Chelsea Saturdays

One of my favourite things to do on the weekend is hang out in Chelsea. As well as my best friend Lisa living there, it is less busy than the rest of London during the weekend, with a distinct lack of tourists among the well dressed Chelsea-ites.

The Saatchi Gallery is particularly good - with often changing exhibitions, free entry and none of the usual queues buzzing around museums, this is a local gem.

They have a pretty surreal giant ant exhibition on at the moment..

And an amazing Media exhibition, by The Times - I couldn't believe that the below two are photographs taken by Times photographers in Libya/Afghanistan, the colours are breathtaking.

As well as other random arty bits..

Puts my doodling to shame!

A room filled with oil. Has been residing in the basement for a looong time now, but still serene and beautiful, worthy of a visit every time.

Being cultural is hungry work. Helpfully, just outside in Duke of York Square was the weekly Farmers Market. I LOVE this market - it's unique, not overly-busy or expensive, and all of the food is brilliant.

[Get the duck sandwich - you won't be disappointed]

We had a healthy-yet-delicious falafel wrap, and some amazing hand rolls from the sushi stall. (vaguely healthy, to make up for the ridiculously good, greasy Ranoush kebab that we had at 3am)

but all of the food is SO tempting - let the onslaught of food porn pictures begin!

^ This stall, Galeta has the BEST dessertss. Definitely try and grab a giant, £2 brownie before they are all gone.

For a relatively small market, the massive range of food on offer is very impressive. Everything from fresh root cane sugar juice, to the famous duck sandwiches, to oysters/lobster, to foreign fruit imported from Thailand (above), to the vast array of desserts (crepes, cakes, mini cakes, brownies, stuffed pancakes to name but a few).

(A truffle stall - major weakness!)

Some are true farmers (as above) who having home grown their produce, come to sell it to the stylish masses, some are families who can just cook really well.

A great place to go on the weekend to get away from the hustle and bustle of central London, with all the perks of great food and none of the cons!

Juicebaby UK

This year Juicebaby have been providing The Model Zone with all sorts of amazing food - I'm so grateful that they have because their food is literally incredible. They're about to open up in Chelsea, make sure you pay them a visit!

All of their food is vegan and plant based, but you'd never know it. Every single thing I ate I fell in love with. I (with no shame) tried all of their salads and loved them all, I've never actually 'liked' salad so this is a huge achievement!

This one, the Rainbow Bhudda Bowl was insane. Filled with 'Quinoa, arame, beetroot, kale, avocado, alfalfa sprouts, sesame seeds, sesame oil, ginger, miso paste, tamari, lemon, salt', it kept me going all throughout my show in the afternoon.

The Pad Thai Kelp Noodles was ridiculously tasty and filling due to being packed with 'Kelp noodles, squash, carrot, bell pepper, red cabbage, sugar snap peas, green onion, avocado, cilantro, almond butter, thai chilli, tamari, lime, ginger, seasame oil, agave, cayenne pepper, sesame seeds, maple syrup cayenne'. 

I also tried an 'undone taco' salad, which was probably my favourite. Tasted like taco-heaven and filled you up, without the unhealthiness! Me gusta :)

And the thing that totally hooked me... chia pudding. I'm a sucker for chia anyway but this took all of the best combinations to make chia heaven.

Juicebaby's chia pudding is literally the best I have ever had. I would literally pay however much these are priced at, they are that good. A thick banana bottom layer holds up a tonne of chia seeds with a topping of home made jam & coconut butter, raspberries, flaked almonds and coconut chips. Also thrown in for good measure is vanilla, filtered water, dates, maple syrup and cinnamon. All the models who were curiously poking at the frogs-spawn like pudding fell in love with it too. Good as chia is super healthy, packed with protein and gives you bounds of energy which was useful for show-hopping!

These Sticky Toffee Balls taste something like chocolate truffles, and are actually made of 'Dates, desicated coconut, coconut oil, carob and vanilla'. I tried to make something similar once and failed drastically, these are much better and very addictive.

Ah, the juices of Juicebaby. I loved them all (I may have spent a bit too much time in the model zone), but the Vanilla Almond Milk was definitely my favourite (mega almond milk addict over here). 'Immunity' was a massive kick-starter with a ginger hit, Sweet Greens was the first green juice I have actually liked and Beet Baby was probably my least favourite as I'm not mad about beetroot, but still pretty good.

I was told that these smaller bottles of juice would be around £4.95, which is really good compared with others in the area (cough GLE).

Juicebaby do everything that is 'healthy' according to pinterest/instagram (chia, almond milk, avocado etc) but how it is supposed to be. They properly soak the almonds so the milk is nutty and delicious, they make the chia pudding from scratch, mix the avocado with the right complements. They do it for you, so you don't end up like me, miserably failing at pinterest's 'healthy yet delicious' recipes, covered in coconut flour, agave syrup, dates and so on.

Definitely worth checking out Juicebaby when they open (next week I think) in Chelsea, they are sure to be a massive hit. I will definitely be there continuing to eat up all of their supplies! Thank you so much for supporting us hungry models throughout London Fashion Week with your tasty amazingness :)

http://www.juicebaby.co.uk/

p.s - Although they were providing the Model Zone for free, everything I've said is the honest truth and I would definitely pay for everythiiiing I had! 

Park frolic

Revision period is once again well and truly upon us. However this year feels a little different to the last one's months of stress, tears and breakdowns because I know that it is (probably/hopefully) the LAST time I will ever be going through it! Yes, after three very quick years I am finishing my law degree. Revision is actually going alright at the moment because I worked really hard this year and really gave everything to have a memorable final year of university (starting up a chess club anyone?) - so it feels sort of like a natural progression. But at the same time, it still sucks!

So the small things in life are currently making me very happy as they provide a distraction from trying to wrap my head around Hart! (Jurisprudence - if you don't know what it is, count yourself lucky.) Last week I went to visit my bestest friend Lisa for a study break :) 

Lisa has joined me on the quest for a perfect summer body and so has also joined me in spending a ridiculous amount of money/time procrastinating by finding new 'healthy' yet amazing recipes. Here is one of  her trademark amazing breakfast's - chia seeks soaked overnight in almond milk, porridge, some strange superfood powder which tastes like cacao, banana and coconut. Amazing. 

It gave us lots of energy to run around the park with Riley! 

wearing a Reiss jumper, Topshop jeans and Nike trainers 

 

My beautiful new Nike trainers.. which I think my feet have had a little trouble adjusting to after getting used to bad quality shoes, but they will get over it! (apparently Achilles heel is a real problem on your body?!)

stripes anybody?

Wearing a Zara trench and Reiss scarf (my favourite scarf ever!) 

Lisa lives on kings road. When I visit her, it is somewhat like stepping into a dream land where the parks are filled with blossom and puppies, the owners of whom chat about their days and say goodmorning (as opposed to the park outside my flat which is alternatively occupied by the local drug dealers and police, searching for needles!). A great thing about London is all of it's hidden parks - the one we went to is literally behind Lisa's flat in Worlds End, and is seriously beautiful! There are lots hidden all over London, it's just a matter of finding them (and sometimes scaling the gates!)

Then we all bundled off to Jak's (also opened up recently in World's End, and seriously amazing) to have a study day where we succeeding in opting for green juice as opposed to their seriously impressive cakes, and the looming waft of freshly baked muffins! 

Riley loves his toothbrush! 

On another random note, I'm in this week's Look magazine! :) 

                            

Don't let revision get you down! xx 

Saatchi Saturday

I am moving back to East London in a matter of weeks, so this has motivated me to go and explore the area I currently live in a bit more! I am living in Gloucester Road now with my boyfriend, and it is amaaazing. Amazing to walk down the street on your phone without fear of being mugged, being so central, always having someone there to listen to your days and give you a hug, right next to my best friend. Unfortunately uni is in the East so I will have to downgrade for another year!

We went to the market in Duke of York Square and decided to try out the 'best sandwich in Chelsea' - it did not disappoint!








For £5.50 each we decided to be greedy and get two, and hid around the back stuffing our faces - it was GOOD. In an attempt to burn off calories/be cultural and productive we wandered into the Saatchi Gallery. 





I like the Saatchi Gallery as they update their collections quite regularly, so there is always something new to see - and there are around six or seven different galleries so it is really diverse. Best of all, it is free! As always, there is completely random art which I probably could have done at home but there was also some really cool exhibits such at this:


made completely out of kites!

and the 'abstract'..




(thrilling - there were three giant canvases dedicated to this art) 

My favourite was the Hugo Boss Red exhibition they currently have on, as it is more interactive than the rest. There was a projector shining light and shadows over a wall, which we played in for ages!






and a giant red completely random dome, with no identifiable point other than ruining your hair whilst trying to get into it!






Would definitely recommend a visit to both the gallery and market, it was an amazing day!