Sky Pod, The City

Towering egotist Boris Johnson's architectural legacy will be a London skyline raped willy nilly by the filthy erections of willy-waving  'starchitects.' Could-be-anywhere skyscrapers thrown up by spivvy developers and financed by tin-pot despots from the Gulf to Guangzhou, these shameless shrines to Mammon are a depressingly familiar sight today. I don't dig Victorian pastiche. I'm no fan of mock-Georgian. I am not Prince Charles. Modern buildings per se are not my enemy: hello Hadid, Zaha; F off Farrell, Terry and take your tawdry towers with you! "But, hey! The little people will love any sub-Dubai crap outcrop as long as it comes with a cute nickname" reason the urban planners that have the ear of the mop-top Eton Mess in charge at City Hall. Today, I've scaled the 37-storey 'Walkie Talkie' (more of a 'molar implant' to my mind), a grim grey Goliath whose daft design meant the summer sun, reflected in and magnified by its concave curves, melted Mondeos parked outside. Nor is Oliver Wainwright, The Guardian's architecture critic, smitten: 'As a literal diagram of developers' greed, it provides painful proof that form follows not function but finance..poking its unwelcome bulk into the skyline from almost every possible vista." Like Kim Kardashian, only in concrete and glass, then? On the plus side, I suppose, the building's upper levels host a leafy new London belvedere; an indoor sky garden consisting of two vast banked swathes of sub-tropical foliage. Serving it, is an island cafe-bar run - like restaurants Darwin and Fenchurch on levels 36 and 37 above (both of which are blessed with more intimate bars, nota bene) - by caterers Rhubarb. In addition to those armed with bar or restaurant reservations, the aerial arboretum is open daily to the public; cue queues at the lobby level airport-style check-in. Order an £11.50 cocktail - Thyme For Tea, Chelsea Garden; or Autumn Breeze (vodka, pinot noir, falernum, beetroot and apple juices) - and the sort of snacks you'd expect of posh wedding canapé slingers such as Rhubarb as you watch the tourists coo over the "Oooh, aaah, Barb-a-ra!" wraparound views . Open until 2am, Sky Pod is undeniably cool ... as in, climate- controlled to the point where wooly blankets and hot water bottles are provided gratis. Cool in the other sense? Only if you're a fan Center Parcs and crass glass carbuncles.
20 Fenchurch Street EC3M 3BY http://skygarden.london/sky-pod-bar

City Social, The City

Room with a view: Jason's latest gaff's cocktails come with a Gherkin garnish.

Spikey-top chefebrity Gary Rhodes once cooked breakfast of bacon and chipolatas for me at Margaret Thatcher's daughter Carole's Bankside loft. Before you jump to any erroneous conclusion ("exactly how pissed were you the night before?"), let me stress that I was there on a (very) slow news day, snouting for a scoop at a PR bash to launch some initiative by a pork-pimping bureau called Ladies In Pigs to which I'd been invited. Initially, I'd misread the event as 'Pigs in Ladies ' - a title that conjured up a tacky 50 Shades of Grey-style porno flick wherein various pot ugly footballer lookalikes - one, a Scouser with a penchant for grannies on the game - would 'pleasure' posh old birds. Also present at this surreal meal? Tory/ indie/ UKIP battle-axe Christine Hamilton. Point being, whilst I found old bangers Christine and Carole mildly entertaining in a kind of la-di-da Loose Women way, Gary appeared to have all the synthetic charm of one of the Ladies' see-through sausage skins. The bar at his Rhodes 24 restaurant at Tower 42 in the CIty always struck me in much the same way. 'Meh' to the max. Chef du jour Jason Atherton has never cooked breakfast for me - it can only be a matter of time - but he strikes me as an altogether more interesting sort. So too, his new sky lounge where once stood Gary's gaffe (sic). More sophisticated, more stylish, slicker, less frenetic or gimmicky than other Square Mile get-high-in-the-sky opportunities - hello Heron Tower! - City Social is a blue-chip banker. The busy room - think Wall Street boardroom pre-the '29 Crash - has a bullish confidence about it. It's like 2008 never happened. The views are an obvious draw but best go at sundown; butch brown-on-brown Art Deco-styling, and London below, both look better by night as - moving away from some unfortunate downlighting - do I in Atherton's otherwise seductively-lit space. Order bar snacks - boqueronnes, crab and avocado salad, or goat’s cheese churros with truffle honey - or more substantial dishes off the restaurant menu, also served in the bar. Innovative cocktails include It’s the British whey (brown butter-washed Johnnie Walker Black, PG Tips syrup, split milk whey, bitters, lemon juice and nutmeg, £11.50) - a fine example of why London's stock is riding high. The root of all evil, they say, is money and you'll do well to shell out yours on a walnut rum, Bramley apple syrup, poire William and root beer cooler of that ilk. I'm more circumspect about City Social's resident booze brokers' hot tip, tolero; worried that a Tapatio blanco, Tabasco, piquillo pepper and apricot brandy firecracker might leave me whistling Johnny Cash's Ring Of Fire, confined in City Social's comfy, comely khazi.

Tower 42, 25 Old Broad Street EC2N 1HQ http://www.jasonatherton.co.uk/restaurants/city-social/ 

Sky Bar, Westminster

A uniformed ‘air hostess’ (pole dancer? Albania's Eurovision entry?) shows us into a new cocktail spot. As far as a film of grime on the windows permits, the views from Millbank Tower’s 29th floor impress . ‘Wow!’ we gush giddily for fully five minutes before, all coo-ed out and done with drooling over the giant erection that is The Shard, we turn our attention to Sky Bar itself. Membership here costs £2,500, but for twenty notes, you too can temporarily join whoever might fancy a night in an anodyne shiny, white box with op-Art furniture and colour wash lighting. I'm guessing dictators’ sons, oily-garchs and vajazzled bimbos. Lindsay Lowlife has lived the high life within and Jack Tweed  has graced the lofty pile with his stellar presence, as has his bezzie, pie and mash-faced cock of Ilford East, Mark The Only Way Is Essex Wright, I hear. ‘Ideal for a big fat gypsy wedding reception’ sniffs Milanese fashion designer friend, loftily. For my £2,500, I’d expect the bar to have tomato juice. No joy. On-the-wagon date agrees to mineral water. It’s served in a plastic beaker. Classy! I’m intrigued by Salt and ‘Peper’ cocktail, 'Crystal' and ‘Amand de Brignon’ champagne (£400). Is that supermarket own brand or do they mean Armand de Brignac? Maybe any profits can go towards a swift reprint of a menu littered with howlers? Are Sky Bar's cocktails worth £12.50 (service excluded)? Search me!  I have to put up with prosecco bellini from a bar besieged. Lukewarm, astringent, pointless, it languishes unloved. We sit contemplating ice buckets (pictured) devoid of champagne that will never come. Hold on! What's this? I set off like Usain Bolt in pursuit of a quartet comely martinis I've spotted on a waiter's tray a hundred metres distant, only to be told they are for guests at a dinner that is happening behind closed, guarded doors. Somebody says Shayne Ward is at a table. But so far as I can see, even he's not in the house tonight.  F***** off, we flee. For cocktails with killer views in cooler surroundings, take your £20 to Paramount atop Centrepoint. New Labour’s 1997 victory was celebrated at Millbank Tower. That night’s anthem occurs to me: Things Can Only Get Better. Over a bottle of cheap red at Pizza Express next door, things finally do.

29th Floor Millbank Tower, 21 - 24 Millbank SW1P 4QP 0845 500 2929

Paramount , Soho

Joy! Paramount, the swish complex atop Centre Point, is no longer members only. Book in advance though; bar tables are at a premium. Understandably so, with killer cocktails and to-die-for 360 degree views of Lilliputian London all twinkly-twilighty below. Tom Dixon’s sleek’n’sexy interior with its Cubist copper bar could be a set from a stylish 1960's American flick.  By the way my date is toying with the slender flute her Roseberry Fizz comes in, I'm reminded of Faye Dunaway stroking Steve McQueen’s bishop in The Thomas Crown Affair's steamy chess match sequence. At £11, my Three King Swizzle, a kumquat-y take on a mojito, isn’t cheap; but it’s better value and loads more entertaining than a DVD of the Pierce Brosnan/ Rene Russo rehash of the original. Around midnight, we flit upstairs to Paramount’s Jetsons-style sky lounge. Surreally, it’s just me, the date and one other chap who is entertaining stereo leggy blondes over pink Krug at £360. Hello! I recognise that lantern jaw-line. Didn’t my Mum always listen to him in the ‘70s when she was taking it easy like Sunday morning? Our barman reckons the blondes - young enough to be his adopted daughter? - are sisters and er, ‘dancers’ from Helsinki. Dunno about the star, but a taxi home brings my night to a happy Finnish.

Centre Point 101 New Oxford St WC1 7420 2900http://www.paramount.uk.net