When The Days Are Long In London, All Roads Lead To Bicester Village
Less than an hour from Marylebone, the Oxfordshire icon promises a summer of elevated fashion, dreamy open-air dining and the full sporting season
A short train ride from London Marylebone (46 minutes to be precise), brings us to Bicester Village. This summer we’re making our way there to update our staples, soak up a season of sport and savour the pop-ups and supper clubs animating the lawns.
It is, of course, the fashion that famously draws most to Bicester Village, with permanent boutiques spanning Dior, Gucci, Saint Laurent, Prada, Miu Miu, Celine, Fendi, Bottega Veneta, Balenciaga and Loewe, and shoes and accessories from Christian Louboutin, Jimmy Choo, Roger Vivier and Aquazzura. British heritage is well represented through McQueen, Burberry, Mulberry and Barbour, while contemporary labels such as Sandro and Maje are among recent arrivals. Beauty and scent are abundant too; a top-up at Jo Malone and Charlotte Tilbury are always on the agenda.
A day in the village is, however, increasingly defined by the dining as much as the shopping. A date for the diary is 31 July, when Berenjak, the lively Soho Persian restaurant known for its open-fire cooking and near-impossible reservations, takes over Cecconi’s for a one-night supper club. International Brand Chef Shwan Baban leads the evening with a family-style menu centred around his much-loved lamb machboos, a dish rooted in his heritage, in addition to charcoal-cooked kashk e bademjoon.
Friday evenings welcome the weekend with live music across the terraces and later hours at the restaurants, with Ottolenghi, La Tua Pasta and Cecconi’s serving in turn throughout the season. A satisfying day’s shopping gives way to a slow summer evening under the last of the light. On 26 June, The Duke’s Summer Garden opens on the lawns with a quirky drinks bar built into a converted Land Rover Defender, its own signature Paloma and an outdoor screen showing Wimbledon and Formula 1. Programming leans into the British summer calendar: Humble Crumble adds a strawberries-and-cream version timed to Wimbledon fortnight, the most English of pairings, while Fortnum & Mason, a name synonymous with the rituals of the season for more than three centuries, brings in a soft-serve menu to cool-down tense afternoons watching tennis and racing.
Sport runs through the fashion as much as the screens. Tommy Hilfiger’s Cadillac F1 collection arrives with a photobooth and race simulator. Lacoste marks Roland-Garros, Ralph Lauren releases a Wimbledon capsule, Arc’teryx shows its trail-running line and ELEMIS pairs its skincare with the world of F1, so whether the day is built around a grand prix, a grand slam or a long walk in the hills, there is a corner of the village that captures it.
A fond favourite from the streets of Marylebone arrives too. Shreeji News, the locally loved newsagent whose shelves of international titles have earned a devoted following among London’s creative set, is launching its first satellite newsstand at the village. Grab a glossy, settle back on the grass and bask in the summer at Bicester Village.
For more information, visit thebicestercollection.com
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