Dolly

Dolly
Alderton is an award-winning writer, director and podcast
host. She was a dating columnist for The Sunday Times Style from
2015 to 2017, and still writes for The Times and The Sunday Times.
In between teaming up with
Pandora Sykes for their podcast The High Low, she regularly
writes for publications such as GQ, Marie Clare and The Spectator.
Her first book, “Everything I Know About Love” was released in
January 2018 and her podcast Love Stories, released in conjunction
with her book, has already risen to the top of the charts.

We called on Dolly‘s experience with dating to help us find love in
London. Here,
she explains why a bench at the foot of a hill is preferable to any
overpriced outdoor cinema, where she’d like her next sleepover to
be and one place where finding love is definitely not as realistic
as it sounds…

Which is the most clichéd spot for romance in London?

The bank opposite The Houses of Parliament. I used to work in a
production company in County Hall and nothing made me feel gloomier
than the conveyer belt of couples who were having their engagement
photos taken there that I passed on my way to the office.

And a place where you genuinely feel the love?

The bench at the summit of Primrose Hill. Heavenly.

The best location you’ve even been to for a date is…?

The aforementioned bench.

And the absolute worst?

I mean, there’s at least one location in every borough of London
where I’ve had a bad date; but don’t know how much of an uplifting
read that list would be so instead I will answer with my most
inventive first date: the boy who took me on a walking tour of
Camden’s rock ‘n’ roll history in the depths of winter. It was me,
him, a Spanish couple and an enthusiastic American tour guide who
tagged along for our drink afterwards.

Which neighbourhood do you find the most romantic?

Hampstead. It’s where the romantic poets were inspired to
write.

You can always count on finding loved-up couples at…

Any overpriced London outdoor cinema event. I blame it on all
that grass they can showily roll around on.

Your favourite place to buy flowers?

Columbia Road on Sunday morning before a bowl of pasta and a
glass of wine at Campania and Jones. Or Wild At Heart at
Liberty. They often sell camomile, which is my favourite flower
(by a lucky coincidence, this also makes me quite a cheap woman to
seduce).

The dream hotel for a sleepover is…

Claridge’s. I mean, I’ve never stayed the night
there, but a girl can dream.

Where would you go to escape the city for the weekend?

Babington House for a treat. That’s cliched and
predictable isn’t it? I can’t help it, I love it there. It’s the
free scones.

One myth about dating in London that you’d like to dispel?

That people meet in galleries. When I hear single women say: “I
am opening myself up to meeting people, I’m going to art
exhibitions”, I want to say: “Unless you would like to go out with
a 60-something woman in a pair of dangly peridot earrings and a
William Morris print tote bag or a French school boy, you’ll have
no luck there pal, trust me.”