Scanorama

I've just returned from Sweden and it's everything it should be, the land of clean beaches, long walks, brilliant design and pint glasses full of... prawns- a place where equality and eccentricity manage to enhance each other.

We were very much on the go from touching down onwards and frankly I mostly just slept on the plane journeys but I did want to quickly mention Scanorama which is the in flight magazine for the Swedish airline SAS because it's one of the best travel magazines I've read in quite some time.

Of course the seven page article about Grasse in the south of France (the home of perfume) could have been written for me but there were also interesting and extremely well written features on Manchester and Brooklyn. I find travel magazines can be even harder than fashion ones to read without thinking the entire copy has been written by a PR but I genuinely felt that the writers of these articles wanted to give an impression of the place- and yes they recommended places to stay, eat and see but I actually felt they meant it and they gave me reasons why.

You can read Scanorama online here; the issue I'm referring to was for May 2011.

Picture from Salt Restaurant, more of which soon...

Oh Comely Magazine

Finding Oh Comely Magazine was like finding the magazine I dreamt about but didn't think would ever exist. Seriously.

I found issue 2 at Waterloo station when I was buying supplies for a journey home. I saw an extremely pretty cover (above) and, somewhat perplexed that it didn't feature overlayed teeth and acres of orange skin, I immediately grabbed it. Was this a real magazine or something someone had left in the shop?

I opened it- an interview with Emmy the Great, features on Peggy Sue, this all seemed too good to be true; but it was real. As treated my copy like a precious new book, trying not to bend the spine because it was so pretty.

I have just received issue 1 which looks just as fine- with Owen Pallet, city gardening and Sally Potter- which Oh Comely HQ will kindly post out to you; their shop is here. They also sell annual subscriptions and toasters- so you can make tea and toast to read your new favourite publication.

Oh Comely Magazine are very friendly, they tweet, blog and like sharing photos.

There's a full lists of stockists here (My copy was from WH Smith at Waterloo- thank you!).

I want to live in a Domino home

I thought one of the good things about not working in central London anymore would be that I wouldn't spend as much money as I wouldn't be able to just 'pop' to the shops after work, or after a couple of post work drinks (which is totally fatal of course). It turns you don't spend less you just spend your money on the internet!

I think the whole blogosphere was really upset about the news of the recent demise of Domino magazine. I was extra upset because I had only just started getting copies via e-bay having never been able to find it in the UK. I know we are going to lose quite a lot of magazine titles to the crunch but I was surprised about this one because it seemed to fill a gap between the very high end, great to look at as home porn magazines and the lower end DIY home magazines which are quite a bit dowdier. Domino was the home magazine you wanted to exist but never really did, until it did (well in my case until I bought some on e-bay)- and now it won't exist anymore. Again.

Anyway as a result of my separation from the larger bookshops and due to my ever worsening internet habit I cracked on Friday and bought the Domino book of decorating, which I had long been lusting after. I can report it is as good as it looks. I'm not sure why there hasn't been more press about this in the UK except that I suppose lots of the stockists are American, but really this is book is useful for design inspiration or just to pore over the beautiful images rather than as a directory of shops.

My new e-bay thing (you have to have one thing you are particularly on the hunt for don't you?) is buying back issues of Domino while they're still quite easy to find. The actual issues are fairly inexpensive unless you want a really rare one but the postage is making my credit card feel a little heavy; it could definitely do with losing a few pounds but I'm not sure this obsession will stop until I have every issue.