The Tiny Squid Lighting Up Menus
The East London borough of Hackney has always been in flux: A diverse area characterized by waves of immigration, it has been home to everyone from Romans to Huguenots, West Indians to Turks. These days, it's known for its creative and tech scenes — the first European edition of the Texas-born South by Southwest festival will take place in Shoreditch, home to London's Silicon Roundabout, in June. East of Shoreditch, toward Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, you'll find clusters of Georgian and Victorian houses alongside verdant parks and some of the city's most interesting boutiques, bakeries and restaurants. At Sesta, which opened on Wilton Way in September close to Hackney Central station, the chef Drew Snaith, a co-founder of the restaurant, updates the traditional Scotch egg with 'nduja Scotch olives and substitutes stone bass for meat in a dish inspired by the Pakistani stew nihari. A 20-minute walk north, at Mambow, its owner, the 30-year-old chef Abby Lee, offers punchy modern Malaysian food paired with gin sours and natural wines. And just above Regent's Canal, the family-run Miga makes refined Korean food such as beef tartare with Asian pear or pan-fried pork belly with king oyster mushrooms.
In Stoke Newington, in the northern part of Hackney, you'll find quilted coats and balloon-sleeved raincoats designed on the premises at Sonia Taouhid, and cultish European labels including Folk, Toast and Sideline at the men's and women's branches of Array. Then there's L.F. Markey, a few bus stops south in Dalston, which sells jumpsuits, denim overalls and dresses in joyful primary colors.
But perhaps the biggest changes to Hackney are taking place on its eastern end in the Olympic Park, where in May, the Victoria and Albert Museum is scheduled to debut its V&A East Storehouse. The 172,000-square-foot space will display thousands of objects, including a 15th-century gilded wooden ceiling from the destroyed Altamira Palace in Toledo, Spain, as well as David Bowie's archive. And near the storehouse, the dance organization Sadler's Wells has a new zigzag-roofed theater showing contemporary works from both local and international companies; in April, the choreographer Mette Ingvartsen's Skatepark will set the stage with quarter-pipes and ramps, and skateboarders will join the dancers. — Kate Maxwell
A Serpentine Band With Jungle-Green Stones
For the Rome-based jeweler Bulgari, the snake is definitional. Since 1948, the 140-year-old house has invoked the serpent's sinuous contours, most often in watches, which over the decades have curled around the wrist both in the abstract tubogas — a flexible band created without soldering — and in realistic interpretations with hinged scales, gemstone eyes and dials hidden in the hissing reptile's mouth. But for collectors who prefer their Bulgari asp with no purpose other than to adorn, this rose-gold bracelet, embellished with jelly bean green chrysoprase elements, a 3.23-carat cushion-cut Zambian emerald, a pair of buff-top rubies and alternating bands of pavé diamonds, is its own dazzling reward. Bulgari Serpenti Amazonian Enigma bracelet, price on request, (800) 285-4274. — Nancy Hass
Photo assistant: Karl Leitz
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