This City of London street runs north-south from the junction of Newgate Street, Holborn Viaduct and Old Bailey to West Smithfield. Its name comes from those who once travelled along it.
Looking south down Giltspur Street, with the dome of the Old Bailey visible, in 2018. PICTURE: Courtesy of Google Maps
An alternative name for the street during earlier ages was Knightrider Street which kind of gives the game away – yes, the name comes from the armoured knights who would ride along the street in their way to compete in tournaments held at Smithfield. It’s suggested that gilt spurs may have later been made here to capitalise on the passing trade.
The street is said to have been the location where King Richard II met with the leaders of the Peasant’s Revolt who had camped at Smithfield. And where, when the meeting deteriorated, the then-Lord Mayor of London William Walworth, ending up stabbing the peasant leader Wat Tyler who he later captured and had beheaded.
St Bartholomew’s Hospital can be found on the east side of the street. On the west side, at the junction with Cock Lane is located Pye Corner with its famous statue of a golden boy (said to be the place where the Great Fire of London was finally stopped).
There’s also a former watch house on the west side which features a monument to the essayist late 18th century and 19th century Charles Lamb – the monument says he attended a Bluecoat school here for seven years. The church of St Sepulchre-without-Newgate stands at the southern end with the Viaduct Tavern on the opposite side of the road.
The street did formerly give its name to the small prison known as the Giltspur Street Compter which stood here from 1791 to 1853. A prison for debtors, it stood at the street’s south end (the location is now marked with a City of London blue plaque).
• An exhibition of items unearthed at the site of the former Red Lion Playhouse and the subsequent inn – the White Raven Tavern – built on the site in Whitechapel has opened at UCL East Culture Lab. Patterns Beneath Our Feet tells the story of a 2015-19 excavation on the site and features some of the discoveries made there – everything from clay pipe fragments to Bellarmine jugs and sugar moulds. The White Raven has particular associations with the history of Black Londoners and was one of the taverns from where members of London’s Black community began coerced journeys of resettlement to West Africa in 1786. The free exhibition is open Wednesdays and Saturdays by appointment. Members of the excavation team will be at the Culture Lab (UCL East Marshgate, 7 Sidings Street, Stratford) this Monday (21st July) to guide people through the exhibition as well as answer questions as part of the Festival of Archaeology. There will be a parallel event at the excavation site. For more, see https://www.ucl.ac.uk/archaeology-south-east/research-projects/2025/jul/whitechapel.
• A 1950s fountain in Victoria Embankment Gardens is once again flowing after more than 20 years of silence. The fountain, located at the end of Villiers Street, is octagonal in design and was inspired by a pumping station erected nearby in 1675-76. Standing at more than 70 feet tall, the water tower used to be a major landmark on the London skyline and had provided water pressure for houses along the Strand by using a heavy weight on the top of the tower. The bandstand which surrounds the fountain dates from the 1870s, when it was used to host midday concerts for workers from the neighbouring printing works. The £85,000 restoration project preserved the fountain’s original teak finish and involved replacing the sprinkler system and water treatment as well as adding LED lighting to each tier of the fountain.
• Britain’s first female civil servant has been honoured with a blue plaque at the site of her former home in Battersea. Jeanie Senior became the first female civil servant in 1873 when she was appointed as the first female inspector for girls being educated in pauper schools and workhouses (and later went to work with soldiers returning from the Franco-Prussian War, which contributed to the foundation of the National Society for Aid to Sick and Wounded in War, a predecessor to the British Red Cross, as well as being a co-founder of the Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants). The plaque, funded by The Battersea Society and the FDA union, is located on the Battersea Arts Centre where the property named Elm House was once located.
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It’s one of the most iconic London traditions – the ceremonial changing of the guard outside Buckingham Palace.
Elite guards have served the monarch since the reign of King Henry VII – he made the Royal Body Guard a permanent institution – and Guards Regiments, among the oldest units in the British Army, were first raised in 1656 to protect King Charles II who was then living in exile in Bruges in modern Belgium.
The Changing of the Guard ceremony originally took place at the (now long-gone) Palace of Whitehall. But when the court moved to St James’s Palace in 1698, the ceremony went with them. And then, when Queen Victoria moved to Buckingham Palace in 1837, a detachment of guards was sent to guard the palace (with the Queen’s Guard also still guarding St James’s, a situation which continues today).
The main ceremonial Changing of the Guard today takes place at Buckingham Palace. It involves the Old Guard (those currently on duty, including the detachment from St James’s Palace) forming up in front of the palace and being relieved by the New Guard which has marched from Wellington Barracks, off Birdcage Walk, with a band which plays New Guard’s Regimental Slow March as it advances towards the Old Guard.
Both the Old and New Guard carry regimental flags, known as “Colours”. The guard duties are traditionally served by one of the five regiments of foot guards (part of the Household Division) which include the Welsh Guards, Grenadier Guards, Coldstream Guards, Scots Guards, Irish Guards.
But regiments from Commonwealth nations and those from the Royal Navy or Royal Air Force also perform the duty from time to time.
The Changing of the Guard currently takes place on Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 11am. The ceremony lasts about 45 minutes.
On days when the ceremony isn’t performed, the guard is still inspected by the Captain at 3pm except on Sunday when the flag (Colour) is incorporated into the ceremony, then known as the Sunday Parade, which takes place at 11am.
Some of London’s iconic red buses (not one of the images in the exhibition). PICTURE: Dele Oke/Unsplash
• A new photographic display featuring a mix of historical and newly commissioned images has gone on show at the London Transport Museum. The exhibition – Then and now: London’s transport in photographs – marks the 25th anniversary of Transport for London and more than 160 years of transport history within the capital and features 40 photographs exploring how public transport in London has evolved amid social change. As well as historical images drawn from the collection, the display features images taken by photographer and train driver,Anne Maningas. Runs until spring, 2026. Admission charge applies. For more, see www.ltmuseum.co.uk/visit/museum-guide/then-and-now-londons-transport-photographs.
• A display of portraits by acclaimed artist Sir Quentin Blake has gone on show at the Foundling Museum in Bloomsbury.The Foundling Portraits: Quentin Blake features a series of 10 Stabilo watercolour pencil on paper artworks which depict imaginary children created by Blake during a period of self-isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. The images are among a collection of 45 which were gifted to the museum by Sir Quentin. Admission charge applies. For more, see https://foundlingmuseum.org.uk/event/the-foundling-portraits-quentin-blake/.
• On Now: Prison Nursing Unlocked – A History of Care and Justice.This exhibition at the Royal College of Nursing Library and Museum in Cavendish Square looks at the role of health care in prisons, from the work of early reformers like Elizabeth Fry to the role nurses play today. Co-created with Royal College of Nursing members, it tells the story of the suffragettes who were force-fed in Holloway Prison, the formation of secure hospitals like Broadmoor, and features artwork created by prisoners and nurses at HM Prison Eastwood Park and HM Prison Warren Hill. Runs until 19th December. For more (and a link to the exhibition online), see www.rcn.org.uk/news-and-events/news/prison-nursing-unlocked-exhibition.
Craven Cottage, home of Fulham FC on the bank of the River Thames in west London, is the city’s oldest football stadium.
Craven Cottage (with the Grade II-listed Johnny Haynes Stand on the left in 2021. PICTURE: Nick/Flickr (licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)/Image cropped
The site has been home to the club since 1896, having previously been based at a range of grounds. It took two years to prepare the ground for play including constructing a changing room building.
The first match was played at the ground on 10th October, 1896 (Fulham beat Minerva 4-0 in the Middlesex Senior Cup).
Initially the ground was surrounded with terracing only – this changed in 1903 when the first stand was built on the north side of the ground. Providing seating for 1,200 spectators, it was affectionately known as the ‘Rabbit Hutch’.
The stand didn’t last long. Just 18 months later, it was condemned as dangerous by municipal officials and had to be pulled down.
In January, 1905, it was reported that the club had gained a 99-year lease on the ground. Work on a new stand, 5,000-seat, started just four months later to be designed by Archibald Leitch with steelwork provided by Clyde Structural Iron Company. Known as the Stevenage Road Stand (with a brick facade on the road), it opened on 2nd September that year.
The Cottage Pavilion in 2018. PICTURE: Nick/Flickr (licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)/Image cropped
Leitch also designed the Cottage Pavillion, located at the south-east corner of the ground, which was used for change rooms and by the club’s administration.
In 1907, the club hosted the first full international match when, in March, 1907, England and Wales drew 1-1.
While the club regularly saw crowds of up to 40,000 in the lead-up to World War II, a record was set in 1938 at a game between Fulham and Millwall when the crowd numbered just shy of 50,000.
These days there are four stands: the Grade II-listed Johnny Haynes Stand on the east side of the ground (it was renamed in 2005 in honour of the club legend who also has a statue at the ground); the Riverside Stand on the west side (redeveloped in recent years); the Hammersmith End stand (located to the north of the ground, traditionally its home end); and, the Putney End stand (located at the south end).
The Cottage Pavilion, the balcony of which is from where player’s families have traditionally watched games, remains in the south-east corner.
• Our Story with David Attenborough – the first ever immersive experience at the Natural History Museum – opens its doors today. Created by Open Planet Studios, the 50 minute experience in the Jerwood Gallery features animations, projections, real-world footage and full 360 degree immersion as Sir David draws on his life of exploration to tell the story of humanity and the planet on which we live. The experience is taking bookings until 18th January, 2026. Admission charge applies. For more, see www.nhm.ac.uk/visit/exhibitions/our-story-with-david-attenborough.
• The Royal Academy’s 257th Summer Exhibition opened this week. Co-ordinated by internationally acclaimed architect and Royal Academician Farshid Moussavi in conjunction with the Summer Exhibition Committee, this year’s display of art and architecture explores the theme of ‘Dialogues’. Among the works on show is a six metre high installation of ostrich feathers and steel chain by British artist Alice Channer, a 4.5 metre high and seven metre wide wall made from deconstructed matchboxes by Brazilian artist Antonio Tarsis, and installation of textile carcasses by Argentine-American artist Tamara Kostianovsky. Meanwhile, the Annenberg Courtyard hosts a large scale installation by Royal Academician Ryan Gander which features five three metre diameter inflatable balls inscribed with absurd questions developed with children in a representation of the “inquisitiveness of children who ask what grown-up minds often dismiss as nonsensical or illogical”. Runs until 17th August. Admission charge applies. For more, see royalacademy.org.uk.
• The London Transport Museum has launched an appeal for £30,000 to help complete the restoration of three 1930s Q stock Underground carriages. The funds will be used to re-upholster the seats of two of the Underground cars in moquette – the durable, woollen seating material used in upholstery on public transport all over the world. Q stock trains first entered service on the District line in November, 1938, and were retired from service in 1971. The restoration of the three carriages – which aims to restore them to operational condition – has mainly been carried out at the London Transport Museum Depot in Acton, west London. Donations can be made on London Transport Museum’s website: www.ltmuseum.co.uk/make-donation?campaign=qstock
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More than 1,000 soldiers and 200 horses from the Household Division took part in the King’s Birthday Parade, also known as Trooping the Colour, on Saturday.
Once the biggest hotel in Europe, the opulent Hotel Cecil opened in 1896 on a prominent site overlooking the Thames. But it only survived for little more than three decades.
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Weeks after the start of the Blitz, on 13th October, 1940, a bomb struck a residential housing block and the air raid shelter located in Stoke Newington.
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We pause from our usual London pub names entries to mention three pub names which, while they don’t come from any association with important historical figures or events of the past, do have an interesting, if briefly explained, origin story.
First up itsJohn the Unicorn, located in a former decorator’s shop at 157-159 Rye Lane in Peckham. The story goes that the pub’s first landlord (and it’s only been opened since 2016), named it after his child’s toy – a fluffy unicorn named, you guessed it, John.
The Sylvan Post in Forest Hill in March, 2023. PICTURE: Courtesy of Google Maps
The Sylvan Postat 24-28 Dartmouth Road in Forest Hill is located – yes, you guessed it – in a former post office. The “Sylvan” part comes from the location in Forest Hill. Get it?
Then we come to ThePregnant Man at 40 Chancery Lane. Located under the headquarters of advertising behemoth Saatchi & Saatchi, the pub was named for one of their most memorable ad campaigns of the 1970s which, run on behalf the Family Planning Association, featured a pregnant man with the caption, “Would you be more careful if it was you who got pregnant?”.
• The intersection between design and disability is at the focus of a new exhibition at the V&A which opens on Saturday. Design and Disability showcases the contributions of disabled, deaf and neurodivergent people to contemporary culture from the 1940s until now and spans the disciplines of design, art, architecture, fashion and photography. Highlights include: the world’s first commercially made adaptive Xbox controller by Microsoft; photographs by Simon Way which capture the work of Jaipur Foot as it makes free prosthetic legs, feet and arms for millions of people across India; the McGonagle Reader – an audio-assisted voting device to help Blind and low vision people to vote independently; and, the Squeeze Chaise Longue, a red recliner developed by artist Wendy Jacobs, which embraces the sitter between two red mohair arms and provides comforting sensory feedback for those who appreciate deep pressure stimulation. The exhibition in The Porter Gallery at the South Kensington institution runs until 15th February. Admission charges apply. For more, see vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/design-and-disability.
• Eid on the Square returns to Trafalgar Square this Sunday. The free, family-friendly festival, hosted by Deana Soni and Haroon Rashid, will feature traditional and contemporary performances by Nasheed artist Mesut Kurtis, Chand Ali Khan Qawwal & Group, the Indonesian Angklung Ensemble feat HE Dr Desra Percaya, and children’s entertainers Omar & Hana. Halal Tourism Britain are running guided walking tours and presenting a pop-up Muslim Museum of Britain, and there will be workshops including drumming, coconut leaf weaving, calligraphy and poetry at the WAW Creative Arts Family Zone, while Rumi’s Cave – Spearhead Creatives will hosts an interactive tent which blends comedy, music and creative writing. Market stalls will offer books, crafts and jewellery, and the chance to indulge in delicious dishes ranging from Uzbek and Afghan cuisine to Korean fried chicken, churros and much more. Runs from noon to 6pm. For more, see www.london.gov.uk/events/eid-square-2025.
• On Now – James Brimble’s Picture Archive. This free exhibition at the Epping Forest Visitor Centre in Chingford celebrates James Brimble’s 1950 book London’s Epping Forest and includes a range of restored images by James, most of which are previously unpublished, including framed prints and a digital display of around 100 images of Epping Forest and the surrounding areas from the 1950s, 60s and 70s. The display also contains some of the original copper printing plates from his book and supporting material depicting Brimble’s photographic legacy. Can be seen until 28th September. For more, see www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/things-to-do/green-spaces/epping-forest/where-to-go-in-epping-forest/chingford-visitor-centre.
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While no official death toll was announced at the time, it’s now believed that 104 people died in the bombing. Forty-eight bodies were recovered and buried in Streatham Cemetery while the remainder still lie under the park.
The majority of those killed were women and children with the youngest just three-months-old. The oldest known victim was 75.
While Lambeth’s civilian dead are commemorated in a memorial at Lambeth Cemetery dedicated in 1952, in early 2000s the Friends of Kennington Park raised funds for a permanent memorial to those killed in the tragedy in the park.
The memorial, which was designed by Richard Kindersley and is located in the South Field close to the Tinworth Fountain Gate, is an upright stab of Caithness stone brought from Scotland standing 2.6 metres tall.
It is inscribed with a quote from poet Maya Angelou – “History despite its wrenching pain cannot be unlived but if faced with courage need not be lived again.”
While another inscription around the edge of the stone commemorates the more than “50 men, women and children” who died during the bombing, a nearby interpretation board puts the toll at more than 100.
WHERE: Kennington Park, inside the Tinworth Fountain Gate, Kennington Park Road, Lambeth (nearest Tube station is Oval); WHEN: Usually 7.30am until 15 minutes before sunset; COST: Free; WEBSITE: www.lambeth.gov.uk/parks/kennington-park
A titan of American broadcast journalism, Edward R Murrow’s name is synonymous with London during World War II from where, as a correspondent for CBS, he famously provided live radio broadcasts at the height of the Blitz.
Edward R Murrow, seen in a screenshot in 1961. PICTURE: Via Wikipedia
Murrow, who joined CBS in the US in 1935, went to London in 1937, initially to serve as director of the network’s European operations. Said to have been deeply committed to exposing the threat Nazism posed to Americans, he was soon deeply involved in reporting events leading up to and during World War II with his first on the scene news report taking place in March, 1938, when he reported live from Vienna, Austria, during Hitler’s annexation.
Following the breakout of the war in 1939, Murrow remained based in London and went on to provide his famous live broadcasts during the Blitz, opening them with the iconic words, “This is London” and, later, ending them with “Good night and good luck”.
Weymouth House in Westminster where Edward R Murrow stayed during his time in London. PICTURE: Spudgun67 (licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0)
His wartime dispatches – which were broadcast from a studio in the sub-basement of the BBC’s Broadcasting House (which was bombed more than once) as well as from locations including Traflagar Square and a rooftop during the bombing raids – were to win him considerable acclaim and also saw him undertake such feats as joining combat missions in the skies over Europe and being one of the first two reporters to enter Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany in April, 1945.
Such was his standing that then British Prime Minister Winston Churchill even offered to make him joint-director of the BBC (a job offer he declined).
Murrow made his last report from London in March, 1946, before returning to the US to head CBS News. he continued to work with CBS until resigning in 1961 to take up a position as head of the United States Information Agency, a job he held until 1964.
He died at the age of 57 after being diagnosed with lung cancer at his home in Pawling, New York, on 27th April, 1965.
During his time in London, Murrow lived in a flat at Weymouth House, 84-94 Hallam Street in Westminster. An English Heritage Blue Plaque now commemorates his stay there.
Murrow is, of course, also the subject of the 2005 film – and subsequent Broadway production – Good Night, and Good Luck (although that focuses on his later stand against US Senator Joe McCarthy and his hunt for communists).
Located in one of the oldest parts of the city’s iconic fortress, the medieval palace has undergone a revamp with a restoration of the sumptuous and extravagant decorative scheme that was in place in the 13th century.
The medieval palace is found within the St Thomas’s Tower, the Wakefield Tower and the Lanthorn Tower on the southern side of the Tower and was built on the orders of successive monarchs, King Henry III and his son King Edward I. They were used as a domestic and diplomatic space periodically by the kings and their queens, Eleanor of Provence and Eleanor of Castile.
The medieval palace today includes a recreation of Edward I’s vibrant bedchamber in the St Thomas’s Tower (which once directly fronted the River Thames and sits above the water gate later known as Traitor’s Gate) and an exploration of the influence Eleanor of Castile had on the decoration.
The Wakefield Tower, meanwhile, was built by King Henry III as royal lodgings between 1220 and 1240. It originally sat at the river’s edge and could be accessed from the river by private stairs.
Believed to have been used as an audience chamber, it contains a recreation of a throne and canopy based on 13th century examples which are decorated with a Plantagenet lion – the symbol of the royal family. The vaulted ceiling is 19th century.
The third of the towers – the Lanthorn Tower – was built as lodgings for King Henry III’s Queen but is now a 19th century reconstruction after the original tower was gutted by fire.
It contains a display and among the new objects is a stone, on loan from the Jewish Museum London, which came from a Jewish mikveh or ritual bath, dating to about 1200 and discovered in London in 2001 within the home of the medieval Crespin family. It’s part of a new effort to explore the story of London’s medieval Jewish community, the taxation of which helped to pay for the construction of St Thomas’s Tower in the 1270s.
Other new objects on show in the Lanthorn Tower include a 13th century seal matrix from a 13th century Italian knight and a gold and enamel 13th century pyx – a small round container used to hold communion wafers made in the French city of Limoges (both on loan from the British Museum) as well as a child’s toy knight made of lead that dates from c1300, lent by London Museum and a perfectly preserved wicker fish trap which was excavated from the Tower moat, containing bones likely dating from the 15th or 16th century and illustrating the moat’s role as a fishery.
A replica of King Edward I’s seal matrix in the Medieval Palace exhibition, accompanied by a description in braille. This item is intended to be touched by visitors, to help them understand what the seal matrix might have looked and felt like in three dimensions. PICTURE: Michael Bowles (www.michael-bowles.com)
Among other stories now told in the display is that of less well-known Tower residents such as King Edward I’s laundress Matilda de Wautham, and John de Navesby the keeper of the white bear which was held in the menagerie at the Tower.
WHERE: The Medieval Palace, The Tower of London (nearest Tube Station is Tower Hill); WHEN: 9am to 5:30pm daily (last entry 3:30pm); COST: £35.80 adults; £28.50 concession; £17.90 children (free for Historic Royal Palaces members and £1 tickets are available for those in receipt of certain means-tested financial benefits); WEBSITE: www.hrp.org.uk/tower-of-london/
Visitors in the central Weston Collections Hall at V&A East Storehouse, a working store and new visitor attraction from the V&A located in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, London, opening this Saturday, 31st May. PICTURE: David Parry/PA Media Ass
• The V&A East Storehouse opens to the public for the first time in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park this Saturday. The venue features more than 100 mini-displays centred on the themes of ‘Collecting Stories’, ‘Sourcebook for Design’ and ‘The Working Museum’ and boasting more than 1,500 items from across the V&A’s collections with works by Hew Locke, Zaha Hadid, Daniel Liebskind and Thomas Heatherwick’s London 2012 Olympic cauldron model among those featured. A massive 11-metre-wide stage cloth designed by Pablo Picasso for the Ballets Russes’ 1924 production, Le Train Bleu, will be displayed for first time in more than 10 years while among large scale objects are a section of the now-demolished housing estate, Robin Hood Gardens, and Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1930s Kaufmann Office – the only Frank Lloyd Wright interior outside of the US. Anyone can book access to any object in the storehouse for free via the ‘Order an Object’ process and the venue is also hosting a series of live events including back2back: Archival Bodies, and new programming strand, A Life in the Work of Others– featuring Turner-Prize-winning artist, Jasleen Kaur. Admission to the Storehouse at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, is free. For more, see www.vam.ac.uk/east.
Visitors looking at a two-storey section of Robin Hood Gardens, at V&A East Storehouse, a working store and new visitor attraction from the V&A located in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, London, opening this Saturday, 31st May. PICTURE: David Parry/PA Media Assignme
• The home where novelist Barbara Pym began writing her celebrated 1952 novel Excellent Women has been given an English Heritage Blue Plaque. Pym lived at the second floor flat at 108 Cambridge Street in Pimlico with her sister Hilary between November 1945 to autumn 1949. It was from a corner room, overlooking Warwick Square and St Gabriel’s Church, that she meticulously recorded her observations, and laid the groundwork for her distinctive literary voice. Her work during this period also included revising the text for her first published novel, Some Tame Gazelle (1950). In March, three more Blue Plaques were unveiled commemorating women: Una Marson (1905–1965), the BBC’s first Black woman producer at The Mansions, Mill Lane in West Hampstead where she lived from at least 1939 to 1943; and, Rhoda Garrett (1841–1882) and Agnes Garrett (1845–1935), at 2 Gower Street in Bloomsbury where they founded Britain’s first female-run interior-decorating business. For more, see www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/blue-plaques/.
• A free family trail inspired by Jessie Burton’s new children’s book, Hidden Treasure, has launched at the London Museum Docklands. Inspired by the tale of two young mudlarks, the trail takes families on a journey around the museum’s galleries to learn more about centuries of life by the river. It’s aimed at children under 12-years-old, who also have free entry into the museum’s mudlarking exhibition, Secrets of the Thames. For more, see www.londonmuseum.org.uk.
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