10 Things That Are So Sydney It Almost Hurts
Getting to truly know a city – quirks, flaws, arrogances, grandiose occupants, public transport systems, dive bars and all, is one of the best things about growing up (as well as gaining your right to legally drink). It’s what helps you fall in love with the place or pack up your worldly possessions and head elsewhere. When it comes to lavishly meeting all areas of the ‘unique to the city’ spectrum, Sydney pretty much outdoes them all and completely non-apologetically. Here we look at ten “so Sydney” spots that make it the great city it is.
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#1 Wellness in a skyscraper
Regular yoga is so 2014. Yoga from the Sky offers a pretty incredible city view with their popular practice. Taking place in the Sydney Tower Eye, the classes offer 360 degree views across Sydney, 250 metres above it all. Reaching that perfect om is but a 309 metre elevator ride and a tree pose away. These classes are pretty popular, so be sure to book ahead.
Where: The Sydney Tower Eye, Corner of Pitt and Market Streets, Sydney
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#2 The paleo cafe
Sure, you might be rolling your eyes at the ever increasing ‘speciality’ cafes out there, but finding a place to eat when you or one of your friends is on a diet is hard work. The Paleo Café offers delicious food with good coffee and offers two types of bacon that you can add on to pretty much any dish, which is really all you’re looking for on the weekend anyway, right?
Where: Shop 5, 310 – 330 Oxford Street, Bondi Junction
#3 A club with a pool in it
For those warm days where you feel amazing, look great, and want to smash a poolside pizza, you’re in luck. Justin Hemmes has you covered with iconic venue Ivy and its Pool Club oasis – a place that will transport you to Palm Springs within minutes while still being accessible on your regular train line. Grab a private cabana, poolside lounge or oversized inflatable duck and let the world sail on by.
Where: Level 4, Ivy, 320 George Street, Sydney
#4 A cafe pretty much made for Instagram
You don’t find your way into the Top 10 most Instagrammed places in Australia without being something pretty special. While waiting for a table at The Grounds of Alexandria – which will take you around an hour on weekends – take a stroll around and check out the on site bakery, grocery store, market stalls and garden beds, which allow diners the paddock to plate experience without actually having to leave the city. Coffee aficionados should head to the coffee research and testing facility that’s on site – a set up that’s giving Melbourne’s coffee crown a run for its money.
Where: Building 7A, 2 Huntley Street, Alexandria
#5 A gelato appreciation class
For those times when eating the food you love simply isn’t enough, enrol yourself in one of Gelato Messina’s gelato appreciation classes. Perfect for a city that never really gets cold, the classes give you a brief history of the business and walk you through some tips and tricks on how to make your own gelato and ice cream cakes at home before arriving at the part that really matters: the gluttonous feast in which you will be served a five course gelato degustation, a gelato cake, free reign to test whatever and however many flavours you like throughout the store and a take home tub to shame eat later that evening.
Where: Gelato Messina, 1/241 Victoria Street, Darlinghurst
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#6 An iconic hike
“There’s nothing like an early morning power walk along the sea early on a Saturday morning to help you conquer life,” someone healthy and not anything like me once said. They were probably fans of the famed Bondi to Bronte walk, which is free and open to all members of the public, but your donning of head to toe Lululemon active wear is certainly appreciated. Throw your cossies on underneath and end your walk at hip local swimming spot Gordons Bay.
Where: Start at Notts Avenue, Bondi Beach
#7 A packed out Sunday session
Everyone knows that in the land of hospitality workers, Sunday night is Saturday night, and the Beresford has been putting on Sunday sessions like no other for some time now. The queer friendly event is said to be the place where you start your night looking like Kim Kardashian Paris Fashion Week era, but leave feeling like Kim Kardashian as Paris Hilton’s personal assistant era. It’s the ideal weekend wind down hang out.
Where: 354 Bourke Street, Surry Hills
#8 A bar where you leave healthier than you arrived
Generally your health is the last thing on your mind when heading out to a bar, but not in Sydney. The Kombucha Bar & Art-Food-Medicine Collaboratory is a shrine to inner health that combines the words ‘collaborate’ and ‘laboratory’ all in the name of wellness. Pull up a stool and grab yourself an ice cold kombucha on tap or attend one of the many workshops, pop up dinners or wellness-related events this multipurpose space has to offer.
Where: 495 Parramatta Road, Leichhardt
#9 Drag queen trivia
Taking the age old tradition of pub trivia and combining it with Sydney’s iconic drag scene makes perfect sense when you think about it, because nothing brings new life to questions about WWII submarines than a chatty diva in a ball gown. Turbo Trivia host evenings throughout the week and across the city, so there’s almost certainly something happening near you, and it’s the perfect excuse to eat pub food, commonly known as the greatest food of all.
Where: Various pubs and RSLs across Sydney
#10 The bar that specialises in spritzers
It’s safe to assume that any bar that takes its name from one of the greatest pop songs of all time is going to be a place worth drinking at. When you combine that with its unofficial spritzers only drinks menu, This Must Be The Place really comes into its own. The days of the Aperol Spritz – AKA the basic bitch of the beverage world – hogging the limelight are over thanks to bartenders Charlie Ainsbury and Luke Ashton, who are opening our minds and palettes one cleansing and refreshing beverage at a time.
Where: 239 Oxford Street, Darlinghurst
(Lead image: Ivy/Facebook)
