This road was used as the route for transporting bricks after the Great Fire of London in 1666, hence the name. It now boasts the greatest concentration of curry houses in Britain.
Harrods was bought in 1985 by Mohamed Al Fayed for £615 million, it covers 4 1/2 acres and holds over 300 department stores.
The bricks of the buildings on Downing Street were originally yellow brick which over two centuries became blackened from pollution. After restoration in the 1960s they were painted black.
The first nude statue in London was erected in the South-East corner of Hyde Park in 1822. After the pleas from 'country women' a fig leaf was later added to save their blushes.
Guy's Tower is the tallest medical building in the world. The portion that sticks out at the top is a lecture theatre and when sitting at the very back you are sat over thin air.
Two oak wells were revealed on Gresham Street dating back to AD63. It has been suggested that water would have been drawn by animals who powered the gear shaft, pulling up 25 gallons per minute.
Bishopsgate often displayed the heads of recently executed criminals on spikes for passers by to to see. The heads were used as a warning to anyone thinking about breaking the law.
Unsold pigs were given to St. Anthony's hospital from this market in the 12th Century. When seen wondering the streets you were obliged to feed them. They grew to great sizes and were worth a fortune
At 1.5 acres Kensington Roof gardens is the largest roof garden in the whole of Europe. The gardens have been owned by Richard Branson's Virgin group since 1981.
Named after hotelier Cesar Ritz, who also managed The Savoy Hotel, the Ritz was the first hotel in London to have en-suite rooms, it was also the first steel framed building in England.
The world's best selling cigarette brand Marlboro is named after this street. The brand initially marketed women with the slogan 'Mild as May'.
A poster displayed at this cinema for a showing of the film 'The Caine Mutiny' was the inspiration for Maurice Micklewhite changing his name to Michael Caine.
Opened in 1927, Veeraswamy's is said to be the oldest surving Indian restaurant in the UK. Famous diners have included Ghandi, Charlie Chaplin, Marlon Brando and the Prince of Wales.
In 1837 The Royal Opera house was the first ever theatre to use limelight. Limelight comes from the mixing of oxygen and hydrogen and then adding real burning lime to achieve a bright light.
Every year a Norway Spruce is erected here and decorated as part of the Christmas festivities. The tree is a gift of thanks from the Norwegians for Britain's support during the Second World War
In 200AD the London Wall was one of the largest construction projects carried out in Roman Britain. It would have required 1,300 barge journeys to transport the 85,000 tons of stone from Kent.
An urban myth, which began shortly after WWII, suggests that an ancient Roman battleground is located here and the body of Iceni Warrior Queen Boudica is buried somewhere beneath platform 9 and 10.
From 1235 until 1835, the monarch’s personal zoo was kept at the Tower, and it included many exotic animals given as presents by other monarchs, including polar bears, leopards and elephants.
The first bridge here was inaugurated on 1 June 1759, when the Prince of Wales (later George III) and his mother Princess Augusta rode across it. The bridge was rebuilt in 1789 and 1903.
In 1616 Anne of Denmark, wife of James I, commissioned Inigo Jones to build the Queen’s House, the first fully Classical building in England. The house now forms part of the National Maritime Museum.
To mark the 50th birthday of the Royal Air Force in 1968, Flight Lt. Allan Pollock flew his Hawker jet under the walkway of Tower Bridge. This unauthorised stunt won him a court martial.
The station was built in 1874 on the site of the old Bethlem hospital for the mentally ill, which dated back to the 14th century and is the origin of the word ‘bedlam’.
The famous illuminated advertising of Piccadilly Circus began as early as 1893, before most of the city had electric street lighting.
During the London Blitz in January 1941, the Central line ticket hall of Bank station took a direct hit, killing 57 people. The crater measured 100 feet by 120.
During the1940 London Blitz, a German bomb broke the water mains above the station and collapsed some of the tunnels, causing 66 deaths. The event is depicted at the end of the film ‘Atonement’.
During World War Two the tube station was used as an air raid shelter. In 1943 a stampede, caused by the sound of anti-aircraft fire, resulted in 173 people being crushed to death in the stairwell.
Opened as the Queen’s Theatre in 1705 by playwright and architect Sir John Vanbrugh, in 1986 it hosted the world premiere of ‘The Phantom of the Opera’, and it’s been on ever since.
The Haymarket is said to be haunted by John Buckstone (its 19th century manager) whose appearance is said to signify his approval of a production. Patrick Stewart claims to have seen him in 2009.
London’s oldest theatre is in its fourth incarnation. The third burned down in 1809. It is said to be one of the world’s most haunted theatres, so watch out for ‘The Man in Grey’!
In the 18th century the park was notorious for highwaymen and Horace Walpole was one of many robbed here. Handel’s ‘Music for the Royal Fireworks’ was composed for an event here in 1749.
The market began life in 1974 as a weekly crafts market, and now has about 100,000 visitors each weekend. The Stables Market is where the horses used to be kept for towing canal barges.
The square here was laid out by Inigo Jones in 1630, on land once used by the monks of Westminster Abbey as a garden, but confiscated by Henry VIII during the Reformation.
The area takes its name from the church of St.Mary at the Bourne (a variation of Tyburn, a local river). The 18th century Marylebone Gardens were famous for bear-baiting, prize-fighting and duelling.
Marie Tussaud, born in Strasbourg in 1761, made her first wax figure of the great French philosopher Voltaire in 1777. She opened a museum in London in 1835.
Euston is London’s oldest intercity railway terminus, opening in 1837 with a connection to Birmingham. The grand old Victorian building was replaced with the modern monstrosity in 1968.
‘Paddington Bear’ was written by Michael Bond in 1958. His bear arrived here somehow from ‘deepest, darkest Peru’ and was named after the station. You can find a statue of him near the escalators.
The floors above the grand Victorian station were run as an upmarket hotel, the Midland Grand, between 1873 and 1922. They are currently being renovated and returned to this purpose.
‘Platform 9 and 3/4 ‘ is a site of pilgrimage for fans of Harry Potter, as this is the place of departure for the Hogwarts Express. A luggage trolley ‘disappearing’ through a wall marks the spot.
In 1991 an IRA bomb hidden in a bin in Victoria station killed one man and injured 38. This led to the removal of all litter bins from London stations.
The new stadium is the second biggest in Europe behind Barcelona’s Camp Nou, but has the most toilets of any stadium in the world! (2618) The first concert held here was George Michael in 2007.
The Hotspur Football Club was formed in 1882 by grammar-school boys who played on Tottenham Marshes. The club is credited with inventing revolutionary ‘push and run’ tactics (the one-two) in 1949.
The club was founded by the foreman of the Thames Ironworks in 1895, hence team nicknames ‘the Hammers’ or ‘the Irons’. Their first game at the current ground was a 3-0 victory vs Millwall in 1904.
Arsenal Football Club was formed by workers from the Woolwich Arsenal in the 1886, hence their nickname ‘the Gunners’. The club moved north of the river to Highbury in 1913.
The 3,000th branch of the hamburger chain and the first in the UK opened in Woolwich in 1974. Woolwich was regarded as a typical suburban area, and if it succeeded here, it could succeed anywhere!
Woolwich was where artillery guns and ammunition were made for the king from the late 17th century. The workers formed a football team called Dial Square in 1886, which later became Arsenal.
This fine Jacobean house was completed in 1612, built for Sir Adam Newton, Dean of Durham and tutor to the elder son of James I. It is now a community centre.
On this historic open space on the London road to Dover, John Ball addressed the revolting peasants in 1381 with the words, ‘When Adam delved and Eve span, who then was the gentleman?’
The largest dome in the world and the largest single-roofed structure in the world was built amid some controversy for £789 million just in time for the millennium, completed in June 1999.
In 1894 a French anarchist named Martial Bourdin was carrying a bomb through the park to the Observatory when it exploded and killed him. No one knows why he had decided to target the Observatory.
Deptford was the birthplace of the Royal Navy, with royal docks established here by Henry VIII in 1513. Francis Drake set off in the Golden Hinde to circumnavigate the globe from here in 1577.
The railway station is the oldest terminus in London, opening in 1836. It was badly damaged in the Blitz, and went through major redevelopment in the 1970s to cope with new levels of traffic.
A market at the southern end of London Bridge is first mentioned in 1276. In 1755 it was closed by Parliament for causing congestion, but soon reopened and is now one of London’s busiest.
This church has origins in a 7th century nunnery and was rebuilt as a church in the 12th century. Its Harvard Memorial Chapel is named after the Southwark-born (b.1607) founder of the US university.
The Bankside Power Station was built as a ‘cathedral of power’ in 1963, but closed in 1981. It reopened as one of Europe’s finest modern art galleries in 2000. The Turbine Hall is 35m high.
