All stories about "Top"

Ever since baby-faced oil swindler Roman Abramovich traded Moscow for Mayfair in 2003, a red tide of Russian super-rich have been making London their home. Belgravia estate agents have gleefully rubbed their hands raw as Russian bidding wars pile tens of millions onto already obscenely-priced luxury mansions, and obsequious Knightsbridge jewelers are now employing Russian-speaking staff to help part these newcomers from their cash. So if a prospective billionaire settler, fresh off his Lear jet, asks you to show him around town for a day (money no object of course), what are you going to do? Here's a sample itinerary you might try, costing a paltry sum northwards of twenty thousand pounds for the day.

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Everyday on Gridskipper we give you a new map. Some are new, some are fetched from our archive, newly updated. Happy Gridskipping. Washington DC is a middle-class town filled with middle-class tastes. That explains the 45 minute wait at the Cheesecake Factory and why chicken fried steak is a daily special every day, everywhere. But what if you're making money in this town? And you wanna blow loads of cash? On food that means something? Where can you go? Wealthy Washingtonians usually skip town for the glamours of the Inn at Little Washington, which twice made it to Forbes' list of the Top Ten Most Expensive Restaurants in World. Otherwise, petit bourgeois get their inner peace at the following venues, where price matters as much as taste. Any restaurant that you can walk out of without dropping a hundred bucks doesn't make the cut. (photo)

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Everyday on Gridskipper we give you a new map. Some are new, some are fetched from our archive, newly updated. Happy Gridskipping. Once upon a time, sexy lingerie in Britain was a somewhat er, specialized business selling torturous polyester and scratchy lace garments to be worn perhaps once on Valentine's Day or more regularly if you were a stripper. Most women never strayed from plain, sensible pants, which had once been white and were now gray and fraying. It was a sad state of affairs. And then Agent Provocateur came along and saved the nation's knicker drawers. Where they led the way, many others followed and now we're spoiled for choice. Mapped here are just some of London's finest purveyors of lingerie.

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Thus, we come to the end of another chapter in the wacky, wild and charmingly schizophrenic history of Gridskipper. Out from Denton's clutches she comes, into the somewhat less menacing grasp of Curbed (a whole slew of city blogs, for the uninitiated).

So as to keep you in the loop, the action here will be suspended until much closer to Memorial Day. Behind the scenes, the site is going to get a minor facelift and an editorial Come to Jesus, on the other side of which will emerge a new Gridskipper ready for summer. As for what that means, mostly you'll have to just wait and see. Although now would be as good a time as any to find a good sun block.

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Hunter, Alisa, and I have been posting from a front table at that hoary blogger watering hole, Schiller's, and some of us have been drinking -- I won't tell you who. What I can say is that it's been a great two months, in large part because I entered a site left in such great shape by its current editor-at-large, and one with such dedicated and witty writers and contributors installed.

What will I miss? I'll miss the fine brick ceiling of the Gawker HQ, and I'll miss a good majority of the people working underneath. I'll also miss working on a site that provided a needy world with so many pertinent details about strippers, needlessly cute animals, drugs, and restaurants.

I wish Curbed lots of luck with their newly envisioned site -- I think I speak for all of us when I say I'm looking forward to seeing exactly what that is. I also wish we could be working together longer, but it's not going to happen with my rent being what it is. Job offers, whether in earnest or not, will be entertained as they never have before.

photo credit

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Remember the story about the pilgrim colony where the settlers all disappeared? The whole town vanished with no trace except a bunch of empty houses and a creepy message on a tree that no one understood. This post is going to be kind of like that tree message. I can't tell you anything about what's going to happen next here at Gridskipper or how I'm going to keep paying for the salmon roe, espresso, and fine Dutchmaster brand cigars that I need to keep me alive. What I can tell you is that I've learned so much while working for this crazy little web site. In fact, my time here has taught me so much that, as a parting gift to you, my dear readers, I wanted to share this list of the Top Five Life Lessons I've Learned From the Blogosphere.

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". . . walking through Williamsburg several years ago, I was stopped in my tracks by the haunting face of a young girl peering out at me from within a doorframe. Pasted on a door was a beautifully detailed woodcut print I would later learn had been crafted by the street artist Swoon. Down the street, I discovered what looked like a cover of a tawdry pulp fiction novel stenciled on some wooden scaffolding by a collective known as Faile . . . from that moment on, I was hooked. With a little patience, you too can develop a street art habit."

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When we wrote about downtown's Trifecta we were like "sure they're douchebags but at least they're douchebags running a sports bar in downtown LA." And then when we wrote about the Grand Sports Bar we were like "they kind of suck but at least they're running a sports bars in downtown LA." And then both of them went out of business. And then the Flower Sports Bar went out of business. And now downtown is more or less bereft of watering holes servicing both man's need for alcoholic nourishment and his need to drunkenly declare that he's about to fight that out-of-town sports fan over there. Luckily downtown still has a few bars and restaurants where you can catch the occasional game. If you show up at just the right time. If they happen to be open that day. If they haven't closed early. If you're lucky. Fuck. (photo)

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Hey, it's Gridskipper's last day at the parent company! Who knows what will happen at our shiny new home. I, for one, will be bowing out of my relatively specious remaining duties, and for all we know, Adam's housecat will be in charge after sundown. But there's been lots of speculation -- OK, some occasional speculation -- regarding who or what might have tried to pry Gridskipper out of Gawker Media's warm, supple, sticky tentacles. Here's the exclusive behind-the-chiffarobe report on what really went down in Nick Denton's smoke-filled lavatory.

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I still can't figure out why my boyfriend doesn't desire a day at the spa like I do. It's especially odd, because there are all kinds of barbershops, boutique salons and spas that cater to the manly men of this city. Maybe he thinks that a $100 treatment called "The Commander in Chief" that includes a manicure is both emasculating and expensive? It sounds good to me. Anyway, here are a few spots in Washington where you can clean up your filthy boyfriend.

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Blogs define the undefinable -- that's why they're blogs and not logs or frogs. Monsieur, you might ask, mais, qu'est-ce que c'est le gridskipping? Indeed, all these years and nobody's had the balls to just ask. Is it because Gridskipper is a loan word that only cool, edumacated people know and practice, or is it because just like the word zeitgeist, gridskipping is nothing more than a zeitgeist for a generation of jaded travelers? Someday, when Martian archeologists are dusting nuclear fallout dust from our petrified servers and piecing together the human spirit for a touching museum exhibit on Earth people, they just may come upon these motheaten annals of travel debauchery and wonder, as we sometimes do, just what this was all about. In their search for real answers, the future bubble-helmeted historians might sift through the Rosetta stone that is Wikipedia, or maybe even a real dictionary. But for the sake of them and future generations of Chinese people, let me lay it out for you in this handy-dandy time capsule format. Forgive me for just cutting and pasting stuff from off the net, but that's all that writers are good for these days.

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Come summer in NYC, few things compare to being able to drinking outdoors (that is, unless you're lucky enough to have summer Fridays, but that's another story). Be it in a backyard or on a rooftop, pairing a cocktail with a cool summer breeze is pretty much the best it gets. And what better place to do so than the epicenter of all things hip? That's right folks, next stop: Williamsburg, where there are dozens of places to slap on a pair of wayfarers and down a few PBRs while basking in the sun. (photo)

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We were in Miami Beach last week, a couple of New Yorkers looking for balmy weather, pretty scenery, and stiff drinks, same as anybody. Through a combination of zealous planning and happy accidents, Jenn and I found all that and more, and most of it was better than we had anticipated. For us, Miami Beach was the perfect balance of action and chillout time, with an open-water kayak adventure followed by some cocktails and a couple hours of horizontal relaxation on the beach: yin and yang coming together harmoniously in South Florida. Miami is hardly uncharted territory, and there's no shortage of tourist information and guidebook coverage, but since we had such a grand time and didn't blow too much money, I'd like to share a few highlights and tips I gleaned while digging the scene in South Beach.

Once a "Hip Miami South Beach Hotel" called the Strand Ocean Drive snapped up my $165-a-night bid for four nights, we were in business. The hotel is comprised of four art deco buildings on Ocean Drive between 10th and 11th streets, and at the moment, which building you're in makes all the difference. Since we were checking in with a scarlet P (for Priceline) on our reservation, we wound up in the Retro building. The room itself was quite posh, but it had a view of an alley and a parking garage on one side, and a construction site on the other. After being assured that the hotel was booked for the night and another room wasn't available, we decided to give it a chance, unpacked our bags, and took a stroll through town.

We started with a cheap but satisfying meal at the nearby 11th Street Diner (we're New Yorkers after all), and then headed up Washington Avenue, a surprisingly scuzzy street thick with tattoo parlors, smoke shops, and souvenir stores with mannequins that looked like sex dolls wearing thongs that said "shut up and lick it." Every beach town, no matter how chic, has its seedy side. But we did eventually reach the tony part of South Beach in the pedestrian thoroughfare of Lincoln Road. Lincoln Road is essentially an outdoor strip mall, but a fancy one, with plenty of attractive options for alfresco dining and drinking. It's also a nice place to stroll through and not buy anything at all, but simply take in the nonstop fashion show and beauty contest.

Back at the room later that evening, our attempts at amorousness were interrupted by our bed collapsing beneath us. The bed was essentially a futon mattress over a low, slatted wooden frame, and a couple of the ribs had somehow slipped out of their grooves, leaving us to claw our way out of a mini-mattress sinkhole. It was both sad and funny, and since changing rooms wasn't an option, we made the best of it.

What wasn't funny was the ungodly construction noise at 7:00 the next morning. It came from the Clevelander hotel next door, which is currently being gutted. Power saws and pneumatic concrete blasters made it impossible to sleep, and it quickly became a matter of either changing rooms or ditching the hotel altogether, even though it was paid for up front. Fortunately, a sympathetic desk manager named Ashley was able to move us to a room in the Contemporary building later that afternoon, and our trip instantly got about twenty times better. Perhaps it was that broken bed that got us the coveted upgrade.

True to their marketing, the Strand Ocean Drive really is a stylish hotel. The suites have futuristic-looking Luminaire furniture, Flos lighting fixtures, tidy kitchenettes with full-size refrigerators, flat-screen TVs (which get the Bravo channel, as Jenn quickly discovered), H20+ bath products, and rainfall shower heads that make you feel like a rich person as you do your daily ablutions. We dug it. After enjoying a swim in the stellar rooftop pool (I do love a pool with a view), we toasted our good fortune in our new suite with a couple of Campari and sodas with lime. (A tip of the glass to the liquor store on 11th Street and the Art Deco Supermarket on Washington, both grimy places that had everything we needed.)

That evening, my nerdy tourist fantasies came true as we boarded the Island Queen for a 90-minute sunset cruise through the islands of Biscayne Bay. The affable narrators pointed out the celebrity mansions, and we ogled homes owned by such luminaries as Oprah, Diddy, Shaq, Gloria Estefan, Al Capone, and Vanilla Ice. You know who had the biggest and most opulent estate? The inventor of Viagra, Dr. Simon Campbell. The narrator made the "raising the bar" joke twice, in case we missed it the first time. Also, Alicia Keys has a big yacht named Alicia moored in front of her house.

The Island Queen was perfect, because the very next morning we rented kayaks from South Beach Kayak and paddled past many of the same houses we had seen on our cruise. We would have never known which houses belonged to celebrities without the benefit of the previous day's narration. We would have never been able to holla at Lil John, not that he heard us.

The weather was perfect and the seas were calm. We happily paddled past Belle Island, Rivo Alto Island, and Di Lido Island; looped around Hibiscus Island; skirted Star Island; and even made a stop at sandy, uninhabited Monument Island to snap some photos and guzzle some water before heading back to Island View Park to return the boats. In all, it was roughly a four-mile paddle (according to Ana Marie, the owner of South Beach Kayak), and we felt terrific having done it. I can't recommend the kayak trip enough, because sometimes you've just got to float.

We had dinner that night at the loud and festive Taverna Opa. As we feasted on delicious Greek-style octopus, snapper, and salmon, and guzzled white wine from Santorini, we talked about which of our friends could hack the kayak trip, and which would be best left on dry land.

The next morning, I made another discovery: The place to get your morning caffeine fix in South Beach is Yogo Cafe on 11th between Collins and Ocean. I brought a couple of well-made Segafredo Zanetti cappuccinos ($2.75 apiece) and some chocolate croissants back to the room, and we woke up on our own time.

Then we hit the beach like we were supposed to, and did some serious relaxing. Our $12.50-per-day resort fee got us a couple of lounge chairs and an umbrella, and we enjoyed a day of sun, sand, and surf at one of the world's most famous beaches. It's true what they say on those softcore Travel Channel shows: there's no shortage of uncovered flesh in South Beach, and the bodies on display were generally quite fit. I sucked in my gut more than once. But it was all good. The sunshine and Campari drained us of all our remaining city stresses, and we rode out the week like a gentle wave, wandering from beach to pool to bar to restaurant without a care in the world.

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Spring is in the air, which means drab winter wear ought to be properly stored away. Pretty pastels in breathable fabrics are the essence of this time of year, as are sweet berries, crisp greens, and a fabulous pair of Romanesque sandals. And so, to help you shed the old and bring in the new, I've scoured east and west for the snazziest shops in Berlin. Whether you've a penchant for Tokyo's youth culture or for Sex in the City, there's something here for everyone. Happy spring shopping.

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Since spring has finally arrived in Berlin (like, yesterday), the streets are teeming with life, and not just the cracked-out vampire kind that dominates the sidewalks during those sunless winter months. With the promise of multiple hours of daylight comes the heavy burden of mischief-time management for many of the city's urban art assassins -- those who had the luxury of winter's endless darkness to do their bidding in relative safety. Not anymore. The days are going to get long -- uncomfortably long, in fact. So what's a street artist to do? Hibernate until winter? Niemals (Never). Just find a corporate sponsor to fund your mural or a gallery to exhibit your work legally and call the rest of your external endeavors "exhibition promotion." Here's another look at Berlin's best graffiti ambassadors, and a sampling of galleries that have embraced urban art and its messiahs as the city's up-and-coming cultural creed. (Our previous coverage is here.)

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Here are some ways to celebrate May in LA: buying a fresh set of skimpy clothes for what promises to be another long, hot summer; investing in a UV lamp (for the June gloom) and a window air conditioner (for those days when the gloom burns off and you think you're going to fry to a perfect golden-brown finish just sitting next to a window); getting a head start on a summer fling or six. Or you could check out our guide to May events in the city of angels. Nothing will be as fun as actually cashing your economic stimulus check, but we've got some good ideas as to how you can spend it.

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As we mentioned last summer, Paris provides free Wi-Fi access from more than 260 public parks, gardens, and monuments. A beautiful idea, but those of us with real work to do need a table and a beer. Helping us out are a number of cafés and bistros that serve free Wi-Fi along with their liquid offerings. And profiling these joints is a nifty little website that rounds up more than 140 hotspots in Paris and plots them on an easy-to-use map. Cafés Wifi selects their monthly favorites -- those cafés that provide a free, fast, and always working connection, along with pleasant working atmosphere -- and reports on the price, the clientele, and the number of electrical outlets. It's a freelancer's wet dream. This very article, including the photo, was posted from #4, la Fée Verte.

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Our first post about overrated eating in the District was wildly popular. As a result, we're putting together a list of the rest of the worst in Washington. From the Old Ebbitt Grill to Circa at Dupont, it seems this city is filled with half-assed eats. (photo)

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You don't have to cross the channel to dress like a Parisienne. If you're in London and pining for some Parisian style, no need to trouble yourself with an aller-retour on the Eurostar. Just hop on the Tube and head over to W11. Westbourne Grove and Ledbury Road in the heart of Notting Hill is a quiet, walkable, boutique-lined little oasis where you can stroll around, window shop, and spend your cash at top Gallic boutiques that congregate in the area. Even if you're just in the mood for a window-shop and a coffee, Westbourne Grove is a nice place to meander on a sunny afternoon. Make that a beer, and you just may be able to almost convince yourself you're in the Marais. Except that the English-speaking French girls mining these fashion houses are smiling and friendly in a way they'd never think to be on native soil.

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A few weeks ago I was raving to my father-in-law about Rustico, a neighborhood restaurant in Alexandria, VA, just outside of DC. Between its 331 types of beer and new American cuisine, I figured it'd be a great place to take him on his next visit. But when I said that my favorite meal there was macaroni and cheese, he laughed. "You go to a restaurant for macaroni and cheese? How much is it?" "$16," I whimpered and his laughter intensified. You know, maybe I am a fool. But damn it, ex-editor Chris's write up of New York's best restaurants for mac and cheese was one of the most read posts of 2007 on Gridskipper. So I can't be the only idiot. Maybe as current editor John said, "All these urban sophisticates are just softies once you crack the surface." Regardless, whether you're a fool, urban softy, or yuppie who can't fathom paying $0.50 for something when you could pay $16 for it, here's are DC's best restaurants for mac and cheese. (photo)

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Above is a falling-apart hotel from Shreveport, Louisiana. Fifteen more "abandoned and decaying" specimens are on view at Protraveller

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Budget Travel gets the goods on what it's like to work for a major airline in the provocatively titled piece, Confessions of an airline agent. As with all titillating titles, I assumed the article would be a let down. Can the behind-the-scenes experience of a modern day airline agent really be that scandalous? Well, yes actually, if you consider a woman breastfeeding a Chihuahua scandalous...

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A wise man once sang Don't do the crime if you can't do the time, a warning simple enough for even me to grasp. This threat of long-term incarceration, a staple of justice and correctional systems for centuries, is still the essential deterrent to criminal behavior. Unfortunately in Berlin, with its twelve years of Nazi dictatorship followed by four more decades of communist authoritarianism, one might end up doing the time -- or worse -- while never having actually "done the crime." Politically and racially motivated confinement, torture, and murder stain the histories of Berlin's prisons, and the process of Vergangenheitsbewaeltigung ("coming to terms with the past") has also involved examining the injustices and atrocities which have occurred within the walls of the big house. While the city now has a normal correctional system for the punishment and rehabilitation of its criminal population, several of Berlin's prisons have been converted into memorials -- remembering those innocents who suffered without cause and warning those who would forget how justice can be perverted by politics.

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There are only three categories of purchasables that genuinely motivate me to shop: books, food, and yarn, in that order. Since independent bookstores have been done, and I don't want to bore you with my philosophical musings on Pathmark, deli counters, and self-checkouts, it looks like I'll be pointing you in the direction of fuzzy bunches of mohair and bamboo knitting needles. Hooray! In the past 10 years, yarn shops have gone the way of a lot of small New York businesses, transforming from mom-and-pop joints into upscale boutiquey venues with a painstakingly "curated" array of goods. The latter shops are fun for browsing, but when you calculate that your knitted sweater pattern will take upwards of $150 and 18 hours of labor to create, the whole do-it-yourself ethic loses it appeal. If balls of cashmere fibers don't get you going, perhaps the Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef Project at the World Financial Center will. Pictured at left, the exhibit seeks to raise awareness about dwindling coral reefs, but at the very least, it should convince you to pick up that crochet hook and join the rest of us cool I-craft-on-the-subway folks. (photo)

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Let's talk about the ugly first. See above. Now this is not to say that these girls were particularly unattractive, or that in general the amount of exposed flesh on the polo fields over the course of the weekend was objectionable. It was hot. All I would have liked is if more people could have looked in the mirror before they left their hotel rooms, these girls included. The blonde here flashed some bum crack on more than one occasion. Not pretty.

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It's that magical time of year again! The season of all seasons -- spargelzeit (asparagus time). Bunches of chlorophyll-deprived white asparagus hit the veggie stands last week.Among the rest of the colorful fruits and vegetables, it sticks out like some sickly and awkwardly tall kid, a gangly outsider. But that doesn't deter the Germans. For the next two months, the strange white vegetable will be the envy of all edible herbaceous plants, as the star of spring-time menus in restaurants across the country. And Berlin is said to have among the best, getting it fresh from the sandy soils of surrounding Brandenburg.

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Hollywood is a tough town. Your typical night out involves waiting in lines, bribing self-important bouncers and dodging paparazzi, which means you'll wake up the next morning, or mid-afternoon, famished. We've already discussed some of the best places to get your morning-ish food in West Hollywood, but should your plans (or one night stand) find you a little farther east, it does help to arm yourself with lots of options.

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Between now and mid-July, there are more than 40 great indie pop/rock concerts coming to town. That's good news for music lovers who are living or traveling in Paris this summer. To help you map out your evenings (and buy tickets in advance) we've tagged the 40 best shows on this Google calendar. After the jump, we present videos for our favorite 25, and name the Top Ten concerts of the summer. (photo)

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To say I love Eggs Benedict would be a bit of an understatement. One of the greatest challenges I face at brunch is wrenching myself away from my beloved Eggs Benny and trying other options on the menu. This post is a roundup of my favorite restaurants for Eggs Benedict in the District. It is also purely selfish, as I'm hoping to get suggestions on some fantastic new Eggs Benedict spots to satisfy my craving. Comments welcome! ()

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We've already sent you to some of London's best design shops for the home. Here's a list of top design destinations and events for the design junkie in search of modern inspiration and historical perspective. After the jump: 400 years of English interiors at the Geffrye Museum in Shoreditch, the newest work of international design stars at the Design Museum along the Thames, and London's only antiques, vintage, and retro department store.

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