Photo / Brian Minkoff

The venue, to be named (somewhat onanistically) 'Dinner by Heston Blumenthal', will be located in the Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park, and will serve "history-inspired modern dishes" (a gambit recently deployed by Bompas and Parr for their Complete History of Food).

Blumenthal has been burrowing away in the bowels of the British Library to research what Britons were dining on as far back as the 16th century, and the menu will feature dishes inspired by once-popular meals including bergamot cured mackerel salad, slow cooked short rub of beef and scallops with cucumber ketchup and peas. Wot, no vacuum jars and snail porridge?

Price-wise, DBHB isn't too bad: £25 for a three-course lunch, and £55 for the three-course à la carte dinner menu. Bookings open 15th October (call 0207 201 3833 to make a reservation), and at those prices it's likely to be booked up solidly for a while.

Those fiending for more Blum may be pleased to know that he's one of the chefs under consideration to operate the re-opened BT Tower restaurant.

We'd normally avoid awful puns in the title (think of the SEO, won't somebody think of the poor SEO), but this story can be treated no other way. An alleged burglar had to be rescued by the fire brigade after his backside became lodged in a Bow window (that's 'Bow' as in the place, not the style of window...see, this story just drips with pun potential). The intrafenestrated gentleman, age 36, was freed then arrested after the occupants discovered his intruding torso at breakfast. The Guardian offers a platter of wisecracks, but fails to speculate on whether the alleged burglar was red-cheeked.

Flying Lotus, aka Steven Ellison (Photo / Simon Fernandez)

Lined up across the stage, left to right, are: a drum kit, a harp, another drum kit, a saxophone, a six-string bass guitar, a laptop, a violin, a piano. A little after 9.30pm, the troupe of musicians come onto the stage, take up their instruments, and tilt into a frenzied performance that would seem largely improvised if one weren't already versed in the music of Flying Lotus.

How to define the style? 'Electronica' or 'dubstep' seem an insult to the musicians, whose virtuosity is matched by the strict discipline they show. Individual songs threaten to fly apart at any moment; haunting, lush waves from the harp clash with frenzied sax solos. On Nose Art, bassist Stephen Bruner threads intricate solos from high up on his fret board, his fingers dancing nimbly across the instrument. At times the singer Andreya Triana drifts onto stage and stands bathed in a spotlight, lending ethereal notes to the mix, before drifting out again. The only person who remains above the music is Ellison himself; a broad grin on his face, he stands behind the laptop, occasionally dabbling with the dials, but more often looking like he's enjoying it more than anyone else in the room.

Though occasionally wobbling close to jazz noodle territory, this was for the most part an accomplished show by a musician revelling in the serendipity of being a master of his craft who has found the artists capable of pulling his electronic vision together into thrilling live music.

Flying Lotus' new album, Cosmogramma, is out now.

The people occupying The Foundry in Hoxton were evicted earlier today. The group were the second lot of Foundry squatters, after a first group barricaded themselves inside in June, fighting the plan to destroy the building and construct a particularly unattractive hotel in its place. After spending two months there (during which Londonist was one of the few media outlets to actually get an interview with the people inside), the first group moved on, to be replaced by the second, whom bailiffs removed around lunchtime today. This photo tweeted by @markasaurus shows the aftermath.

       

London's taste for the eclectic and avant-garde keeps it firmly at the frontiers of fashion - creating the perfect, fertile environment from which an abundance of new designers can emerge. The energy and diversity of the city has been a constant source of inspiration for generations of London-based designers and indeed, anyone interested in fashion, and this new series of STYLEist celebrates the amazing talents of the capital's up and coming style-setters.

Olya Shishkina
Olya attended the Private School of Design and Fashion Modelling and the University of Design and Technology in Moscow. She moved to London from Moscow in 2007 to attend the BA Womenswear course at Central St Martins (CSM), after having run her own atelier - ?SHI¹ - in Moscow in collaboration with her twin sister since 2001. She obtained the Queen Elizabeth Scholarship Trust award during her second year at CSM. During her degree she had the opportunity to work for Erdem, Frost French and Michiko Koshino, where she was able to acquire valuable experience in preparation for the launch of her own label OLYA SHISHKINA.

Describe your brand
My designs are created for young, contemporary women who like to stand out and be individual. I love being experimental, particularly working with different fabrics like leather, metallics and sheepskin. I like to create items that will not only appeal to the playful individual, but also to the more fashion-forward thinkers.

How has London inspired you or your designs?
The creativity of London has always inspired me… people, music, art, clothes… You can get inspiration out of everyday life here. Combination of new and old, something amazing beautiful with something very ugly…weird, magical places, maybe people who were born here don’t notice it or just get used to it. But for me it’s just an incredible feeling. There are so many extremely talented people around and a lot of competition, which just encourages me to work harder and aspire to create something distinct.
It was the juxtaposition of the ugly and the beautiful in London that inspired me to create my collection that was exhibited at AFW 10 where I used materials that are usually considered to be very tough and unattractive such as metallics and PVC to create fluid feminine forms.

Where do you hang out?
It doesn’t matter where I go, what matters is who you are with…
I love East London, Favela Chic, Hoxton Bar & Grill, the White Cube Gallery. I love Latino, Samba - any music that let’s you move freely and forget your surroundings. I love the Roundhouse for live performances and Lounge lover for a casual cocktail with my friends.

What the worst outfit you have ever seen someone wearing on the tube?
When I see someone wearing something bad I just try not to remember it… but I do remember something very funny... I saw a very old woman on the tube a few years ago in London. She was probably in her late 60s. She was wearing old worn-out tracksuit bottoms with stripes down the side, stretched knee marks and sports t-shirt. Round her neck was hanging a huge old portable radio, one like our grandmas used to have in their kitchens, which was connected to a pair of huge headphones that were on her head. These headphones had a pair of antennae coming out of them just like the old televisions used to have. All the people around her on the tube were sitting in silence with straight faces, no one was paying her any attention, however I was unable to hold my enjoyment of the whole scene, and I started to laugh quite loudly until tears started streaming down my face. I guess it was not very polite but I was unable to stop myself!

What was the first thing you designed?
It was in 1991 when we moved from Germany to Russia - the contrast of the post-communist country struck me - there was nothing in the shops and as soon as anything was to appear queues would form, sometimes people would even join a queue without knowing what was at the end of it. Everyone wore the same clothes and I remember that my twin sister and I would redesign our mother’s clothes that she had bought in Germany. I would say that those were our first creations, we were about 11-12 years old then and that is when I knew for the first time what I was going to do in the future - design clothes.
When I was finishing school, our mum did not have enough money to buy us dresses for our graduation ball, even if she did have the money, there were no dresses in the shops that we would have been able to choose from. Instead, my twin sister and I made our own dresses from some fabric that our mother had kept from 10 years ago. She was incredibly happy that it turned out to be useful after all those years!
They were short dresses on top of which long see-through dresses were put on. The long dress morphed into the short one - two in one - in those days we really stood out from the crowd. At our school we were always like two white crows amongst the black crows (Russian saying).

Which designers inspire you?
Madeleine Vionnet - one of the greatest dressmakers of her time, she inspired generations of designers. I am especially fascinated by her bias cut.

Where can we buy your clothes?
At the moment my clothes are not on sale, but I am working on it. I am planning to sell in London, Russia, Germany and Canada. Some of my clothes can be custom made by request from my website.

Claudio Santana

The show (along with its website) has been put together with volunteers who have worked on other Old Vic Tunnels productions this year. They are part of a scheme to give 16-25 year olds a non-traditional route into theatre work including front-of-house, marketing and production. Tickets are £9 (£6 with concessions) and £1 from every ticket goes to the children’s charity The Railway Children.

More information and tickets are available from their website.

Photo (c) The Grotowski Institute

Let's hope you need the sun hat this Sunday in Springfield Park. Photo by Carole-* via the Londonist Flickrpool

Skint and staycationing? This lot might help.

Tonight: Enjoy late night opening at the London Wetlands Centre, Barnes from 6-9pm. Entry £3.95.

Pocket Change Comedy is an evening of free comedy as part of the London Fringe in the New Players Theatre Players Bar and Restaurant from 8pm. Also Friday and Saturday night.

Friday: Late Shift at the National Portrait Gallery offers free music, an alternative talk on the collection and drawing workshops. 6.30-9pm, free.

Saturday: Spend the day at the London Open Bike Polo Tournament in Southwark.

Run Riot tips us off to the International Meeting of Styles Grafitti Festival will see aerosol addicts gather at Highbury Studios, N5 to 'jam' on huge walls to a very funky soundtrack. Midday to sundown - free!

Take an exhibition tour of The Family and the Land at The Photographers' Gallery before the place closes for a year.

Join Paraiso School of Samba in the Clore Ballroom, Royal Festival Hall from 11am for a free day of workshops and a carnival performance at 6pm (learn some moves for the imminent Notting Hill Carnival).

Sunday: Springfield Summer Festival brings you homegrown talent, food and tunes from the heart of Hackney, including 'Hackney's Got Talent', Springfield Park E5, noon-6pm.

The London Permaculture Festival inspires and informs with a grassroots event for the 'green minded'. Lots of practical sessions, seed swap, experts, shiatsu, recycling, networking plus a question time and locally sourced food, film room, live music and a bar. From 11am-11pm at Cecil House. £4/3.

Talk to someone you don't know at A Feast of Strangers, Hyde Park Speakers Corner.
You will be introduced to someone you do not know and offered a Menu of Conversation, with 25 topics of conversation to choose from. 2.30-4.30pm, free and open to all - bring a rug and refreshments to share.

The Global Poverty Project presents 1.4 Billion Reasons discussing extreme poverty and viable solutions and mixes it up with a free music festival at Rich Mix between midday and 6pm. Please RSVP.

Monday: Rich Mix CityScreen shows Breakfast at Tiffany's at 12.30 in Broadgate Circle, Liverpool Street. Bring blankets, food and drink (no glass). Free.

Make your own board games at the Museum of London between 12.30-2 and 2.30-4pm. Free.

Free entertainment with 12 Good Eggs from Art Saves Lives at Leicester Square Theatre but please make a donation.

Tuesday: Rich Mix CityScreen shows 500 Days of Summer in Broadgate Circle, 12.30.

Wednesday: Rich Mix CityScreen shows Up at 12.30 and Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince at 6pm.

(c) Simon Kane

Norton-Hale’s plot sticks closely to the original, telling the tale of Rodolfo, a writer (in this case for a website) who lives with his twenty-something student friends. One night he meets his neighbour, Mimi. Mimi and Rodolfo fall in love but heartbreak and death lie ahead - this is opera: were you expecting anything else?

All of the parts are played by trained opera singers who work without mikes or amps and in casual clothing. The cast changes each night but we enjoyed Benjamin Seifert’s Marcello with his moody insouciance and killer scowl. Claire Presland’s vacillating siren Musetta was fun and sexy while David Friedman as her older lover was the best actor on the night with his bittersweet performance.

We loved the cheeky second act. Part of the act’s appeal is the surprise element (even for those who know the plot) so all we’ll say is that it allows the audience to get up close and personal with the performers Punchdrunk-style while demonstrating the skill and power behind the performers’ voices.

This is opera a la Gok Wan: stripped down, pumped up and thoroughly modern. It will no doubt irk puritanical purists but it will appeal to everyone else. It will be showing at the Soho Theatre until September 4. Tickets and more information are available here.

Also currently at the Soho Theatre: Our Lady J

By Tyla75

There are 1800 pictures in our Flickrpool tagged Hackney alone so excellent fodder for a competition like this and many of you will be living or working in the borough witnessing the changing landscape. And noticing what's staying the same.

The most striking, resonant and narrative images submitted to the project will be selected for an exhibition at Hackney Museum in October and archived for future generations to pore over. Imagine it: "wow, look at what people used to wear down Broadway Market!", "gosh, Hackney Wick used to be an industrial wasteland yet full of artists", or "amazing, Hackney used to have a Woolworths". Etc.

Hackney Council are working with Shoot Experience on this so it's easy to upload your images to the Shoot Experience website - do so by 17th September.

Read all the information and rules online

See also our very own Thames Barrier to Teddington Photography Challenge.

Smashing idea, this: a double compendium of 33 short stories, each based on a London Borough. The collection is split across two volumes, which ignore the Thames as usual-divider and instead split the capital into East and West moieties. The result is a hotchpotch of enormously variable but highly enjoyable vignettes of London life.

The whole of London is here, from tales of struggling immigrants to champagne-quaffing Kensingtonians. Many are deliciously contemporary: an urban treasure hunt, a local campaign against Olympic heavy-handedness, the trouble with foxes... Some are simply beautiful, such as Debi Alper's 'How Lucky You Are'. Others, such as Jonathan Green's entry for Richmond, which can only be described as a back-to-front instant-message ghost story, are impressively inventive.

Pedantic readers shouldn't be put off by the book's title, which invents an additional borough in order to include a story about the Square Mile. Less easy to forgive is the lack of copyediting throughout. One or two typos are to be expected in any book, but the number of spelling mistakes on show here is simply distracting (although sometimes amusing - author Tim Scott apparently 'stared' in an ITV comedy series...well, wouldn't you?).

If you can see beyond these minor production problems, though, this twin pack of London shorts is a fine collection of fiction from a talented ensemble of authors.

33 East / West is available now from Glasshouse Books. Each of the two volumes (East, West) is available from Amazon for £7. Follow the publishers on Facebook.