I have just returned from a couple of days in London on a jolly with Fab and Annie.  The purpose?  To check out D&AD New Blood 2008.  We have to enter it next year and decided to go and check out the vibe…  The hotel we stayed in was sheer comedy and absolutely horrendous.  We thought that the “Oxford Hotel” couldn’t be all that bad?!    Two stars, situated in Earl’s Court, serving breakfast and with an en-suite bathroom.  Perfect.  Until we got there…

We were on the top floor (about 10 flights of stairs, no lift) and in our bedroom for three, we found five single beds, none of which appeared to be level!  There was carpet on the walls and above that, grubby sackcloth (was this ever cool?!)  There was a small wonky shelf by each bed, a 70s radio mounted on the wall that had been kicked in and to top it all off, a poster of Paul Daniels in a clip frame above one of the beds!!!

Ohhhh dear.  The sheets (complete with cigarette burns) looked like sleeping Mexicans (bad 80s aztec design), so we ended up sleeping ON the beds in our towels!!!

We looked high and low for the bathroom and then discovered it in a cupboard!  It was literally the size of a caravan bathroom and the toilet flush had vanished, so you had to actually stick your hand inside the wall and pull up a rod in order to discard your ‘doings’!!

Breakfast was yet another treat - value cornflakes with very thin toast and jam.  You sat around a table full of strangers and tried not to wonder what the floaty bits in the orange juice were…

D&AD was great, some really good stands and some very creative work - design, advertising, photography, illustration and animation mostly.  We picked up lots of ideas, ate some nice food and drank some nice wine.  We laughed a lot about the hotel and visited the V&A very briefly.  Thumbs up London!

(left) D&AD - everything black and yellow of course.  (right) London Festival of Architecture