Monthly Archives: July 2014

Sabon opens in Hong Kong – Lavender Apple Shower Oil and Delicate Jasmine Body Lotion review

Posted on July 21, 2014 | Leave a comment

UPDATE: Sabon has since opened lots more stores in Hong Kong – full list of locations at the bottom of this post!

Beauty junkies in Hong Kong are enjoying something of a purple patch (insert preferred colour of choice here) right now. Whilst the influx of new beauty brands here has included many I was already familiar with (like Kate Somerville or the new arrivals at FACESSS), there have also been plenty popping up that I hadn’t heard of – including Israeli skincare brand Sabon, who have just opened their first stores in Hong Kong, in Tsim Sha Tsui’s Harbour City and Tai Koo’s Cityplaza.

Sadly, I wasn’t able to make the store opening (which has its very own wishing well made from Jerusalem stone… skincare was definitely never this swanky in Nottingham, I tell ya!), so Sabon very kindly sent me a few of their goodies to try – and on the basis of these, I’m already sniffing out my next Sabon purchases.

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Paul Lafayet Tiffin Afternoon Tea at The Langham Hong Kong review – teatime for two in TST

Posted on July 17, 2014 | 3 comments

Back on the afternoon tea trail – and one of my favourite teatime old faithfuls is the Tiffin Afternoon Tea at Palm Court in The Langham, Hong Kong. For truly old-school Hong Kong dwellers, you may know the building better as the former Great Eagle Hotel; it was rebranded as The Langham Hong Kong in 2003, modelled after the historic Langham Hotel in London… which, of course, is legendary for its afternoon tea, so I really wouldn’t expect anything less!

Although the contents of The Langham Hong Kong’s cake stand aren’t anything too ground-breaking, the Tiffin Afternoon Tea does have a lot of other great things going for it – super pretty crockery, a really relaxed loungey vibe and frequent promotions to keep things interesting, including their current collaboration with French patisserie, Paul Lafayet.

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Posted in Food, Hong Kong

Tagged afternoon tea, afternoon tea hong kong, afternoon tea Tsim Sha Tsui, best afternoon tea hong kong, best afternoon tea Kowloon, best afternoon tea Tsim Sha Tsui, best scones in Hong Kong, high tea, Palm Court, Paul Lafayet, Paul Lafayet afternoon tea, review, The Langham Hong Kong, Tiffin afternoon tea, where to have afternoon tea Hong Kong, where to have afternoon tea Kowloon, where to have afternoon tea TST

Chom Chom Hanoi Happy Hour restaurant review – just winging it

Posted on July 14, 2014 | 2 comments

As a non-drinker, it often feels like Hong Kong’s plethora of Happy Hours are wasted on me. But no worries, because Vietnamese eatery Chom Chom has discovered the best way to entice me along to one – by offering plenty of delicious food too!

I loved Chom Chom back when it was a teeny-tiny private kitchen dishing out limited servings of pho and special tasting menus on Wellington Street. And I love Chom Chom even now it has turned into a hipper-than-thou “bia hoi” eatery serving up Vietnamese street food and casual bites to the baying masses on Peel Street. Wherever Chef Peter Franklin goes, I will follow!

What I do not love, however, are queues – and the new Chom Chom boasts these by the bucketload. It’s cool, it’s hip… of course it doesn’t take reservations, kids! My usual trick to avoid queues is to be a bit of a granny and go early (perfectly in-keeping with my other granny tendencies, like the constant need for naps and dislike of loud music) – and now thanks to Chom Chom’s nifty Hanoi Happy Hours, the early bird really does catch the worm… if the worm was a delicious pho roll, that is!

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Posted in Food, Hong Kong

Tagged banh mi, best chicken wings in Hong Kong, best restaurants in Central, best Vietnamese food in Hong Kong, best Vietnamese restaurants in Central, best Vietnamese restaurants in Hong Kong, bia hoi, Chom Chom, Chom Chom Hanoi Happy Hour, Chom Chom Happy Hour, Chom Chom HK, Chom Chom Hong Kong, Happy Hour, Peel Street, Peter Franklin, restaurant, review, VFC, Vietnamese, Vietnamese Fried Chicken

Studio Ghibli Layout Designs: Understanding the Secrets of Takahata and Miyazaki Animation @ Hong Kong Heritage Museum review

Posted on July 9, 2014 | 7 comments

Of all the museums in the city, I seem to find myself back at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum the most often (somewhat annoying, given it’s probably the one that’s also the furthest away from me!), and the latest exhibition to entice me over to the Shing Mun River was Studio Ghibli Layout Designs: Understanding the Secrets of Takahata and Miyazaki Animation. I can’t claim to be a devoted Hayao Miyazaki fan – but like everyone else, I love Spirited Away and think Totoro is really cute, so why not?!

Spirited Away room, from news.gov.hk

The Studio Ghibli Layout Designs exhibition comprises over 1,300 drawings from the animation process behind the films of Isao Takahata and Hayao Miyazaki – from their earliest works on television shows like Heidi: A Girl Of The Alps and Sherlock Hound, right through to the studio’s latest film releases The Wind Rises (Miyazaki’s last film) and The Tale of The Princess Kaguya.

Unlike many animation houses, Studio Ghibli continues to make all its films using traditional hand-drawn methods; rather than cute character studies, the works shown are more the backgrounds of scenes (layouts are regarded as blueprints for the film and are vital for its continuity), displaying the director’s ideas on colour, perspective, motion and other camera effects – and these sketches are practically artworks in themselves.

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Posted in Culture, Exhibitions, Film, Hong Kong

Tagged animation, best art exhibitions Hong Kong, best museums Hong Kong, drawings, film-making, Hayao Miyazaki, Heritage Museum HK, Hong Kong Heritage Museum, Howl's Moving Castle, Isao Takahata, layout designs, My Neighbour Totoro, Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea, Princess Mononoke, review, Spirited Away, Studio Ghibli exhibition, Studio Ghibli exhibition HK, Studio Ghibli exhibition Hong Kong, Studio Ghibli Hong Kong, Studio Ghibli Hong Kong Heritage Museum, Studio Ghibli Layout Designs: Understanding the Secrets of Takahata and Miyazaki Animation, things to do in Hong Kong, things to do in New Territories, things to do in Sha Tin

MAC Shimmerfish nail polish review, Alluring Aquatics Collection

Posted on July 7, 2014 | 8 comments

Couldn’t get enough of the a-ma-zing packaging for MAC’s Alluring Aquatics Collection? Yeah, me neither… so I thought I’d bring you another shamelessly covet-worthy post on the collection’s other nail lacquer, MAC Shimmerfish, for you to drool over! [Polish geek side-note: the third lacquer from MAC’s Alluring Aquatics Collection, Neptune, was not released in Hong Kong.]

Shimmerfish is a super shimmery (surprise!) silver with teeny-tiny flecks of light copper also swimming in the mix. It has the same kind of mottled glittery foil finish (a la Chanel Graphite, OPI Warm & Fozzie and Butter London Wallis) that is absolutely my favourite kind of complex molten metallic; in fact, it reminds me of OPI’s Designer De-Better, which was from the same Muppets Collection as Warm & Fozzie – check out my friend Eugenia’s swatches of that here for comparison.

Just like the sun sparking on ocean waves, Shimmerfish totally dazzles when the light hits it – resulting in brightly glistening flashes of silver at your fingertips. But those coppery flecks keep things equally awesome in the shadows too, delivering a coolly complex shade that you just can’t quite put your finger on – is it a silvery bronze… a bronzy silver… a rusty rose-gold… a champagne-taupe… or some equally intriguing new shade that doesn’t even have a name invented for it yet?

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