Live Like A Local

Tanya Maher of trending raw restaurant Tanya's cafe enjoys London's mix of cafes, garden shops and tourist attractions. She shares her favourite spots with us below.

Holland Park
It's only a 30-minute walk from my house so I'm there a lot. Even on the days that the peacocks are all hiding, they seem to come out for me. I'm convinced I was a peacock in a previous life. Once, I counted 23 of them there. I feel so at home in this beautiful, uplifting park that it's not only my favourite in London, it is my favourite ever.

Canal walk
Anytime someone comes to visit, I take them for my favourite stroll along the canal. We start at Warwick Avenue and end in Camden Lock. You get a good grasp on the diversity of London life by seeing the house boats, Regent's Park mansions, cute cafes, markets and even the zoo, which you can walk through.

The Chelsea Gardener
I really am not much of a shopper, but I love homeware stores and garden shops, especially The Chelsea Gardener. It's next to the Chelsea Farmers Market and is where I spent a major part of my budget on opening Tanya's first cafe. It's full of fresh local and exotic living plants, tasteful furniture and rustic indoor garden gifts.

Buckingham Palace
When we first got to London, we went attraction crazy but my highlight still remains the same. During the summer 17 rooms and the garden path of Buckingham Palace open up to visitors and you can take the guided tour to learn about how the royals live. It held my undivided attention for hours.

Cafes
You can probably live your whole life in London and visit a new cafe every day. There's no shortage of these and it's amazing to see how many healthy alternatives are popping up all over town. I love artistic spots like Sketch, very British places like Bumpkin, ones with garden vibes like Megan's, rustic like Jak's and hippy like inSpiral Lounge. When creating my own cafe, these restaurants were a huge inspiration and call me biased, but I do believe that Tanya's cafe is now the happiest and healthiest place to work, eat or meet friends.

• Read more about Tanya's here

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