Welcome to London x London’s Knightsbridge Guide: your guide to the best bars, restaurants and things to do in this Central London neighbourhood.
Knightsbridge sits on the boundary of the City of Westminster and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, bordering Belgravia and Chelsea with Hyde Park along its northern edge.
One of London’s most affluent addresses, Knightsbridge is surprisingly enchanting for a name with such murky origins.
Its streets run past five-star hotels and boutique stores, but there is more here than department stores and price tags.
Nobody is entirely sure where the name comes from. One theory holds that two knights fought to the death on a bridge that once crossed a stream here; another suggests “knight” was simply old slang for a young lad, and the bridge a meeting place for the city’s youth. For centuries it had a rough reputation, a no man’s land between Kensington and Westminster known chiefly as a haunt for highwaymen.
Development only really began after the Knightsbridge Paving Act of 1790, and it was the arrival of Harrods and Harvey Nichols in the mid-19th century, along with a wave of embassies, that turned the area into one of the most desirable addresses in the city. Today its streets mix fine museums, old churches and some of London’s most expensive real estate.
Old money, high prices, quiet grandeur
