Trip to London

I recently had cause to go to London for a reason connected to my MA, which was an evening event, but I got a train that got me into Kings Cross just before 2pm, so I decided to have a little trek round and visit some stationery stores. I consulted google and found this post which was very helpful. I wanted to go to Chinatown market as I've never been, and I also wanted to go to Muji and Artbox. I was also told on Twitter to visit the Japan Centre.

I drew myself a map the night before and wrote down the addresses of where I needed to be in case I got lost and had to ask someone or use googlemaps. When I got to Kings Cross I got the tube to Piccadilly and came up just opposite the Japan Centre.

It's mostly food which isn't really my thing, but they do have Japanese books and magazines and a bunch of origami papers. I bought some Hello Kitty origami on the far left of the above picture.

I walked along to Chinatown market where I first had some lunch and then went inside the market to a place called Mr Panda. They had lots of stuff but some of it was quite pricey. I bought some stickers and some envelopes. I also found a Hello Kitty concession where I bought a new case for my phone.

I came out the Charing Cross road side of the market and walked along Long Acre to Muji. There's tons of shops along there if that's your thing. I like the 0.7mm gel pens from Muji and use them for work and I was running low on black and red so I ducked in there to buy some more.

I had a little rest on the steps of Covent Garden tube station, which is currently exit only while they do some work. It's the world's tiniest station and has 52465456 steps from the platform to the street and the world's worst lift to use instead.

I was a bit unsure where Artbox was, and came across a shop called Tea Palace where I decided my friend Gillian would benefit from a gift from. The salesman was really helpful (especially since I hate tea!) so I'd recommend it if you are into tea. Prices were reasonable, I felt.

I found Artbox, it's inside a little mall. The shop has a really nice feel to it and everything is set out nicely and clearly priced. I had a bit of spending money that was a gift, so I bought a few lettersets and cute notebooks that you can see above. They had a nice sale section, too.

As I was wondering next, I found a nice pedestrianised area where people were sitting on a roundabout in the middle of the street. There was an ice cream van so I bought myself an ice cream with a flake and sat in the sunshine!

It was a lovely day of doing what I wanted, and I was also impressed that I managed to navigate myself without getting lost or freaking out with anxiety!