Embassy of the United States in London

3 October 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, London Reading Time:  7 minutes

© Curran2/cc-by-sa-4.0

© Curran2/cc-by-sa-4.0

The Embassy of the United States of America in London is the diplomatic mission of the United States in the United Kingdom. It is located in Nine Elms and is the largest American embassy in Western Europe and the focal point for events relating to the United States held in the United Kingdom. From an architectural point of view, the embassy is interesting because, among other things, aspects of medieval castle building came into play here, including a moat. Ground was broken on 13 November 2013, and the building opened to the public on 13 December 2017.   read more…

Lambeth Palace in London

1 October 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, House of the Month, London Reading Time:  10 minutes

Lambeth Palace from the herb garden © geograph.org.uk - Marathon/cc-by-sa-2.0

Lambeth Palace from the herb garden © geograph.org.uk – Marathon/cc-by-sa-2.0

Lambeth Palace is the official London residence of the archbishop of Canterbury. It is situated in north Lambeth, London, on the south bank of the River Thames, 400 yards (370 metres) south-east of the Palace of Westminster, which houses Parliament, on the opposite bank.   read more…

Tower Bridge in London

2 June 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London Reading Time:  7 minutes

© Fuzzypiggy/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Fuzzypiggy/cc-by-sa-3.0

Tower Bridge is a combined bascule and suspension bridge in London, built between 1886 and 1894. The bridge crosses the River Thames close to the Tower of London and St Katharine Docks and has become a world-famous symbol of London. As a result, it is sometimes confused with London Bridge, about 0.5 miles (0.80 km) upstream. Tower Bridge is one of five London bridges owned and maintained by the Bridge House Estates, a charitable trust overseen by the City of London Corporation. It is the only one of the trust’s bridges not to connect the City of London directly to the Southwark bank, as its northern landfall is in Tower Hamlets.   read more…

Trinity Buoy Wharf in London

26 April 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London Reading Time:  7 minutes

Bow Creek Lighthouse © Grim23/cc-by-sa-3.0

Bow Creek Lighthouse © Grim23/cc-by-sa-3.0

Trinity Buoy Wharf is the site of a lighthouse, by the confluence of the River Thames and Bow Creek on the Leamouth Peninsula, Poplar. It lies within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The lighthouse no longer functions, but is the home of various art projects such as Longplayer. It is sometimes known as Bow Creek Lighthouse.   read more…

Eel Pie Island in London

13 December 2019 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London Reading Time:  7 minutes

The Eel Pie Island Museum in Twickenham © flickr.com - Jim Linwood/cc-by-2.0

The Eel Pie Island Museum in Twickenham © flickr.com – Jim Linwood/cc-by-2.0

Eel Pie Island is a 8.935-acre (3.6 ha) island in the River Thames at Twickenham in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames. It is on the maintained minimum head of water above the only lock on the Tideway and is accessible by boat or from the left (generally north) bank by footbridge. The island had a club that was a major venue for jazz and blues in the 1960s.   read more…

Hampton Court Palace in London

31 May 2019 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, London, Museums, Exhibitions, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  7 minutes

Hampton Court Palace © flickr.com - Duncan Harris/cc-by-2.0

Hampton Court Palace © flickr.com – Duncan Harris/cc-by-2.0

Hampton Court Palace is a royal palace in the borough of Richmond upon Thames, 12 miles (19.3 kilometres) south west and upstream of central London on the River Thames. Building of the palace began in 1515 for Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, a favourite of King Henry VIII. In 1529, as Wolsey fell from favour, the cardinal gave the palace to the King to check his disgrace; Henry VIII later enlarged it. Along with St James’s Palace, it is one of only two surviving palaces out of the many owned by King Henry VIII.   read more…

Tower of London

1 March 2019 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, House of the Month, London, Museums, Exhibitions, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  15 minutes

© Bob Collowân/cc-by-sa-4.0

© Bob Collowân/cc-by-sa-4.0

The Tower of London, officially Her Majesty’s Royal Palace and Fortress of the Tower of London, is a historic castle located on the north bank of the River Thames in central London. It lies within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, separated from the eastern edge of the square mile of the City of London by the open space known as Tower Hill. It was founded towards the end of 1066 as part of the Norman Conquest of England. The White Tower, which gives the entire castle its name, was built by William the Conqueror in 1078 and was a resented symbol of oppression, inflicted upon London by the new ruling elite. The castle was used as a prison from 1100 (Ranulf Flambard) until 1952 (Kray twins), although that was not its primary purpose. A grand palace early in its history, it served as a royal residence. As a whole, the Tower is a complex of several buildings set within two concentric rings of defensive walls and a moat. There were several phases of expansion, mainly under Kings Richard I, Henry III, and Edward I in the 12th and 13th centuries. The general layout established by the late 13th century remains despite later activity on the site.   read more…

Strawberry Hill House

28 August 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, London, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  17 minutes

© panoramio.com - Maxwell Hamilton/cc-by-sa-3.0

© panoramio.com – Maxwell Hamilton/cc-by-sa-3.0

Strawberry Hill House—often called simply Strawberry Hill—is the Gothic Revival villa that was built in Twickenham, London by Horace Walpole (1717–1797) from 1749 onward. It is the type example of the “Strawberry Hill Gothic” style of architecture, and it prefigured the nineteenth-century Gothic revival. Walpole rebuilt the existing house in stages starting in 1749, 1760, 1772 and 1776. These added gothic features such as towers and battlements outside and elaborate decoration inside to create “gloomth” to suit Walpole’s collection of antiquarian objects, contrasting with the more cheerful or “riant” garden. The interior included a Robert Adam fireplace; parts of the exterior were designed by James Essex. The garden contained a large seat shaped like a Rococo sea shell; it has been recreated in the 2012 restoration.   read more…

Wallingford in Oxfordshire

9 December 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  7 minutes

The Coach & Horses pub © geograph.org.uk - Bill Nicholls/cc-by-sa-2.0

The Coach & Horses pub © geograph.org.uk – Bill Nicholls/cc-by-sa-2.0

Wallingford is a market town and civil parish in the upper Thames Valley in England. Until 1974 it was in Berkshire, but was transferred to Oxfordshire in that year. The town’s royal but mostly ruined Wallingford Castle held high status in the early medieval period as a regular royal residence until the Black Death hit the town badly in 1349. Empress Matilda retreated here for the final time from Oxford Castle in 1141. The castle declined subsequently, much stone being removed to renovate Windsor Castle instead. Nonetheless the town’s Priory produced two of the greatest minds of the age, the mathematician Richard of Wallingford and the chronicler John of Wallingford.   read more…

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