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Do the Strand

Strand-on-the-Green is an often overlooked part of West London but its riverside location and pretty houses make it one of Chiswick’s most charming areas. Many of the houses date from the 18th century but its history goes back much further. In the Museum of London you’ll find pottery dating back to the Bronze and Iron Ages, as well as Roman artefacts, collected by local antiquarian Thomas Layton. In the medieval period fishing was the main industry, with rights granted by Henry II to the Prior of Merton. Later the Dean and Chapter of St Paul’s allowed locals to fish there for an annual rent. It was the arrival, however, of Frederick Prince of...

Track the Vintners' plaques

The Grapes, Lime Street  As you turn right out of Mansion house Station and walk down Garlick Hill, look up to your left and you’ll see two Vintners’ plaques positioned high up on a redbrick building. The property is no longer in the Company’s possession but it reminds us that across the centuries, throughout the City, several addresses were acquired by the Vintners’ Company.  Despite a change of ownership, and indeed in most cases a complete rebuild, you can still find clear signs of our previous extensive involvement in real estate.    Just to the east of Leadenhall Market is Lime Street, a curving street that leads up to the Lloyds building...

The door, the statue and the City of London

200 miles north of London, near the cathedral city of Ripon, lies Newby Hall. It’s a handsome house, originally built by Sir Christopher Wren and enlarged and improved by John Carr of York and Robert Adam. It was once owned by the Weddell family, and later became the home of the Marquesses of Ripon. Today it’s owned by the Compton family, who are descendants of the family and who have maintained its beautiful gardens. They’ve even installed a miniature railway (and Gyles Brandreth’s collection of teddy bears). Walk around the extensive grounds and aside from the herbaceous borders, an enchanting rock garden and the gentle River Ure, you’ll find a weat...

Looking for Richard

College Hill, a narrow lane parallel to Queen Street is one you’ve may never gone down. At the bottom of it stands St Michael Paternoster Royal. A Wren church, it was one of the last to be built after the Great Fire. It’s named after the paternosters, the ‘Our Father’ chants the priests used to utter, and the town of La Reole, in Bordeaux, which had connections with the wine trade. Now the church is the headquarters of the Mission of Seafarers but its claim to fame really lies in one of the burials, for it was here that Richard Whittington, Lord Mayor of London was buried in 1423. His house once stood next door. What we know of Dick Wh...

A Buzz around the City

Beekeeping has become quite trendy around London now and the City has caught onto this. It fills many companies' CSR and at the same time adds interest and a talking point. Indeed, if you’re a valued client of Nomura, you may receive a jar of honey as a present. Around the City you’ll find a hive or two on top of the London Stock Exchange in Paternoster Square as well as the Mansion house. I wonder if the Lord Mayor enjoys a dollop of honey on his toast in the morning? Today I had the pleasure of taking round some German students from Bavaria, some of whom are beekeepers. I naturally had to include a couple of spots along the way! Sadly th...

A whiff of Bauhaus

The City of London is not well-known for its 1930s buildings. Between the Daily Express and Daily Telegraph buildings on Fleet Street, the impressive Ibex house in the Minories and the delightful Fox Fine Wines shop in Moorgate (formerly the Fox umbrella shop) you could be stumped trying to think of any more modernist monuments within the Square Mile. Walk out of Cannon Street Station, however, and look for the small Nii Haw sushi bar straight ahead of you. Before it fed local office workers with dim sum this cute and curvaceous outlet was a branch of TM Lewin. But 80 years ago 115 Cannon Street - to give its correct address - was the Mortimer Gall...