With gleaming waterfront apartments around London Bridge on the market today for sums that only those on bankers salaries could afford, it is hard to imagine upmarket parts of south London like Borough and Shad Thames tarred by heavy industry and nothing short a miserable place to live. […]
Fleet Street, on the fringes of the City, has to be one my favourite places to head to for an evening out with friends. Pubs like Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, tucked away down a narrow alley, are oozing in character. Here you’ll find a maze of cosy rooms […]
The breadth of history on show in London for all to see never ceases to amaze me. Last week I saw the remains of a Roman bathhouse hidden below a City office block. This weekend I viewed, beneath another modern building, traces of the first theatre to be […]
Lurking beneath a rather dull and grey London office block there is a fascinating discovering to be made. After passing through an unassuming entrance at 101 Lower Thames Street and descending a flight of concrete steps, you are greeted by the extensive remains of a Roman bathhouse. This […]
London is a city that was built on overseas trade. Right from the establishment of Londinium by the Romans in 43AD, merchants came from far and wide to sell their wares. Later on, Medieval London prospered on the back of trade with the continent, with wine being imported […]
London’s Livery Companies, which today boast a membership of over 26,000, have played a big part in this weekend’s Celebrate the City festival. They’ve been selling their wares at a market outside Guildhall and many have also opened their doors to the public. But what, in the free […]
“The next station is Caledonian Road,” is one of the announcements I hear every day as I trundle into work on the Piccadilly Line. Then a few minutes later the doors open so a few people can get out and others get on. And in no time at […]
With a host of exhibitions, TV programmes and special events on right now, the Thames is the talk of London. And as the sole reason as to why London is what it is and where it is today, it is only proper that this important river gets the […]
Planning officials today would tell you exactly where to go if you offered them a rose as payment for building a footbridge across a public road without permission. But that’s exactly what was imposed when in 1381 Mrs Knollys was rebuked for creating a structure to connect her […]
Today it is one of the poorest parts of London with residents struggling to get by on low incomes, many shops look shabby, 70s tower blocks are ridden with crime and street drinking is an all too apparent problem. So it may surprise some that Deptford High Street […]
Past In The Present 