MARYLEBONE
Bazaar’s guest editor Ravinder Bhogal shares fond memories of the central-London locale enlivened by its vibrant community
Iopened my restaurant Jikoni in Marylebone Village five years ago. This is where I had my first kiss with my husband, where we broke up, made up and fell in love. We chose to have our marriage blessed here at St Marylebone Parish Church, where the poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning also took her vows.
It’s easy for a neighbourhood to be charming when it’s this dense with wealth, but what makes Marylebone truly rich is its diverse community. Around the corner from my restaurant there’s Jas Musicals, a music shop owned by Punjabi immigrants, standing opposite Casely-Hayford, a bespoke tailor with West African heritage; there’s an Iranian delicatessen selling sticky rose-scented pastries down the road, and Arif the Turkish greengrocer next-door has been doing business for well over 30 years.
Beyond the chi-chi shops selling covetable knick-knacks, the neighbourhood is a hospitable place, where a person can come from anywhere and thrive. It’s a beautifully stitched patchwork of characters full of stories and anecdotes, and an escape from the throngs of people on Oxford Street that’s just a hop and a skip away.
On days when I feel overwhelmed, I stroll down Chiltern Street and my stresses are briefly assuaged by the lively conversations I strike up with film-makers, theatre agents or retirees – whichever random sampling of humanity might have come out on that particular day. Marylebone isn’t without urban hassles, but somehow, sitting by the window of my restaurant, waving at passersby I have come to know by name, I find myself exactly where I am meant to be. Jikoni (www.jikonilondon.com), 19–21 Blandford Street, London W1. ‘Jikoni: Proudly Inauthentic Recipes from an Immigrant Kitchen’ by Ravinder Bhogal (£26, Bloomsbury Publishing) is out now.