Bevis Marks Synagogue in London

6 June 2022 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London Reading Time:  13 minutes

Clock outside the Bevis Marks Synagogue © Ethan Doyle White/cc-by-sa-4.0

Clock outside the Bevis Marks Synagogue © Ethan Doyle White/cc-by-sa-4.0

Bevis Marks Synagogue, officially Qahal Kadosh Sha’ar ha-Shamayim (“Holy Congregation Gate of Heaven”), is the oldest synagogue in the United Kingdom in continuous use. It is located off Bevis Marks, Aldgate, in the City of London. The synagogue was built in 1701 and is affiliated to London’s historic Spanish and Portuguese Jewish community. It is a Grade I listed building. It is the only synagogue in Europe which has held regular services continuously for more than 300 years.   read more…

The Golden Hinde

1 May 2022 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Tall ships, Museums, Exhibitions, Yacht of the Month Reading Time:  12 minutes

© Jose L. Marin/cc-by-2.5

© Jose L. Marin/cc-by-2.5

Golden Hind was a galleon captained by Francis Drake in his circumnavigation of the world between 1577 and 1580. She was originally known as Pelican, but Drake renamed her mid-voyage in 1578, in honour of his patron, Sir Christopher Hatton, whose crest was a golden hind (a female red deer). Hatton was one of the principal sponsors of Drake’s world voyage. A full-sized, seaworthy reconstruction is in London, on the south bank of the Thames.   read more…

Mayfair in London

19 January 2022 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London Reading Time:  5 minutes

Burlington Arcade © Solipsist/cc-by-sa-2.5

Burlington Arcade © Solipsist/cc-by-sa-2.5

Mayfair is an affluent area in the West End of London towards the eastern edge of Hyde Park, in the City of Westminster, between Oxford Street, Regent Street, Piccadilly and Park Lane. It is one of the most expensive districts in the world.   read more…

Kensington Palace Gardens in London

27 December 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London Reading Time:  8 minutes

Entrance area to Kensington Palace Gardens © Oxfordian Kissuth/cc-by-sa-3.0

Entrance area to Kensington Palace Gardens © Oxfordian Kissuth/cc-by-sa-3.0

Kensington Palace Gardens is an exclusive street in Kensington, west of central London, near Kensington Gardens and Kensington Palace. Entered through gates at either end and guarded by sentry boxes, it was the location of the London Cage, the British government MI19 centre used during the Second World War and the Cold War. Several foreign diplomatic missions are located along it. A tree-lined avenue half a mile long studded with embassies, Kensington Palace Gardens is one of the most expensive residential streets in the world, and has long been known as “Millionaires Row”, due to the huge wealth of its private residents, although in fact the majority of its current occupants are either national embassies or ambassadorial residences. As of late-2018, current market prices for a property in the street average over £35 million. It connects Notting Hill Gate with Kensington High Street. The southern section of Kensington Palace Gardens is called Palace Green.   read more…

Belgravia in London

3 December 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London Reading Time:  15 minutes

Chesham Street © No Swan So Fine/cc-by-sa-4.0

Chesham Street © No Swan So Fine/cc-by-sa-4.0

Belgravia is an affluent district in Central London, covering parts of the areas of both the City of Westminster and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. Belgravia was known as the ‘Five Fields’ during the Tudor Period, and became a dangerous place due to highwaymen and robberies. It was developed in the early 19th century by Richard Grosvenor, 2nd Marquess of Westminster under the direction of Thomas Cubitt, focusing on numerous grand terraces centred on Belgrave Square and Eaton Square. Much of Belgravia, known as the Grosvenor Estate, is still owned by a family property company, the Duke of Westminster’s Grosvenor Group, although owing to the Leasehold Reform Act 1967, the estate has been forced to sell many freeholds to its former tenants.   read more…

East End of London

25 October 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London Reading Time:  16 minutes

Shoreditch photoshoot on Boundary Street © Jwslubbock/cc-by-sa-4.0

Shoreditch photoshoot on Boundary Street © Jwslubbock/cc-by-sa-4.0

The East End of London, often referred to within the London area simply as the East End, is the historic core of wider East London, east of the Roman and medieval walls of the City of London and north of the River Thames. It does not have universally accepted boundaries to the north and east, though the River Lea is sometimes seen as the eastern boundary. Parts of it may be regarded as lying within Central London (though that term too has no precise definition). The term “East of Aldgate Pump” is sometimes used as a synonym for the area.   read more…

Museum of London

8 October 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London, Museums, Exhibitions Reading Time:  8 minutes

Museum of London building © Ethan Doyle White/cc-by-sa-4.0

Museum of London building © Ethan Doyle White/cc-by-sa-4.0

The Museum of London documents the history of the UK’s capital city from prehistoric to modern times and is located in the City of London on the London Wall, close to the Barbican Centre and is part of the Barbican complex of buildings created in the 1960s and 1970s to redevelop a bomb-damaged area of the City. The museum is a few minutes’ walk north of St Paul’s Cathedral, overlooking the remains of the Roman city wall and on the edge of the oldest part of London, now its main financial district. It is primarily concerned with the social history of London and its inhabitants throughout time. The museum is jointly controlled and funded by the City of London Corporation and the Greater London Authority. The museum is the largest urban history collection in the world, with more than six million objects.   read more…

Golders Green in London

5 July 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London Reading Time:  7 minutes

Golders Hill Park © geograph.org.uk - Martin Addison/cc-by-sa-2.0

Golders Hill Park © geograph.org.uk – Martin Addison/cc-by-sa-2.0

Golders Green is an area in the London Borough of Barnet in England. A smaller suburban linear settlement, near a farm and public grazing area green of medieval origins, dates to the early 19th century. Its bulk forms a late 19th-century and early 20th-century suburb with a commercial crossroads. The rest is of later build. It is centred approximately 6 miles (9 km) north west of Charing Cross on the intersection of Golders Green Road and Finchley Road.   read more…

The Churchill Arms in London

25 June 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon appétit, London Reading Time:  3 minutes

© CVB/cc-by-sa-4.0

© CVB/cc-by-sa-4.0

The Churchill Arms is a public house at 119 Kensington Church Street on the corner with Campden Street, Notting Hill, London. There has been a pub on the site since at least the late nineteenth century. Previously known as the “Church-on-the-Hill”, the pub received its current name after the Second World War. It is known for its exuberant floral displays, and extravagant Christmas displays in the winter, and has been described as London’s most colourful pub.   read more…

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