Silvia Roba

Just as we have a Royal Academy of Language that monitors the correct use of Spanish, there is also a Royal Academy of Gastronomy founded on the conviction that food and the way it is prepared has always been at the very heart of our culture. Studying and promoting this important heritage is the academy’s principal mission, which is why, […]

Sometimes you can pass by the same place over and over again and hardly register its existence. You’re so used to seeing their window displays that they become part of the urban landscape, and it never occurs you to go inside and have a poke around. Well something like that happened to me the other […]

If there is one thing we all do when we travel, it is to look for the place with the best views of the city we have chosen for our holiday. We cannot help it: we like hotel terraces, rooftop bars, lifts with glass walls, towers, etc. Whatever the vertigo, it is worth it to […]

The festivities of San Isidro are about to begin. Every year, Madrid honours its patron saint with a programme packed full of cultural events that is scheduled to coincide with the world’s number-one  bullfighting festival, starting this afternoon in the Las Ventas Bullring.

This time I would like to suggest a route that will leave you with a delicious aftertaste. If you have a sweet tooth you are in luck, because at Easter the shop windows of cake shops and bakeries in Madrid put on a very tasty show. Increasingly original chocolate eggs and “monas de Pascua” (Easter […]

You don’t have to leave Madrid to enjoy one of Mother Nature’s most spectacular shows as soon as the first hint of spring is in the air. The fabulous image of blossoming almond trees all around Spain is replicated at this small, intimate park on Calle de Alcalá, undiscovered by many. It is known as La […]

The title of this blog entry is a Spanish expression dating back to the Middle Ages. At that time, a lack of hygiene was commonplace and virtually no-one spent much time on their hair. When society gradually acquired better and healthier habits, this expression came to be used as an insult hurled at the vagabonds […]