Category Archives: London

Clerkenwell. Where we’re at.

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ClerkenwellHere’s some background about where we’re based (and where your mail is handled if you use our mail forwarding service).

Clerkenwell is in the London Borough of Islington. The name originates from “Clerks’ Well” an actual well dating back to the middle ages that still remains visible from the Well Court building on Farringdon Lane. We’re based on St John Street, the pictured St John’s Gate is located just a minute’s walk from our office.

Other “historical” landmarks include:

• Smithfield’s Market
• The execution site of William Wallace (Braveheart)
• The Crown Tavern – the pub where Lenin and Stalin apparently first met
• The Eagle – London’s first gastropub (Clerkenwell is now a foodie’s dream with restaurants including St John, Club Gascon and Moro all being in the area)

Cineastes may recognise Clerkenwell from a number of films. Skyfall, Eastern Promises, About a Boy, The Dark Knight Rises and 28 Weeks Later all had scenes shot around here.

Clerkenwell is now considered the hub of the UK’s design industry and hosts the aptly titled Clerkenwell Design Week, “the UK’s leading independent design festival”. The design boom (previously Clerkenwell was associated with the printing industry) has resulted in a real buzz. Rarely are the multiple bars and restaurants empty, it’s only at the weekend that things slow down and even then there’s Fabric nightclub.

Clerkenwell’s location is a huge selling point. Nestled snugly between the financial square mile, trendy Shoreditch and Central London, it’s at the heart of London’s business activity. This, and the fact that it’s such a hub for creativity, makes Clerkenwell the ideal place to base any business from.

Welcome to the brand new London Presence

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Consider London’s momentous year capped; London Presence has had a makeover.

We’re delighted to present the all new LondonPresence.Com. Not only have we given the site an overhaul, we’ve also sculpted our services and processes so that they fit into our new way of thinking.

For ease of understanding we’ve broken our services up into four different areas (click the links for more information):

• Mail Forwarding
• Phone Services
• Virtual Office Packages (Mail & Phone Services combined)
• Holiday Cover

We’d really love to know what you think of the new site. So get in touch via our contact page, Twitter or Facebook.

Olymp-clinically Obese

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With the Vancouver Winter Games now over it’s London’s turn to take on the Olympic challenge. In 877 days the capital will be immersed in an Olympic fervour. For most of us living in London the games will be incomparable to anything we’ve experienced before. World Cups, Tennis Championships and Golf Tournaments will fade into obscurity under the glare of the Olympic torch. Or this is the promise.

Despite the magnitude of the games, Londoners haven’t taken the event to their hearts yet. This can be blamed on one thing: too much hype.

We won the Olympic bid in July 2005 (the 7/7 attacks infamously followed), come summer 2012 we will have known about the London Olympics for 7 years.

Every week since our successful bid various news items related to the games have bombarded us. Even the Beijing Olympics were viewed (in British broadcaster’s eyes) as a prequel to London rather than its own Olympic Games. Since then we’ve had Boris Johnson wiff-waffing and numerous handovers including one this week (how many times can one thing be handed over?). No matter what the event, a seven-year lead up will inevitably cause overkill.

To make matters worse a vast majority of the press has been negative. Not only have we been over fed the Olympics; we have been over fed all the bad stuff. We’re olymp-clinically obese.

The only way to recapture our hunger and get match fit is to go on a diet, to shove everything Olympic related in the freezer until summer 2012 when our appetites will be suitably whetted. Londoners more than anyone want a successful Games, we just don’t want them rammed down our throats.

The Great British Summer!

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Given the fact that we have been basking in glorious sunshine over the past couple of weeks, it may have come as a bit of a surprise to many Londoners last week, as parts of the city were brought to a standstill as a result of heavy rain .
According to a recent study, extreme weather conditions are going to become an everyday part of life in the UK, as climate change causes sea levels to rise by and estimated 20-50 cm by 2050. As Last Tuesday’s torrential rain left many Londoners stranded at various bus stops and tube stations across the capital, many people are asking how London will cope in the event of extreme weather.

London City Council confirmed that, regardless of the Embankment Wall and Thames Barrier, The House of Parliament, Downing Street and the M15 are all at risk, if the Thames floods due to increasing rain and rising sea levels.

Though the last recorded death due to flood in London was in 1928, in the context of erratic weather the threat is still very real. As a consequence, the council are now in the process of briefing urban developers to come up with an effective and sustainable solution to the problem.

Bafta 2009 at the Southbank Centre

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The British Academy Television Awards 2009 have taken place in London’s Royal Festival Hall to celebrate the very best in TV. Here the full list of winners and nominees:

Best Actor
Stephen Dillane – The Shooting of Thomas Hurndall (C4) – WINNER!
Jason Isaacs – The Curse of Steptoe (BBC Four)
Ken Stott – Hancock and Joan (BBC Four)
Ben Whishaw – Criminal Justice (BBC One)

Best Actress
June Brown – EastEnders (BBC One)
Anna Maxwell Martin – Poppy Shakespeare (C4) – WINNER!
Maxine Peake – Hancock and Joan (BBC Four)
Andrea Riseborough – Margaret Thatcher: The Long Walk to Finchley (BBC Four)

Best Entertainment Performance
Stephen Fry – QI (BBC Two)
Harry Hill – Harry Hill’s TV Burp (ITV1) – WINNER!
Anthony McPartlin & Declan Donnelly – I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! (ITV1)
Jonathan Ross – Friday Night with Jonathan Ross (BBC One)

Best Comedy Performance
Rob Brydon – Gavin & Stacey (BBC Three)
Sharon Horgan – Pulling (BBC Three)
David Mitchell – Peep Show (C4) – WINNER!
Claire Skinner – Outnumbered (BBC One)

Best Single Drama
Einstein and Eddington (BBC Two/Company Pictures)
Hancock and Joan (BBC Four/World Productions)
The Shooting of Thomas Hurndall (C4/TalkbackTHAMES)
White Girl (BBC Two/Tiger Aspect Productions) – WINNER!

Best Drama Series
Doctor Who (BBC One/BBC Productions)
Shameless (C4/Company Pictures)
Spooks (BBC One/Kudos Film and Television)
Wallander (BBC One/Left Bank Pictures) – WINNER!

Best Drama Serial
Criminal Justice (BBC One/BBC Productions) – WINNER!
Dead Set (C4/A Zeppotron Production)
The Devil’s Whore (C4/Company Pictures & Power)
House of Saddam (BBC Two/BBC Productions & HBO)

Best Continuing Drama
The Bill (ITV1/TalkbackTHAMES) – WINNER!
Casualty (BBC One/BBC Productions)
EastEnders (BBC One/BBC Productions)
Emmerdale (ITV1/ITV Studios)

Best International
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (More4/MTV Networks)
Dexter (ITV1/John Goldwyn Productions)
Mad Men (BBC Four/AMC) – WINNER!
The Wire (FX/Blown Down Productions/HBO/FX)

Best Factual Series
Amazon with Bruce Parry (BBC Two/Indus Films & Endeavour Productions) – WINNER!
Blood Sweat and T-Shirts (BBC Three/Ricochet)
The Family (C4/Firefly Films)
Ross Kemp in Afghanistan (SKY1/Tiger Aspect )

Best Specialist Factual
Blood and Guts: A History of Surgery (BBC Four/BBC Productions)
Life in Cold Blood (BBC One/BBC Productions) – WINNER!
Lost Land of the Jaguar (BBC One/BBC Productions)
Stephen Fry & the Gutenberg Press: The Machine That Made Us (BBC Four/Wavelength Films)

Best Single Documentary
A Boy Called Alex (C4/Walker George Films)
Chosen (True Stories) (C4/True Vision Productions) – WINNER!
The Fallen (BBC Two/Minnow Films)
Thriller in Manila (More4/Darlow Smithson Productions)

Best Features
The Apprentice (BBC One/TalkbackTHAMES)
Celebrity MasterChef (BBC One/Shine Limited)
The Choir: Boys Don’t Sing (BBC Two/Twenty Twenty Television) – WINNER!
Top Gear (BBC Two/BBC Productions)

Best Current Affairs
Saving Africa’s Witch Children (Dispatches) (C4/A Red Rebel Films and Oxford Scientific Films) – WINNER!
Mum Loves Drugs, Not Me (Dispatches) (C4/True Vision Productions)
Omagh: What The Police Were Never Told (Panorama) (BBC One/BBC Productions)
Ross Kemp: A Kenya Special (SKY 1/Tiger Aspect Productions)

Best News Coverage
Channel 4 News (C4/ITN)
News At Ten – Chinese Earthquake (ITV1/ITN) – WINNER!
Sky News – Canoe Man (Sky News/Sky News)
Sky News – Mumbai (Sky News/Sky News)

Best Sport
Cheltenham Gold Cup – Denman v Kauto Star (C4/Highflyer Digital)
ITV1 F1: Brazilian Grand Prix 2008 (ITV1/North One Television) – WINNER!
Olympics 2008 (BBC One/BBC Sport)
Wimbledon 2008 – The Men’s Final (BBC One/BBC Sports )

Best Interactivity
Bryony Makes A Zombie Movie (BBC Three Online & TV/Hat Trick Productions)
Embarrassing Bodies Online (www.channel4.com/bodies/Maverick Television) – WINNER!
Merlin (BBC One/BBC Productions)
Olympics 2008 (BBC One/BBC Sport)

Best Entertainment Programme
Friday/Sunday Night Project (C4/Princess Productions)
Harry Hill’s TV Burp (ITV1/Avalon Television)
QI (BBC One/TalkbackTHAMES)
X Factor (ITV1/TalkbackTHAMES) – WINNER!

Best Comedy Programme
Harry and Paul (BBC One/Tiger Aspect Productions) – WINNER!
The Peter Serafinowicz Show (BBC Two/Objective Productions)
Star Stories (C4/Objective Productions)
That Mitchell and Webb Look (BBC Two/BBC Productions)

Best Situation Comedy
The Inbetweeners (E4/BWark Productions)
The IT Crowd (C4/Talkback Productions) – WINNER!
Outnumbered (BBC One/Hat Trick Productions)
Peep Show (C4/Objective Productions)

Philips Audience Award
The Apprentice
Coronation Street
Outnumbered
Skins – WINNER!
Wallander
X Factor

G20 summit: the protests & the police

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Violence has broken out at a vigil being held by G20 protesters outside the Bank of England to mark the death of a man during violent demonstrations there yesterday.

To know more about the anger on the streets, have a look on

Sky News

Guardian.co.uk

BBC.co.uk

Will there ne blood again? Did police cause more trouble than they prevented?

Stay online to see all the news!

Prepare for another snow fall… the spring is still far away.

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From the Timesonline.co.uk: “It hardly seems possible, but Britain’s big freeze is to get worse. Just as the country digs itself out of Monday’s snow and ice, another belt of snowstorms threatens to strike the southern half of the country on Thursday and Friday with the risk of another major shutdown of the economy. The depression that brought the first mass of snow has slipped southwards and is now slowly wheeling around in the Bay of Biscay. It is ready for a second attack, later today, beginning with rainshowers along the South Coast. Because the ground is already covered in snow, it behaves like a refrigerator chilling the air — so the rain will rapidly turn to snow as the depression heads inland.”

But when will the spring arrive? And why is Britain so badly prepared for snow? Read here to discover more!

Heaviest snow in 20 years hits London!

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Timesonline.co.uk reports: “The heaviest snowfall in 20 years has closed thousands of schools and caused transport chaos up the eastern side of Britain, with London and the surrounding areas the hardest hit.

Six million bus passengers were left in the lurch as all London’s bus services were halted because of dangerous driving conditions, and every Tube line except the Victoria line was at least partially suspended.

Many mainline commuter rail services were also cancelled or seriously delayed, and flights at London’s airports were decimated, with both of Heathrow’s runways shut, Luton and London City closed, and Gatwick and Stansted flights subject to delays and short-notice cancellations.”

All the Europe is freezing and the weather forecast for the rest of the week is not one of the best… Have a look at the BBC website for the latest update!

Recession Britain, it’s official: but don’t lose hope!

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It’s a a hard Friday for the UK: it’s official we are in recession. Probably it’s not exactly news, but all the newspapers have opened today with new even darker predictions for the future.

The BBC.co.uk reports: “The UK is now in recession for the first time since 1991, official government figures have confirmed. … That means that the widely accepted definition of a recession – two consecutive quarters of falling economic growth – has been met”.

The Guardian.co.uk says: “Britain has officially entered recession for the first time since 1991, after the economy shrank at the fastest pace for nearly 30 years in the fourth quarter”.

The Timesonline.co.uk explains: “Britain is in the grip of its sharpest recession for three decades, grim official figures confirmed today. The economy suffered a brutal 1.5 per cent drop in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) during the past three months, shrinking at its fastest quarterly pace since 1980”.

People in London feel the pressure: unemployment is accelerating sharply, with 1.92 million people now out of work, the housing market remains severely depressed and retail sales are weak. There are no ‘green shoots of recovery’, no light at the end of the tunnel. The average recession in the UK since 1955 has lasted for three quarters, but the past two recessions have lasted for five. But people don’t lose the hope and the will to do and work.