London does not really do triumphal architecture in the way continental cities do. It has grown up piecemeal, with a belief in private enterprise, suspicion of autocratic government, and a relatively impecunious monarchy.

Greenwich is in some ways the exception, and one of the best views in all of Britain is to be had looking south at it from Island Gardens on the north bank of the Thames, or better still, as it was meant to be seen, from a boat on the river. It is undeniably grand. However, g...

The little Old St Pancras church lies to the north of Kings Cross station. Lovely though the church may be it seems an unlikely location for a royal wedding, and indeed it is, but in 1826 a royal wedding of sorts took place there – between Louisa Constance Bouchier Smith and Charles Edward Stuart, Count Roehenstart – pretender to the British throne.

The last of the Stuart monarchs, Queen Anne, died childless in 1714, and the 1701 Act of Settlement prevented Catholics from the throne. This ...

In these strange times we have more time to look more closely at some of the familiar spots in our own locality. So, I had time to stop and study this over-the-top shop frontage in the historic market place of Kingston-upon-Thames – normally full of shoppers but it was very quiet as most shops were still closed. 

At first sight this Grade II listed building might be thought to be Medieval or Tudor but the two dates 1909 and 1929 give away the fact that it is just over 100 years old and built...

Up a narrow 52-step spiral staircase and in the attic of the early eighteenth-century church of the old St Thomas' Hospital is the oldest surviving surgical theatre in Europe. Predating anaesthetics and antiseptics, this atmospheric museum offers a unique insight into the history of medicine and surgery. The original timber framed Herb Garret was once used to dry and store herbs for patients' medicines and in 1822 an operating theatre was included. The Old Operating Theatre Museum has a sp...

Coffeehouses became a hub of news and inevitably a place where new ideas were formed. Boy runners were sent from coffee house to coffee house in order to relay information on major events of the day. After a while coffeehouses became members only clubs in order control the clientele and raise the status of the particular coffeehouse. This conversion of coffee houses into clubs came at the same time as coffee consumption began to decline due to import duties on coffee increased significantly....

London's coffeehouse culture and its commerce were intrinsically linked. During the 18th century a new active culture evolved. Coffeehouses sprang up all over London and attracted a variety of patrons with a head for business. The crowd at coffeehouses included doctors, merchants, writers and politicians.

Over two-thousand coffee houses existed in London by the closing of the seventeenth century. Here are some of London's prominent coffeehouses in the 18th century that we didn't have time t...