People / My Bristol Favourites
My Bristol Favourites: Louise Leigh
Stand-up comedian Louise Leigh is performing her new show, Louise Leigh Amused, as part of the Bristol Comedy Festival.
“Celebrating midlife, menopause and farts, the show was so much fun at Edinburgh Fringe Festival, at sold out dates last year at the Room Above, at Leicester Comedy Festival and elsewhere that Louise is not ready to stop performing it.”
Louise Leigh Amused: Sex, Drugs and HRT is at Basement 45 on Frogmore Street on May 14 at 4pm.
These are Louise’s top-five Bristol favourites:
Fay’s Tea Garden in St Andrew’s Park
The Tea Garden is the social heart of St Andrew’s Park – photo: Martin Booth
“My nearest coffee place and my favourite. I can only go at quiet times because my dog is an inveterate pastry hound who will swipe a croissant from a child given half a chance. Because it’s quiet, if I ask nicely, Fay gives me my flat white in a special mug. I’m insufferable, honestly.”
Henleaze Lake
Henleaze Swimming Club celebrated their 100th birthday in 2019 – photo: Barbara Evripidou
“Did I mention, I’m insufferable? 2023 marks the year I become one of north Bristol’s worst kind of smug prats: a full member at Henleaze Lake. If you’re not aware of it, it’s a sort of golf club but for cold water swimming. It’s way better than it sounds.”
St Werburgh’s allotments
“There’s this one allotment on the corner of the Concorde Way near St Werburgh’s City Farm that makes my heart sing,” says Louise Leigh – photo: Louise Leigh
“There’s this one allotment on the corner of the Concorde Way near St Werburgh’s City Farm that makes my heart sing. I go out of my way to check on it every week, crushing my face between the railway fencing to gaze at it for minutes at a time. Just the sheer amount of love and tending that has gone into the soil there. Beautiful.”
Oppo Comedy, Wednesdays at the Barrelhouse
Sophie Duker performing ay Oppo Comedy at the Barrelhouse – photo: Oppo
“Talk about love in the soil! Oppo Comedy is my home gig, which I co- run every Wednesday night at the Barrelhouse in Clifton with various delightful young people; new material from some of the best comics in the country (and me) and an absolutely stunning audience. Yum.”
The jet wash in Stapleton
Louise’s favourite jet wash is on Park Road opposite the Masons Arms pub – photo: Martin Booth
“Oh god, I love a jet wash. If you want to feel like a strong and powerful woman – Kate McKinnon in Ghostbusters, Angelina Jolie in Mr & Mrs Smith, Boudicca fighting the Romans! – I can highly recommend jet washing your car. All this and you get the mud out of your wheel arches. Yes. Please.”
Main photo: Louise Leigh
Read next:
- Bristol Comedy Festival to return in May
- Henleaze Swimming Club turns 100
- My Bristol Favourites: Mark Olver
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