Hackney’s open street art It is Open House this weekend except at Beck Road in Hackney where it is Open Street. The road, consisting of two almost eerily uniform rows…
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Secret London History – The magic of the River Wandle First visible source of the Wandle IF THERE’S ever been magic working on London’s rivers it is surely the Wandle…
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Secret London History – The lost past of St James’s Park station The former Niagara panorama and ice rink turned garage It is well known that Petty France, by St…
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Secret London History – London Bridge – the world’s most successful monopoly An early run of the Doggett’s rowing race . . . . . . . . . .…
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Secret London History: Waterloo – the bridge that killed off a rival John Rennie’s Waterloo Bridge – “the noblest bridge in the world” This is the story of two bridges…
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From this . . . . . . to this The sole remaining stanchion The original Crystal Palace – built in Hyde Park in six months to house the Great…
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Elephant and Castle station Shakespeare would have had to walk but we can visit the sites of three forgotten Elizabethan theatres – with not a plaque between them – by…
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The Goldman Sachs building, Farringdon Street GOLDMAN SACHS, the seriously rich US finance group, has just built a huge £1 bn office block on Farringdon Street just south of Holborn…
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The world’s first panorama LEICESTER SQUARE is not famed for its churches. An exception is Notre Dame de France. Built on the site of the London pad of the Earl…
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Sergio Verrillo (above), an American from Connecticut, prepares to taste the first draft of freshly barrelled Chardonnay from his new winery under a railway arch in Battersea. His Blackbook is…
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The towpath on the way to Brentford At 11 am on August 1, 1820 something unusual happened when the Regent’s Canal was opened making it possible to travel by boat…
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The Chapter House of Westminster Abbey, arguably, is the most important small building in the country. It is interesting enough in its own right before looking at what happened later.…
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THE PHRASE “hidden gem” is the most overused way of describing curious places in London, not least by me. But in the case of the wine cellar constructed by Cardinal…
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I have just published – OK self-published – my first book about London. All done in poems, over 80 of them.I was going to write about the process but @DaveHill…
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The new garden (above) and the old one (below) The newly revamped Garden Museum, next door to Lambeth Palace, is a triumph of professionalism over history and intimacy. It used…