Larissa Shearman

We know our friends in the south have the claim when it comes to laneway culture, but we think we can give Melbourne a run for its money. Sydney has little shopping lanes, hidden streets with excellent food and drink venues, and alleyways that have been taken over with street art and green-thumbed community spirit. Trust us, you’ll be surprised by what you find. Want to explore more? These are our favourite public artworks hiding in plain sight. 

Let’s face it, we all know that a day out in the city can be notoriously expensive. But we’ve done a little digging and it turns out, it doesn’t have to be. Here’s a game plan for a day out on the town for less than that crisp $50 in your wallet. Have a ginger brulée tart at Bourke Street Bakery: $5.50 Build up some sustenance for the big day ahead by grabbing a table along the street outside Bourke Street Bakery in Surry Hills. We love the surprising ginger-twist on a classic brulée tart, but they also have savoury pies and sausage rolls, and other bakery staples. Now found in locations all around Sydney, the OG (and the best) is in Surry Hills on the corner of Bourke and Devonshire Streets, where it’s been attracting tourists and locals alike with its wonderfully French-inspired display since 2004. Photograph: Supplied Take a rest at the Chinese Garden of Friendship: $6 We know it’s a half hour walk from our first stop to this one, but by the time you arrive the Chinese Garden of Friendship is going to look like a great place to catch your breath. The garden was designed by Sydney’s sister city Guangzhou, found just north of Hong Kong, and it was modelled on Ming Dynasty architecture, meaning there are waterfalls and pavilions for you to explore. For the price of entry, you will be able to walk around these beautiful gardens to find a pool of colourful koi fish or a wall featuring two dragon designs symbolising the two cities coming together. Wander at your leisure before

Unfortunately, liquid courage doesn’t make a great artist (as we found out), but that’s not the point at Cork and Canvas’s newest Sydney location. The point is to relax and allow the professionals do the hard work while you enjoy your BYO drinks and nibbles. The concept of paint and sip has really taken off over the past few years, but Cork and Canvas was the first studio in Australia to pair bubbles and brushes when the craze started in Melbourne in 2013. The cost of a class is $50, which is a little exxy, but you get access to unlimited paints in a class lead by professional artist Ben Walsh. And, let’s be honest, the novelty of having a glass of wine while you paint is probably a one-time spend. If you’ve never painted before it can be a little daunting, but the organisers have made the process simple. When you arrive, your painting station is already set up with an easel and some primary colours, and all you have to do is don your apron, and set up your wine and cheese. All the cutlery and crockery is provided. In the Paint Your Mate class, we sit opposite our bestie and paint their portrait in a Picasso-style. The abstract concept was comforting, as there wasn’t the same pressure to make every line perfect. In fact, while we were given guides for possible head shapes and features, it was also made very clear that we could do whatever we wanted, with the goal that the final picture only represented our subject – rather than be a perfect likeness. Teacher Walsh led the cl

If we were to tell you that you’d just done a shot in a darkened room surrounded by neon-clad strangers, you’d assume you were in a nightclub, not at a dance studio at 6pm. But this is Clubbercise – a new dance fitness class that’s come to Australia from the UK, and now hosts sessions for over 100,000 people worldwide every week. Up the stairs at Dancekool Studios, in the CBD, we’re greeted with foreboding ‘caution’ tape across the door. We’re told to suit up with flashing LED glow sticks and neon body paint, then wait in a darkened room. That’s when we’re given a shot – of orange juice, this is a fitness class after all – as instructor Mari Suzuki gets everyone pumped up and ready to dance. The class costs $15, including your juice ‘shot’, which seems reasonable when compared to other dance classes in the CBD. It costs $1 to rent a glow stick, or $9 to buy one. It might sound silly but you’re going to want them for an added arm workout. These are proper sticks with different lighting settings and they really add to the vibe of the class. If you’ve had any experience in dance it’ll be easier for you to pick up the combinations of aerobics, stretches and freestyle dance, but experience is not necessary in order to have fun and burn some calories. We’re told you burn 600 calories per 60-minute class. The whole session is done completely in the dark, which helps if you’re feeling self conscious. We were surrounded by people of all different fitness levels. The music was a mix of

The Monet painting that gave the impressionist movement its name is coming to the Southern Hemisphere for the first time in June 2019. Impression, soleil levant (Impression, Sunrise) is leaving the walls of the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris for a turn in a new gallery space at the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra, alongside almost 60 other impressionist masterpieces. The majority of these will be from the man himself, but there will also be works from JMW Turner, the English romantic painter whose style influenced Monet, as well as other artists who were influenced in turn by the French artist. The paintings in this exhibition have been gathered from the Marmottan, as well as the Tate in London and other galleries in Australia and New Zealand. The exhibition is curated by the Marmottan’s Marianne Mathieu, who was in charge of the research into the background of this famous painting, which depicts the port of Le Havre on the north coast of France. The story goes that when Monet was asked for the title of his depiction of the busy port, he named it an impression because it couldn’t be considered the kind of view that was in keeping with the realism art movement of the time. The NGA revealed its full 2019 program today, which also includes an exhibition which will put two artistic rivals – Matisse and Picasso – in the same room, and will track their relationship through their art. Sourced from private and public collections, it will be a unique group of works, many o

When we think of the ocean, we don’t really think about the huge amount of the rubbish and pollution which is floating all around the world. Artist Danling Xiao from Mundane Matters decided to raise awareness of the issue out of the water by recycling ocean plastic found off the Whitsundays Islands into ‘Wasteland’, a suspended installation of over 2,000 plastic orange spheres. Rubbish collected and used in the artwork includes plastic bottles, a broken chair and kettle and microplastics, tiny plastic particles less than five millimetres-long which come from disintegrated plastic products or, surprisingly, are found in many health and beauty products like toothpaste. These small pieces are particularly dangerous to marine life as they are swallowed easily but don’t digest. Xiao melted down the plastic debris to create thousands of plastic balls.   Looking up at 'Wasteland' hanging in Customs House Photograph: Katherine Griffiths     Xiao says, “I thought this was an incredible example of how items we waste can transform our environment positively”. The creative studio worked with Eco Barge, a company which has collected ocean waste off the coast of North Queensland for nine years, collecting over 180,000 kilograms of debris, and giving more than 80 turtles a safe place to swim in their rescue centre. This is not the first time Mundane Matters has questioned the impact of our lifestyle on the natural environment. From 2015-2017, the studio created ‘Fruit and Vegetable Vase

Think of the wildest boat party you’ve been to in Sydney and now turn the dial up to 11. Two young Northern Beaches guys, Donovan Biss and Johny De Keghel, have created a floating “luxury beach house”, which is going to make you wish it were beach weather already. The two-tiered, 200sqm vessel is fitted out with three rustic-chic bars, a grand top deck and spacious white-and-timber accented interior in the style of a luxury, coastal Hamptons mansion. And the best part is that you can hop aboard for as little as $45 thanks to a series of weekly parties with plenty of booze, views and a summer-ready soundtrack.   Photograph: Supplied         The series of summer sessions, Easy Like Sunday, costs from $45pp, including water taxi transfer from Sydney Harbour to the boat (with drink on arrival). If you want an idea of the vibe, one of the parties will have waterside views of the upcoming Harbourlife festival. Prefer something more sophisticated? The boat is available to hire for private functions, starting from $1,100p/h. Pricey, but it gets you an on-board chef and bartenders to cater your shindig, as well as flexible entertainment options. For private events, the boat can pick up you and your guests from any commercial port in Sydney, as well as 15 outer CBD locations. Once on board, there are plenty of spots fit for lounging in the afternoon sun on the harbour, drink in hand. Hamptons Sydney’s first weekly event, Easy Like Sunday, is on October 14 (3-7pm) and bookings are now