Optima Magazine

• Books
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• Exhibitions
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• Music
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  • (Re)Discover St Albans
  • A Pocketful Of Rye
  • A Snapshot Of Reel Life
  • A Spire To Aspire To…
  • Aristocrats At Home
  • Canons & Du Cros In The Spotlight
  • Cavalry Charge
  • Courtiers, Queens & Rolling Stones
  • Easter AwayDays
  • Eccentric Owners & Old Masters
  • Exhibition Islam In The Spotlight
  • Far Over The Misty Mountains Cold
  • Flicker Of Sunlight
  • Flying With The Few – And The Many
  • Hold Very Tight, Please
  • In An English Country Garden
  • Knights Of The Air
  • Lady Gilbert's Gardens
  • London Landmarks
  • News From Nowhere
  • Rural Utopia
  • The Chiltern Way Walking Festival
  • The Cream Of The Crop
  • The Finest Town In England?
  • Tom Craven In The Spotlight
  • Walking Into History
  • Welcome To Hogwarts
  • Woodland Interlude
• Sport
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Our First Child by Washington Musonza

• In An English Country Garden 11 May 12

  Borde Hill Garden, near Haywards Heath in West Sussex, has been described by Country Life as ‘one of the country’s truly great gardens’. Roughly an hour and a half away from the heart of the... Read More

• Welcome To Hogwarts 30 Mar 12

  The countdown to the long-awaited Warner Bros Studio Tour: The Making Of Harry Potter is at its eleventh hour as I write. On the afternoon of Saturday 31 March, the latest chapter in the amazing... Read More

• (Re)Discover St Albans 30 Mar 12

  The Cathedral and Abbey Church of Saint Alban dominates the skyline, as it has done for over 900 years. Its imposing façade and dramatic rooflines root the city firmly in the past; this is a place... Read More

• Rural Utopia 21 Oct 11

  We southerners are apt to underplay the glories of our landscape. It’s as if we have an inferiority complex, knowing that even the best of our natural beauties – the intimate beechwoods of the... Read More

• Woodland Interlude 26 Aug 11

  Between Abbots Langley and Hemel Hempstead stands the ‘blink and you’ll miss it’ village of Bedmond. With a population of under two thousand, two general shops and one pub, even on the High... Read More

• London Landmarks 8 Jul 11

  The French poet Baudelaire had a word for the person who ‘walked the streets of the city in order to experience it’: the flâneur. I’ve always fancied myself to be one, if a little detached... Read More

• Lady Gilbert's Gardens 10 Jun 11

  There’s a delightful timelessness about the Grim’s Dyke gardens. Sitting on the terrace of the hotel, with the sound of the birds and the movement of the wind in the trees, the natural world... Read More

• Easter AwayDays 15 Apr 11

  It isn’t always easy getting the balance right between family fun and downtime, but if you’re stuck for activities for your youngsters this Easter the answer could be CAYDA Day Camps, running... Read More

• Exhibition Islam In The Spotlight 21 Jan 11

  The show has been devised and prepared by historian Jahan Mahmood, a Birmingham University lecturer who runs workshops tackling radicalism and aiding the construction of a British Muslim identity, and... Read More

• The Cream Of The Crop 5 Nov 10

  When the name Howard Jacobson was announced as winner of the 2010 Man Booker prize on 12 October, few people (apart from the publisher and the author himself) can have been more delighted than the... Read More