Author name: David Parkin

AFTER last week’s photographs of the unfinished construction work at Leeds station, I make no apology for this image of a beautiful creation. No, not me, the jacket I’m wearing in the photo above alongside the Michelangelo of tailoring, James Michelsberg. “The Baron”, as he is colloquially known, has created a new garment for me […]

THE development around Leeds railway station continues apace. I’d say there should be more emphasis put on the word “continues” rather than “apace”. Work is continuing at the front and back of the station. If you don’t know which is the front and which is the back then I’d recommend you don’t ask the brains

WATCH out, watch out – there’s a Humphrey about. Do you remember that tagline from TV adverts for milk in the 1970s? I didn’t think you would. It was used by dairy Unigate to promote its doorstep deliveries of bottled milk. A “Humphrey” was a mysterious figure that kept drinking people’s milk through long striped

WHAT do you call 16,000 property professionals when they converge on a city for a major conference? Well, in my experience, anything you like, because they are too busy striding boldly through the city tugging wheelie cases and bellowing into mobile phones or talking loudly to each other about what deals they are about to

I KNOW Frank Sinatra’s original Rat Pack had a reputation as hellraisers but I didn’t expect their modern day tribute act to be quite the same. However news reaches me that the Rat Pack tribute act that I booked for the lunch to celebrate the life of Leeds lawyer Rodney Dalton have been at the

WELL that didn’t take long. Two years after the latest Gino D’Acampo-branded restaurant opened in Leeds, the hospitality firm behind it has done a pre-pack administration deal to shed a load of debt. The Leeds restaurant opened inside the Marriott Hotel off Boar Lane in 2023 with a £1.5m investment and “feature’s” (that is their punctuation, not

IT was just like it used to be. Big hitters in a restaurant, doing deals, swapping war stories and laughing uproariously. Garry Wilson and Darren Forshaw of Endless held a drinks event yesterday to celebrate their move to become joint chairs of the private equity firm they founded 20 years ago. In that two decades

JUST like that! Although, given my new glasses, perhaps I should say “Waay hey!” as Eric Morecambe often exclaimed while waggling them about. His specs, I mean. Having been to a performance of the comedy play The Last Laugh in London a few weeks ago the most apt phrase that is associated with Morecambe and Wise that

I PARTICULARLY like this photo above. Not because it shows me in action hosting a political question time event for candidates bidding to be the next mayor of a major English region. No, I’m very partial to it because a trick of the light makes it look like I’ve got a fringe…for the first time

YES, you read that headline right. It is one in the eye for the cynics among you who thought my only celebrity story involved Arnold Schwarzenegger. You see, I’m not a one-trick pony. More a dancing monkey with hidden depths. Hollywood star Val Kilmer’s death this week at the age of 65 brought back memories