I have a (probably fairly unhealthy) fixation with play cafes and am always embarrassingly pumped when I hear about a new one popping up somewhere useful.
Hangouts
This could so easily have been just another generic soft-play centre, but the owners have clearly put a lot of thought into making it stand out from the crowd.
I always feel slightly uncomfortable about members’ clubs and their keeping-out-the-riffraff vibes, so this felt like a nice, inclusive alternative.
It goes without saying that anywhere where you have to surrender your toddler’s buggy and also they’re not allowed to touch anything is going to be a nightmare.
I can’t abide an ugly soft play centre, but if it’s tastefully appointed with a muted colour palette, clean lines and the odd kitschy add-on I’ll gladly climb aboard.
Being able to wander unobstructed by other humans without having to worry about losing toddlers in a sea of legs made it much less stressful.
It is quite nice being able to look round a museum without every other bastard in London being there at the same time.
It was a not-so-lovely THIRTY-SEVEN DEGREES on the day we visited, which is literally the same temperature as a living person’s insides.
It’s a castle but, I’ll be honest, we were only really here for the playground, which is also a castle.
I was half expecting to be digging up physical clues, but obviously that would be completely ridiculous and also it’s 2020, not 1952.
