August is always a busy month for me with the day-job (it’s now Clearing time in the UK University I work for in case you were wondering… it eats all my time), but its gotten rather hectic for all things VCG too. I’ve been unable to blog until now as I’m playing MAJOR catch-up with plenty of bike-related matters at the moment… but believe me, I’m not complaining! Anything to do with bikes makes me happy… There has been more work with The Cycle Show on ITV4: it has been an absolute blast working with the team on there for the past few weeks and meeting a wide variety of cyclists along […]

Cherries on Cupcakes and Icing on Cookies High-heels on Pedals and Skirts sat on Brooksies Baskets with Flowers and Ding-Dong Bell rings These are a few of my favourite things… My love affair with cycling, fashion, coffee & cakes is more than apparent on my blog, but when someone decided to pick-up on this and create something beautiful from it, my heart skipped a million beats at once! I was rather excited when Alyssa Ramsey of Arcobaleno Jewellery Design contacted me about designing two bespoke pieces. The only clues were they would be related to the blog & my personality: I wasn’t told what they were going to be, so […]

I’ve fallen in love with cycling early on crisp winter mornings… they are the perfect weather setting for the darker months: cool & fresh air in your lungs, bright skies and a sense of peace and quiet all around you. You get to take in a bit more of this crazy-busy city when it’s quiet – like being able to stop and take shots like this of the ever changing London Skyline & not be disturbed! The slight chill in the air is also a great opportunity to layer-up… and who says you have to wear drab colours in the winter? Me and my chosen Cycle Wardrobe for the day certainly didn’t agree […]

Before these dark evenings started drawing in and the temperature started to drop, me and The Boy met up with our friend Simon a few weeks ago for a CycleSunday afternoon ride around Surbiton. We’d been wanting to do this for ages as Surbiton is Simon’s cycling-ground, and he sure knows the place! He planned out a wonderful tour of the area, including two of my favourite things – Coffee & Cakes… and an unexpected encounter with a famous resident of Bushy Park… En route to Kingston we made two stops that were definitely reflective of our interests! 1st one was for The Boy. He needed to make a Rib-Stop on Brick Lane (he will explain this […]

 What do you get when you cross the opportunity to ride around one of the nicest boroughs in London with the chance to eat some rather lovely cakes? A lot of keen cyclists attending the first public BikemindedRBKC Cake & Coffee Cruise! After the success of the inaugural ride for invited Bloggers, me and The Boy* attended the public ride last Saturday. Tickets sold out for the event which was brilliant news! It was fantastic to see such a huge turn out for the ride (and Super-Kathryn above, checking them all in) especially knowing what an absolute treat everyone was going to get for their £5… The meeting-point for the day was of course Pedlars for […]

 After all the ideas and planning, the inaugural BikemindedRBKC Cake & Coffee Cruise took place on the 24th September. Having taken part in the practice-cycle with Kathryn a few weeks ago, I was very excited about how the event would go with the group of invited cyclists & bloggers on the day. The Boy* and I arrived at Pedlars which was the meeting place for the Cruise, and were welcomed by a scene of bicycles & a lot of chic looking cyclists! Beautiful sunshine and smiles appeared to be the order of the day as we had a meet-and-greet session outside over some Flat Whites with our fellow riders. This was a […]

Last month I met with Kathryn of BikemindedRBKC to discuss working together on ideas for future cycling projects. Plenty of progress has happened since that excellent meeting, and the first project to come from it will be the Kensington & Chelsea Cake & Coffee Cruise! The C&CC will be a cycle cruise to some of the Royal Borough’s Cafés, with the chance to sample some of the best Coffee & Cakes on offer with a degustation menu being specially arranged for the ride… including a very special luxury foodie stop along the way. With the various Coffee-Stops confirmed by Kathryn & the Bikeminded team, the next step was to get together for a […]

A few weeks ago The Boy and I were invited to join our friend & Photographer Paul Winch-Furness for lunch at Melograno, a lovely Deli in Holland Park where he was working for the day. Of all my Coffee-Cycle Days, this would be my most epic one to date! Having never cycled from Newham to Kensington, I loaded up the route on Google Maps and had it ready to go on my iPhone. The usual CS3 journey was fine: we broke away from it and followed the route Google had plotted. Along the way, there was the chance to take in some sights: cycling along Embankment, through a traffic free Mall & past Buckingham […]

It’s always rather nice when like-minded cyclists come together, and because of that some exciting things are in the pipeline here at Vélo-City-Girl… I’m currently working with Bikeminded on a fabulous new project! Bikeminded is a fantastic campaign by the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It’s a cycling resource for residents and aims to encourage more residents of the Borough to get on two wheels and experience more of the area (a brilliant example of this being their recently launched ‘Bike Heros‘ project). I cycled to Nude Espresso on Hanbury Street to meet-up with the lovely Kathryn of Bikeminded a couple of weeks ago to discuss ideas for the project, which I’m very excited to say […]

Last weekend saw the 1st CoffeeCycleSaturday Ride: saddle up on a Saturday, have a brew at some of the best Coffee Houses in town and enjoy the ride & anything that happens along the way. The Boy planned the route, marking off the Coffee Stops for the day. We set off early and cycled towards Bermondsey. There was a slight delay getting there, thanks to Tower Bridge doing this… I’d never seen this in action before, even though I’ve lived in London all my life! I have to be a geek and admit that this was pretty cool to watch. Bridge down, we made it south of the river and met Simon for […]

There is a wonderful relationship between Cycling and Coffee. This is something that makes me rather happy… especially when it’s a combination of beautiful bikes and a beautiful brew 🙂  I attended the first CoffeeSaturday Pop-Up event at Prufrock Coffee last weekend, with The Boy*. We didn’t cycle there, as I was still slightly under the weather & he needed to get his Speculoos for the Bake-Off there in one piece! However, in between sampling all the biscuits and drinking lovely coffee throughout the day, I did manage to do a lot of Bicycle spotting: in the window of Prufrock Coffee locked-up on Leather Lane in the window of Department of Coffee and Social […]