Until this year I had only been to Tasmania once, and that was on a team- building exercise with work colleagues. We had to climb Cradle Mountain, walking through the snow with rather heavy backpacks and camping in the wilderness. It did skew my view of the place. This year I have been twice and hence felt very pleased when Hobart came in as number 7 on the Lonely Planet's top 10 recommended cities to visit in 2013.

What to see
The Lonely Planet recommendation is due in no small part to MONA (the Museum of Old and New Art), the magnificent Fender Katsalidis-designed building for gambling entrepreneur David Walsh. It is a staggering experience – the site, the architecture cut into a sandstone cliff, the challenging collections of art, and the Tasmanian weather delivering all four seasons in one day. It is, in fact, the largest privately funded museum in the southern hemisphere.


Installation at MONA by artist Roman Signer

What makes the experience so remarkable is the way the whole notion of what it is to be a museum and visit a museum has been rethought. On arrival everyone is given an iPod and head phones. The iPod locates nearby art works and tells you about them.  This means you engage differently, you concentrate more and you learn more. I am a lazy museum visitor and the joke in the family is that I have finished and am in the gift or coffee shop while my husband is still at the third exhibit. This approach made me focus.

It also changes the way the museum can be lit, the way information is conveyed and the approach to exhibits.  It not only won this year's national architecture award – The Sir Zelman Cowen Award for Public Architecture - but has won lighting and engineering awards. The rule book has been rewritten and replaced with something so innovative and successful it is the envy of public institutions worldwide.  So, go to MONA.



We stayed for a night in 'Esmond' (above), one of eight steel-framed, diamond-shaped pavilions on the river Derwent again designed by Fender Katsilidis. Each pavilion is named after an Australian artist or architect - ours was  named for modernist Tasmanian architect Esmond Dorey. The interior can only be described as playful luxury. A $25 million hotel is planned for the site as staying there is very much part of the experience. There is a beautiful heated swimming pool as part of the row of pavilions but the fact that we locked all our clothes and towels in a cubicle as it blew a gale outside is no reflection on the establishment.


This is a chair; yes a chair, and a comfy one at that, in Esmond. Unfortunately I don't know the name of the designer.

Where to eat
The Source is the restaurant on site at MONA where chef Philip Leban recommends 5,7 or 9 small courses with wine matches. Make sure you have something to celebrate.



Ethos (above) is set in a restored heritage building. The fit-out is charmingly recycled with handmade plates and light fittings cunningly fashioned from bottles. The produce is biodynamic (if it is a vegetable) and hand reared or caught (if it is meat or fish). Great, friendly service and food.



Pigeon Hole – this tiny café located  in West Hobart serves a limited menu which ensures everything is extremely tasty – such as the salt cod soup shown above. The bread is second to none and we left with two massive loaves.



Smolt -  a handsome timber fit out in this centrally located restaurant (Salamanca Square) is only the beginning of the experience.  We not only had dinner but the food and service were so good we came back for breakfast (a friend had recommended it as one of the best breakfasts she had ever had in her life).


The soft colours of this inner city mural work beautifully on the building in terms of scale and subject matter.

Garagistes – unfortunately we didn't get to eat at this most celebrated of Hobart restaurants but I have foodie friends who sing its praises because of its dedication to locally sourced and even 'foraged' ingredients. If you needed more proof, sommelier & manager Katrina Birchmeier has won Australia's best Young Restaurateur of the Year.

Where to shop
The Maker in Salamanca Place in the heart of Hobart is a tiny shop that makes you browse with intent. It feels both curated and specific and yet serendipitious which, to my mind, is a real retailing skill. Original watercolours (I bought one for my mother) sit alongside antique keys, linen tea towels and contemporary jewellery – not to mention the quality clothing by Tasmanian label lj struthers.



These eggs at A Common Ground are so picture perfect they could be a MONA installation. A Common Ground – across from The Maker - is another tiny shop filled to the brim with quality produce, but this time of the food variety. Owned by Matthew Evans, an ex-Sydney food writer, and now rare pig breeder and Nick Haddow who runs the Bruny Island Cheese Company they stock the very best of Tasmanian produce from artisan chocolates to barrel-aged cider vinegar.



Set on the first floor of 147 Liverpool Street in the Hobart CBD, Oyster & Pearl is more atelier than shop. Welcome to the world of Lou Whiting who sources the best natural fabrics globally and then makes them into garments locally. She has a keen eye for displays and is a natural merchandiser so it's well worth a visit.