When she’s not checking out the swankiest hotels as the editor-in-chief of Mr & Mrs Smith and newly launched, Smith and Family, Juliet Kinsman can be found in Kensal Rise, where she lives with her partner Simon and daughter Kitty. Her passion for her neighbourhood is evident through her popular hyper-local blog Park-Life.org — the go-to source for news, events and general musings about the Kensal Rise and Queens Park area.
She is also the producer of the Kensal Flea — a must-do shopping experience for urban treasure hunters. Her handpicked collection of local businesses and artisans at the flea market once again reflect her love of her community. The Christmas edition of the Kensal Flea is on November 30th at Paradise by Way of Kensal Green.
WLM recently caught up with Juliet:
We’re sure you get asked all the time, but how do you juggle it all?
Ha! I do three days or so with my Mr & Mrs Smith editor-in-chief hat on (although I never really take it off), and then I’m also a freelance travel writer, I do some hotel consultancy work and in those ever-elusive spare moments I try keep my finger on the pulse on what’s happening in Queen’s Park and Kensal Rise for my blog Park-Life.org.
Generally I’m a pretty good at multitasking with lots of energy (I drink too much coffee)…But if life throws an unexpected curveball like last week when my Macbook hard drive died on me and it properly throws things off kilter. I genuinely hate not replying to each and every email I get properly but when you get 300 a day about so many different things and people it is like pushing water upstream. Social media has probably made things worse – get easily distracted, plus we think technology has ramped up the volume of emails we all end up having to process, either replying to them sloppily on the hoof or accidentally deleting altogether via my smartphone.
What inspired you to start your blog Park-Life?
Chatting to Sally Wilton, the founder of the Lexi Cinema, about how in need of bras the South African women were in Lynedoch Village, a community near Cape Town which the Lexi Cinema supports through the Sustainability Institute. So we launched a campaign via Park Life’s first-ever blog post calling for people to donate bras.
I wanted to create a hub for locals to chat to each other and find out about local heroes and happenings and support local businesses such as this very special social enterprise of a picture house.
What is one local issue you’d love to see addressed?
Just one? The issue I work hard to promote myself is boosting community spirit – or Ubuntu, which I learned about when volunteering in South Africa – and hopefully my blog and Kensal Flea, which returns to the Paradise on Saturday 30 November, help. It’s a great day where local makers and creatives to flaunt their wares in a truly beautiful pub, and locals come for a browse, a gossip and to buy their often locally made or upcycled Christmas presents.
Kensal is celebrated for its unique village-like feel, but it would be nice if more tribes mingled, with young spending more time with the elderly, and us all experiencing the kaleidoscope of cultures on our doorstep. I loved the Algerian cookery classes this summer run by the Algerian National Centre at the now defunct Albert. And finally, sorry to sound like Victor Meldrew, but something our neighbourhood also really needs is dog owners cleaning up after their pooches. The Council needs to do more than stick up a few stickers threatening a fine — they need to enforce it.
Where is your favourite place to hang out with your family in west London?
Minkie’s Deli where we say hi to local lynchpin Doron and order Jack’s first-class flat whites, and bump into friends and neighbours. The Lexi Cinema’s kids club at 10.30am on Saturdays. For eggs Florentine on a Sunday morning, the Tabernacle in Notting Hill is great to cosy up in with the papers in winter, and the café in the Wallace Collection where you can also have a nose around the rococo room on the way out and also try and figure out the use of some of the bonkers antiques. The imaginative menu at Parlour is fun for out-of-town visitors although not especially child-friendly. If there are ever food trucks parked up at St John the Evangelist Church you’ll usually find us there – like recently organised by the Paradise for their Harvest Festival. Booking a visit in to say hello to all the cats and dogs rescued by the Mayhew Animal Home always a great outing for pet lovers!
You’ve recently launched Smith and Family – where are your top destinations to travel with kids?
We had a tremendous wholesome family holiday this summer on the Swedish island of Gotland this summer thanks to my friend Jules McKeen who set up Peaks of London suggesting we stayed in the superbly stylish farmhouse Jakobs Gotland. I love Italy and Thailand in particular because they’re just so smiley and friendly to children, even your whippersnappers are, shall we say, ‘spirited’ little blighters.
We had a glorious time at La Bandita Townhouse earlier this summer in Pienza, Tuscany, a really chic guesthouse with an excellent restaurant where we could sit at the counter and watch the chef make every dish. Somewhere I’d love to holiday at as a family is Masseria Torre Coccaro in Puglia. It has gardens galore to explore, a private beach club and a yacht for charter as well as a lake-style swimming pool with lifeguard and also a spa and a cookery school in a 17th-century chapel where you can take pizza-making lessons.
Where is your favourite romantic getaway?
If I were to take truth serum I’d probably admit my other half and I aren’t the most romantic! But we do love a mini-break, naturally…Cliveden House, Chewton Glen and Lucknam Park have all the heart-stirring qualities adults could want from luxury country-house hotels (first-class restaurant, award-winning spa) plus five-star facilities for kids too including glorious grounds and swimming pools.
What are your top three travel essentials?
1. Smart phone: I love documenting my travels and saving those memories in cyberspace and sharing tips via Instagram and Twitter and Pinterest.
2. My oversized Lily and Lionel scarf from Love KR is ideal, created by another lovely local Alice Stone: especially great for dealing with unpredictable airplane temperatures, and is as elemental to summer beach breaks as winter city escapes.
3. A book! I have a Kindle but I much prefer a paperback. I really recommend Laetitia Rutherford’s Our Hearts Hang from the Lemon Trees, her just-published moving memoirs of growing up in Notting Hill and summer holidaying in the South of France — a touching portrayal of how an eccentric, educated family can lurch from edifying to soul-crushing to precious. Book lovers, please also watch this space for Social Book Week, happening next May 5–12, a week of sociable author events all over London to support the Reading Agency’s mission of encouraging confident and enthusiastic reading among all: come and get a taste when Richard Kilgarriff hosts a children’s storytelling room at the Kensal Flea this November.
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Photo credit: Rachel Juarez-Carr.
