Pandora Sykes – Favourite Things

Each week Reaction Weekend brings you Favourite Things – interviews with interesting people about the skills, hobbies, pleasures and past times that make them who they are.

Pandora Sykes is a writer, journalist and broadcaster. A former fashion editor and columnist for The Sunday Times and contributing editor at ELLE, she has written for titles including The Telegraph, The Observer, Vogue, and Grazia. She was also the co-creator and co-host of renowned podcast The High Low. Her new podcast series The Missing is available to listen to wherever you get your podcasts from and her debut essay collection “How Do We Know We’re Doing it Right?” is available for purchase here.

These are a few of her favourite things…

Reading on my bed in the middle of the day

This is the greatest joy in the world for me, even more so since I had my children! Like taking a bath at 3pm, there is something mildly transgressive about squirrelling back into a neatly made bed with a book, at a time when you should be striding around attacking the day. At the weekend, when my husband takes the kids for a few hours, I like to get back into bed, clean, dressed and fed (reading loses so much of its magical quality when you are painfully hungry) shutters all open, phone off, Classic FM on, and read. I like doing it on any bed, but on my own bed, my favourite bed, is the best.

David Shrigley

A friend of mine used to work in hospitality at Sketch, a private member’s club in Mayfair, and occasionally she was allowed a lay-friend in. I’d ask to come when the pink gallery dining room was closed to everyone else for cleaning – so that I could press my nose up against the 239 David Shrigley works on the walls (which have since been swapped out for 91 coloured ones). I love the interplay between picture and text. His work is funny, thought-provoking and sometimes shocking but without pretension. He said once in an interview that because there is text, and imagery, the work doesn’t need explaining. That to explain it, would devalue it. There is a school of thought that suggests that if something can be explained immediately, it does not have depth or value. But I think Shrigley’s work really counters that. His work makes me happy, and I can’t ever imagine that changing.

Otters

My childhood nickname is Panda. But I go by another animal in my marriage – Otter. For some long, convoluted reason, my husband started calling me Otter nine years ago and since then, otters have become rather prominent in my life. We have many illustrated otters and books about otters around our house, and my husband has an otter tattoo on his forearm. For the last seven years, he has also ‘adopted’ an otter for me (the adoption sadly does not include actually getting to meet them in real life). Each year, I get a new otter, I’ve never been quite sure why I couldn’t keep the last one, although they always come with a charming backstory and a funky name. Last years’ was called Ganja.

 Titivating my trinkets

Decorative items give me enormous pleasure. I spend hours each week surfing vintage websites (and in normal times, perusing antique fairs) looking at vases, ceramics and prints. Most of the lighting and furniture in my house is second-hand; I love imagining how many lives these pieces have lived, before they came to me. As much as I love decorative items, I hate clutter. Which means I can often be found, particularly when stressed, tidying and streamlining. I am sure it’s extremely tragic to relish a weekend with no social plans, so that I can make a little pile of things to give to family and friends, but I am okay with that. I am less Marie Kondo and more William Morris – “have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful,” he once said. I like that as a mantra.

Lotus Biscoff spread

Some people can’t keep wine at home because they don’t trust themselves not to drink it all at once; I have that same problem with Lotus Biscoff spread. I knew I had a problem when I smashed a jar that my sister had just given me on the kitchen floor. I got down on my haunches with a pair of tweezers in one hand, and a teaspoon in the other. With the tweezers, I plucked out the bits of glass, and with the spoon, I dug into the safe splats of biscuity spread. Houston, I texted my sister afterwards, we have a problem. Lotus Biscoff is not my only guilty pleasure in a jar, I also love Marshmallow Fluff. I suppose you are supposed to eat both of them on toast, but I think the bread is a farce. You just need a spoon.