Everyone knows about London’s bridges – Tower Bridge, London Bridge… even the controversial Millennium Bridge (which had to close as soon as it opened for some time because it wobbled too much). But did you know about the Greenwich Foot Tunnel? Deep under the Thames lies a public pathway between the north and south side …
How much do you really know about central London’s newest Bridge? Discover everything you need to know with these interesting facts about the Millennium Bridge – complete with some handy tips for visiting. At only 21 years old, the Millennium Bridge stands proudly as one of London’s most iconic landmarks. Thousands of Londoners use it …
Overlooking the pretty Notting Hill area, Trellick Tower is one of London’s most controversial tower blocks… and for plenty of reasons. Architect Ernö Goldfinger designed the tower based on his previous work, Balfron Tower, which you can find in Poplar. On first impressions, the Trellick Tower apartment block is incredibly striking: standing at 322ft tall …
How many Big Ben facts do you know? If you’re any kind of Anglophile, or a Londoner yourself, you’ll know what the Houses of Parliament’s clock tower looks like, and you will probably have heard it chime too. What else is there? Well, how about Big Ben’s history, and how Big Ben got its name? …
From Eastenders to Ray Winstone, nothing is more London than cockney rhyming slang… well, apart from maybe a bit of roadman slang. Some theories on cockney rhyming slang’s origins include it being a game, a code, or a tricksy way to confuse non-locals. It certainly achieves that a lot of the time! Find yourself confused …
Few iconic designs shout London as much as the K2 Telephone Boxes. Created to replace the unpopular Kiosk No 1 (K1) boxes commissioned by the General Post Office in 1921, Sir Giles Gilbert Scott’s iconic design was submitted to and the eventual winner of a competition held by the Royal Fine Arts commission in 1924. …
No doubt you’ve seen them darting across London’s skies. A flash of bright green splitting through the air, quickly followed by another and another. It used to be that the most exciting colour you’d see on a bird was the red plumage on an aggressive robin, but that was before a band of rose-ringed parakeets …
Hidden in plain sight across the road from St James’s Palace, the Queen Alexandra Memorial is an elaborate memorial commemorating the much-loved wife of King Edward VII, Queen Alexandra of Denmark. Queen Alexandra Memorial Located in the garden wall of Marlborough House, the house in which Alexandra and Edward lived until he was crowned king …
The Alexandra Road Estate (officially the Alexandra & Ainsworth Estate) winds alongside Camden’s railway line, a swooping swish of striking architecture and intricate design that reflects Brutalism’s utopian vision. It was conceived in an age of hope, when public sector housing wasn’t a bunged-in afterthought of poor doors and cramped rooms, but at the cutting …
The Hardy Tree is one of London’s stranger sights. After all, it’s not every day that you come across a tree ringed by old gravestones, neatly arranged concentrically, radiating from the tree’s trunk. Curious? I’d be surprised if you weren’t. What’s the story behind the Hardy Tree? Why is it called the Hardy Tree? I …