9 minute read
Win A group getaway on board the Camillia Boatel
The Four Sisters Boatels have recently launched their latest widebeam canal barge accommodation, The Camillia Boatel, and to celebrate its opening we are giving away a two-night stay on board for up to eight adults, including a bottle of Prosecco on arrival.
Permanently moored in Lochrin Basin on the Union Canal, The Camillia Boatel is tucked away in a quiet pocket of the city centre and offers the perfect space for you and your friends or family to reconnect and relax while rediscovering Edinburgh.
Float to sleep in one of her three beautifully dressed cabins including a deluxe Captain’s Cabin, a double cabin room, a set of adult bunk beds in a separate cabin plus a double sofa bed. There is also a large shower room on board with eco-friendly toiletries as well as complimentary slippers and luxury bathrobes. The open plan kitchen lounge area is fully equipped with modern amenities and the entire boat has all of the modern tech necessary for a comfortable stay, including unlimited smart streaming.
TO ENTER
For your chance to win an overnight stay for up to eight at The Camillia Boatel, visit ionedinburgh.com by noon on Monday 19 July and leave your details. The winner will be notified by email and announced in the next edition of i-on. To find out more, visit thefoursisters.co.uk
Terms and conditions: The prize must be claimed within 12 months and booked directly. The stay cannot be booked for August or the two weeks over Christmas and New Year. Guests must adhere to government guidelines.
What we’re talking about this summer
Keith Haring mural at Palladium, New York, 1985. © Timothy Hursley, Garvey|Simon Gallery New York
THE EXHIBITION YOU WON’T WANT TO MISS…
V&A Dundee’s latest show is a glitter-spangled tribute to club culture
Charting the evolution of nightclubs from the 1960s to today, Night Fever: Designing Club Culture is the first largescale examination of the relationship between club culture and design – and it couldn’t have come at a more poignant time when we’re all looking towards the future, hoping for a chance to dance together again.
Featuring the likes of Studio 54, New York’s decadent celebrity haunt, and Manchester’s notorious Haçienda, which birthed the ‘Madchester’ and acid house movements, the exhibition includes films, photography, posters, flyers, and fashion, as well as a light and music installation, and considers how nightclub design has changed and developed.
Always radical and experimental, club design employs architecture, art, fashion, graphics, lighting, performance and sound to create an immersive sensory experience where design, music and technology meet on the dancefloor. Let’s hope we can do the same soon too.
Until January 2022 at vam.ac.uk/dundee/nightfever
DJ Larry Levan in Paradise Garage, New York, 1979. © Bill Bernstein, David Hill Gallery, London
An evening at the Space Electronic, Florence, 1971. Photo by Carlo Caldini, © Gruppo 9999
Guests in Conversation on a Sofa, Studio 54, New York, 1979. © Bill Bernstein, David Hill Gallery, London
Dance floor at Xenon, New York, 1979. © Bill Bernstein, David Hill Gallery, London
Grace Jones at ‘Confinement’ theme, Area, New York, 1984 © Volker Hinz
Sub Club SoundSystem at BAaD, Glasgow. Photo by Brian Sweeney
LIVE MUSIC IS BACK Three small festivals with all the feels
IN TOWN
Edinburgh Summer Sessions returns to the city from 06 to 15 August. Anne-Marie, Travis, Simple Minds, Tom Jones, Michael Kiwanuka, and DMA’s will all be taking to the stage under the epic shadow of Edinburgh Castle and we’ll be there ready to party. Tickets from £27.50 at www.smmrsessions.com
Anne-Marie
ON THE COAST
East Lothian’s Gosford House is the grand setting for Scotland’s hottest new music festival, OUT EAST. Taking place on 06 and 07 August, the family-friendly fest boasts an eclectic line-up featuring Clean Bandit, Sister Sledge, Tinchy Stryder, Callum Beattie, The Futureheads and a 34-piece Ministry of Sound classical orchestra. There will also be arts, culture, well-being workshops and a host of great food and drink offerings. www.outeastfest.co.uk
Michael Kiwanuka © Olivia Rose
IN THE COUNTRYSIDE
Dizzee Rascal, Sleaford Mods, and 10cc are just some of the acts who will headline at everyone’s favourite family festival, Doune the Rabbit Hole. Taking place from 15-18 August at Cardross Estate, they’ll join much-loved Scottish acts Camera Obscura, Teenage Fanclub and more. And you definitely won’t want to miss Charlotte Church’s Late Night Pop Dungeon for a dance, a sing and the chance to do your thing. www.dounetherabbithole.co.uk
REBUS IS… OUT OF OFFICE
Photography: Hamish Brown
SUPPORT YOUR INDIE BOOKSHOP
Independent Bookshop Week (from 19-26 June), brings a whole host of exciting literary events to the country’s muchloved indie bookshops. Here in Edinburgh, we’re blessed with many little gems including Lighthouse, ‘Edinburgh’s Radical Bookshop’ and Golden Hare Books in Stockbridge. There’s even some new kids on the block – like Portobello Bookshop which opened in 2019 and Ginger & Pickles children’s bookshop which opened last year, proving that even in the face of Amazon (and a pandemic), nothing quite beats a browse around your local bookshop. Make sure you show yours some love. He may be best known for Rebus, but Edinburgh-based author Ian Rankin spent his lockdown writing another famous fictional crime character: DI Laidlaw, Glasgow’s original maverick detective created by literary legend William McIlvanney.
Published from 1977, the Laidlaw trilogy changed the face of crime fiction and inspired many writers to enter the realm of ‘tartan noir’, including Rankin himself. The author remembers meeting his hero after queuing to get his copy of McIlvanney’s Whitbread prizewinning novel signed at the Edinburgh Book Festival. When Rankin excitedly blurted out his plans for the first Rebus book, McIlvanney inscribed the page “Good luck with the Edinburgh Laidlaw.”
Over the years, the two men stayed in touch and when McIlvanney died in 2015 and his wife, Siobhan, discovered an unfinished handwritten manuscript for a Laidlaw prequel, she immediately knew the best man to finish the job. “Ian is the writer Willie would have chosen,” she said.
Rankin was honoured but knew he had serious work to do, swotting up on the criminal underworld of 1970s Glasgow and learning to imitate the writing style of McIlvanney. “I’m a huge fan so I didn’t want to do him a disservice,” he explains. “I wanted the book to be as good as it possibly could be, as good as a Laidlaw novel. I owe him a huge debt, as pretty much every Scottish crime writer does – he’s the godfather, so you want it to be right. You want it to be his world, his story and his voice.”
The Dark Remains will be published by Canongate on 2 September 2021.
A GRAND ARRIVAL Inside Gleneagles’ new city hotel and members’ club
When the king of the Perthshire countryside decides to take a second residency in the heart of Edinburgh, everyone is bound to sit up and take notice. In case you didn’t already know, Gleneagles, the much-lauded five-star hotel, spa and resort, is opening a luxury city hotel and members’ club on St Andrew Square, and the doors are due to swing open this autumn.
In keeping with the luxurious style and elegance of the countryside hotel, Gleneagles Townhouse, in the former premises of Bank of Scotland, will ooze class and charisma. The townhouse will have 33 bedrooms, each with their own design and a clear nod to the building’s heritage, while the members’ club will have its own exclusive social spaces with a raft of carefully-curated events in place. Members will also gain exclusive access the rooftop bar on Fridays, priority booking at the all-day restaurant, and use of the members and residents-only wellness centre. The good news is that, every other day of the week, the rooftop terrace will be open for all to enjoy, with its sweeping views across the New Town and an extensive cocktails list. We can’t wait to savour a negroni at sunset…
www.gleneaglestownhouse.com
The Gleneagles resort in Perthshire
Inside the new rooftop bar and bedrooms at Gleneagles Townhouse
BEYOND THE GALLERY Three different places to see art…
IN A TAPESTRY STUDIO
Archie Brennan: Tapestry Goes Pop! is the first major retrospective of pop artist, weaver, and former Mr Scotland, Archie Brennan who changed the course of modern weaving and is considered one of the greatest unrecognised pop artists of the twentieth century. Why unrecognised? Most likely because his medium of choice was tapestry. The exhibition takes place at Edinburgh’s Dovecot Studios where Brennan began his 60year weaving career. Until 30 August 2021. www.dovecotstudios.com
ON YOUR SCREEN
When Edinburgh photographer Helen Pugh took a shot of her daughter painting a rainbow on their window she couldn’t have imagined that the Duchess of Cambridge would end up calling it one of her favourites but she was thrilled to learn it had been chosen as one of the final 100 images selected by the National Portrait Gallery and their royal patron for Hold Still, an ambitious community project to create a unique collective portrait of the UK during lockdown. See the exhibition online at www.npg.org.uk/hold-still/
IN THE WOODS
Nestled in the trees at Jupiter Artland, you’ll find the upside down world of Mimi, a cutesy yet creepy cartoon princess who exists behind the doors of an abandoned high street store. Created by Scottish artist Rachel Maclean, Mimi is a new permanent exhibit which is inspired by commercial shops as sites of desire, the dangerous, magical role forests play in fairytales, and the experiences of young adults in the shadow of the pandemic. www.jupiterartland.org
