I also share your enthusiasm and pride for Melbourne’s culinary diversity and international cuisine. For almost every type of food you crave for, you can find it cooked in several ways in Melbourne, from the traditional, to the modern Australian and fusion style of cooking.

Hope to see your 2010-2011 list soon of recommended Melbourne restaurants!

Having lived in both Sydney and Melbourne there are some great art galleries in both locations, well worth a visit! Melbourne definitely has a more ‘inviting’ arts community and there are literally hundreds of small, more boutique galleries with some stunning upcoming artists which are begging for you to visit! Sydney, on the other hand has a huge range of galleries featuring more prolific, established artists and can be utterly inspiring when you visit.

However, every artist needs to eat, and for fear of sparking some colourful conversation from Sydney-siders, I have to suggest that you therefore visit Melbourne!!! The vast array of gorgeous cafes, think sitting outside in the sun, on handcrafted wooden chairs made by a local carpenter, eating simple, delicious food with the freshest local produce made by people that are genuinely passionate about the plates they serve, just flicking through design magazines leading you to your next back street gallery….you can’t go wrong!!

Happy to throw some suggestions of my favourite places over to you!

Good luck with all your bookings – and you must take Mr and Mrs Smith’s advice with The Prince Hotel in Melbourne….stunning!

L x

From what I’ve heard, residents of those two cities can be very biased, so I’m not sure if I can get an objective perspective from an Australian…