Forget pop-ups, this summer it's all about float-ups in London
There was a time when bike cafés were the in place to go. You’d cycle down to your local on your fixie bike and hang out with the other cycling enthusiasts over a flat white. But no more.
It’s time to make way for the canoe café. The people behind Moo Canoes, London’s first canoe hire provider with a shed in Limehouse, are dreaming big and hope to set up the world’s first floating canoe hire café. They raised money on crowdfunding website Kickstarter and are currently refurbishing the boat. Eventually it will become a canoe-hire centre and Fifties-style milk bar, serving ice-cream sundaes, milkshakes and home-made hot dogs. If Moo Canoes opens on schedule, Londoners will be able to go on river tours of the capital this summer in cow-printed canoes (moocanoes.com).
But the canoe café is not the only floating business taking over the Thames. Book-lovers should climb aboard Word on the Water, the London Bookbarge. Moored up at the canal exit at Paddington station is a Dutch barge, filled to the brim with books. Squeezed into the narrowboat are second-hand classics, contemporary fiction and children’s books. They make full use of space, even holding live events such as acoustic music and readings on the roof (facebook.com/wordonthewater).
If you fancy yourself a city booze cruise, Vestal Vodka’s Vestal Voyages (vestalvoyages.com) should be your first port of call. You’ll set off from King’s Cross on a 50ft cruiser and make your way to Islington, all the while sipping delicious cocktails.
With the year’s earlier floods and water levels on the rise, maybe it’s a good time for London entrepreneurs to take advantage of the Thames. If last summer was about the pop-up, this summer looks set to be about the float-up.
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