Wendy Shillam

An urbanist by profession and a lover of city living by temperament.

Since I was little girl I always wanted to live right in the heart of a city. I imagined being able to look out of my window and see the greengrocer putting out his stall in the morning and being able to walk out of my apartment to sip a cup of coffee in the square. Right now I live in the heart of London, and work on the Whitehill Bordon eco-town in the heart of Hampshire, which means spending the weeks in a cute flat in the town square of Petersfield. I have also lived in the heart of Bristol, Heidleberg, Mojacar Spain and Nottingham.

In this blog I will be looking at cities across the world, visiting in person or by internet and trying to establish what makes some cities great and other cities abysmal. I hope you will contribute to these pages so that we can all share in the good stuff and learn from the bad.

So if you know where you can get a good cup of coffee near you please tell me – and even better send an image. But I also want to know what the public transport situation is like, what is the economy of the city based upon, and how do people live, work and play there?

Oh and by the way - I define a city as any civilized collection of live, work and play spaces of whatever size!