury on every corner. Later on at the evening we went to Marina Bay area to have dinner and watch spectacular light show.
Day three started with breakfast at Tiong Bahru Market & Food centre, which was quiet experience and then we went to see Henderson Waves, highest pedestrian bridge in Singapore. After quick walk through city centre we went back to Marina Bay where we had organised tour around Marina Bay Sands Hotel. This is the hotel with the worlds largest infinity pool and viewing platform offering the view of Marina Bay and on the other side Gardens by the Bay. For dinner we went to the famous Lau Pa Sat - Satay Club and i have to say that it was the best satay i've ever had. According our guide Stall 7&8 made the best one and i can only agree!
Our last day in Singapore started with lovely breakfast at Rang Mahal and then i went for quick walk around F1 track, it was pretty cool experience to walk around paddocks. After Checkout from Naumi Hotel we went to visit Singapore Art Museum and our last visit before coming back to Airport was the Gardens by the Bay. It's pretty spectacular to walk in between branches of these gigantic artificial trees in Supertree Grove. Inside in the Garden pavilions you'll find Flower Dome and Cloud Forest. The Flower Dome is slightly lower but larger and features seven different gardens. The Cloud Forest is higher but slightly smaller and it replicates the cool moist conditions found in tropical mountain regions. It does also have it's own 35m waterfall inside!
Spectacular Supertree Grove in Gardens by the Bay
We didn't wanted to leave but our flight unfortunately wouldn't wait so we had to move back to Singapore's Changi Airport. It was amazing few days in Singapore, big thank you to Singapore Tourist Board for guiding us and showing us the highlights of Singapore. I know i'll come back for sure to explore even more.
*this article was posted on my Tumblr on June 2015
Grey Goose Vodka VX launch Party
French Premium Vodka, Grey Goose was launching new The Grey Goose VX vodka and i was lucky to be invited. Launch party was in newly refurbished building of boutique Hotel Sea Containers by Mondrian at London's southbank. Invitation also mentioned surprise so i was pretty excited.
Sea Containers is a beautiful new hotel, party was in the rooftop bar called Rumpus Room that offers spectacular views of London. Welcome drink cocktail and all other drinks were obviously made from GG vodka. The Grey Goose VX is a special vodka finished with a hint of precious cognac. It does makes sense to try it as they are both from same part of France.
Party was running well when suddenly I've noticed familiar face and i couldn't believe it first. Two of my favourite band Clean Bandit singers were standing right next to me. Then i realised, that's the surprise :)
What followed was amazing private concert of Clean Bandit supported with Jess Glyne.