Shrimpy Balfour

Shrimpy Balfour is co-owner of the rainbo street food van, money from which goes to their Food for Freedom initiative, rescuing child labourers in Nepal

Something wonderfully and brilliantly provincial is happening in force right now in London: the Saturday market is back. Communities across the capital are ditching their local supermarkets, meeting likeminded neighbours and indulging in a lazy cup of freshly brewed coffee while they're at it.

Polly Courtney

Novelist and champion of the underdog

The real issue is that publishers make some terrible assumptions about what men and women like to read (or ought to read). In an attempt to capitalise on the dwindling 'mass market' they have carved the reading population up by demographic and crudely assumed that each 'segment' is a homogenous group with similar tastes.

Planet Ivy

News for the bored generation

It's really quite sad if you think about it; not so long ago, Baz Luhrmann was the darling of Hollywood, a breath of fresh air in an increasingly formulaic industry. Audiences aren't so easily distracted these days by shiny colours and slick cinematography. More and more, they crave inner beauty over outer beauty. And perhaps it is that Baz Luhrmann hasn't quite realised this yet.

Orlando Seale

Actor and musician

Time travel was invented for festivals like How The Light Gets In (HTLGI). It's a maddeningly exciting place. Maddening because there's so much to see, hear, and taste, more than even the greediest of festival-goers could swallow, more than it seems possible to fit into one festival.

Robert Peake

American poet living in England

The truth is, the modern world we live in does not appreciate poetry. Not like it ought to, not like you and I do. We get it. We eagerly await that new journal or book of poems, smuggle it like contraband into our grey morning commute.

Roisin Curran

Student journalist at the University of Limerick, Part time beauty columnist, currently on Erasmus in Malta

Whether you come for the culture, the shopping, the parties or even just the weather, you won't return home unsatisfied.The surprising aspects of Maltese life will have you in their hooks from the word go, just give the unique Island a chance - before everyone else discovers what its capable of.

Robert McNamee

Architect and now Director of the Electronic Enlightenment Project

Spring 2013 marks two significant anniversaries for Alexander Pope, perhaps the most representative and alien English poet of the 18th Century.

Sara Bran

Catching the Comet's Tail

Ben is a master of the kind of acute observation of family life that has you pondering the deeper significance of the type of breakfast cereal your spouse prefers.

John Worne

Director of Strategy, the British Council

But in these austere times she also asked for better evidence of the value of culture. In short, her point was that if we want UK Government to continue investing in culture - as public spending gets the squeeze - we in the cultural industries need to demonstrate a return on that investment

Ben Gregor

Film Director and Dad

So your kid likes acting and singing and wants to be famous? You want them to be the next Harry Potter? Justin Bieber? Well, as a film director I have to say that the first thing you need to do is... STOP!

Jenni Calder

Scottish literary historian, poet, novelist

Can we separate thinking from being? I'd suggest that thinking, rational and irrational, is part of being, that thinking implies language, and that language is a primary instrument for giving expression to sensation and experience.

Tom Ward

British writer and graduate of Newcastle University, recently named the recipient of the Norman Mailer Student Writing Award 2012, in conjunction with British GQ

University introduced me to writers I would never have read of my own accord. Sam Selvon, Angela Carter, Ballard etc etc. By now I was actively searching out writers. I loved Buk, so wanted to read Fante and Celine. McCarthy was a hero and Patrick DeWitt filled the gap that McCarthy's long-awaited next novel is sure to fill.

Dr Michael Petry

Artist, curator and author, director of MOCA London

The gentle line of her candy coloured watercolours clash against the harshness of her themes to great effect. She says "The images, which reflect our cultures of masculinity and femininity collide with transgendered realities"...

Kate Lawson

Fashion Editor & Style/Pop Culture Writer

The exhibition of all exhibitions (in my humble opinion) is coming to Somerset House this autumn, in a celebration of the work of the late great Isabella Blow - the enigmatic fashion editor, consultant, muse, nurturer of young fashion talent and style icon.

Bianca Brigitte Bonomi

Journalist and event organiser

Vitrine Bermondsey Street's latest exhibition features new paintings by John Walter and encapsulates the ornate, bold and iconoclastic vision of his maximalist aesthetic.

Bianca Brigitte Bonomi

Journalist and event organiser

A recent exhibition of what organisers have termed the University of the Arts London's 'brightest and best students' has provided a refreshing and necessary glimpse into some of the artists likely to play a significant role in the future of British art.