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London weekend

8th May 2012 by Helena 6 Comments  

When people ask me where I’m from, I just say England. I’m not English of course, I’m half-Swedish, half-Italian, living in Abu Dhabi and with a house in France. But no one really wants to know all that. Added to which, England is where I feel most at home.
Rupert, Leonardo and I just got back from London yesterday. We flew in on Wednesday and en route to the friends we were staying with drove up Redcliffe Gardens, the first place I lived in when I moved to London aged 16. Actually it wasn’t strictly the first place. Prior to that I had lived in a bedsit in Maida Vale, which was utterly dingy but I loved it. There was an old Greek man who lived downstairs and used to feed me Moussaka. And I worked at what was then Hennes, now H&M in Oxford Street.
I suppose what struck me so much driving up Redcliffe Gardens was how little it has changed in 20 years. I am a totally different creature, with children and published books and an unhealthy obsession with Chelsea football club. But London is almost identical. Maybe that is one of the reasons I feel so at home there.
We started our visit at Stamford Bridge, where we watched Newcastle beat Chelsea, funnily enough with a great friend of mine from the time I lived in Redcliffe Gardens. Leo and I spent Friday morning on the Stamford Bridge tour, and Saturday at the FA Cup Final. In between we shopped (Peter Jones, another example of how London remains the same), saw friends and went to the National Gallery and the Freud exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery. An ideal five days. Leo was weeping when we left and asking how soon we can go back. I have booked him into the Chelsea Soccer School in July, so we will be there then at least. But if I can sneak in a visit back home beforehand, I will.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2012


Filed Under: Chelsea FC, Life, blog --> Tagged With: london, weekend

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Helena Frith Powell was born in Sweden to a Swedish mother and Italian father, but grew up mainly in England. She is the author of eleven books, translated into several languages including Chinese and Russian. She wrote the French Mistress column The Sunday Times about life in France for several years. She is a regular contributor to the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Tatler Magazine and Harper’s Bazaar.

Helena has been the editor of four magazines, including M Magazine, a supplement for the Abu Dhabi-based National Newspaper and FIVE, a high-end fashion glossy, also published in Abu Dhabi. Helena was also editor-in-chief of 360 Life, a quarterly glossy magazine published with the Sports 360 Newspaper in Dubai, part of the Chalhoub Group.

Helena contributes regularly to UK-based newspapers and magazines and holds a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Cambridge. She is working on a thriller set in Sweden as well as a novel about the relationship between Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield called Sense of an Echo.

In 2022 her short story The Japanese Gardener came second in the Fish Publishing Short Story Prize. One of her stories was also shortlisted for the Bridport Short Story Prize. When she’s not writing, she works as a headhunter for the media and entertainment industry for the Sucherman Group. 

Helena, who was educated at Durham University, lives in the Languedoc region of France with her husband Rupert and their three children.

Bibliography

More France Please, we’re British; Gibson Square 2004

Two Lipsticks and a Lover 2005; Gibson Square (hardback)

All You Need to be Impossibly French; (US version of above) Penguin 2006

Two Lipsticks and a Lover; Arrow Books (paperback) 2007

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (hardback) 2006

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (paperback) 2007

So Chic! (French version of Two Lipsticks) Leduc Editions 2008 (also translated into Chinese, Russian and Thai)

More, More France; Gibson Square 2009

To Hell in High Heels; Arrow Books 2009 (also translated into Polish)

The Viva Mayr Diet; Harper Collins 2009

Love in a Warm Climate; Gibson Square 2011

The Ex-Factor; Gibson Square 2013

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles; Gibson Square 2016

The Arnolfini Marriage; Amazon Kindle December 2016

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles (paperback); Gibson Square spring 2018

The Longest Night; Gibson Square spring 2019

 

 

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