North London Railway - Hoxton

(For reasons of space – these very intensive inner city squares will be divided into quarters – meaning two quarters for the line of the North London Railway for this square. The two eastern quarters can wait for the future)


North London Railway
The railway line continues northwards turning north eastwards

River Walbrook
Springs contributing to the Walbrook may, or may not, rise in this area and flow south.

Post to the south Shoreditch
Post to the east Bethnal Green Boundary Estate


Basing Place
Basing Square - Berman’s Almshouses. These were built here in 1813 and resulted from funds left by Nonconformist Minister William Berman in 1700 and were for eight poor women. They were destroyed by Second World War bombing and rebuilt in Brentwood, Essex
Mission. In the 19th there was a Mission Hall here and a Wesleyan Sunday School. This also seems to have operated as an independent private school also described as a Ragged School.

Basing House Yard
This is presumably named as the yard of the adjacent pub.
Shoreditch Ambulance Station

Bath Place
This is now a gated passage under a building whereas it was once a through road between Old Street and Rivington Street.

Bowling Green Walk
8 Griffin manufacturer of dressing cases, etc 1875
City Iron Works. From 1852 this was the works of the Cornish Lawrence Brothers who held patents in lock gates and sluices

Calvert Avenue
Syd's Coffee stall. It was started by Sydney Edward Tothill in 1919 with his invalidity pension from the Great War, and has been in the same position and run by the family ever since. The business is now Hillary ‘Caterers, commemorating Sir Edmund Hillary.

Charlotte Road
43 Kemistery Gallery
63 Bricklayers Arms. Said to have once been a Mecca for local artists.

Chapel Place
This is now 318 Old Street.
The New Tabernacle Congregational Chapel is now offices and said to have a spring beneath. The New Tabernacle, was founded in 1832. It was called the 'new' Tabernacle church to distinguish it from the Methodist Tabernacle at Moorfields. It was closed in 1950.

Coronet Street
The Circus Space This was the Shoreditch Vestry Combined Generating station and Dust destructor providing electricity for the surrounding area and using the Waste heat for the public baths.  Built 1895-7 as the first such works set up to fulfil both functions. The consultant engineer was E. Manville and it was opened by Lord Kelvin. The facade is in Fletton brick and terracotta with the motto E PULVERE LUX ET VIS - Out of the dust, light and power. It was sympathetically converted to a circus training school by Philip Lancashire in 1994, with a gymnasium in the old generating hall, and a training space in the former Combustion House.
35 Bass Clef night club which closed in 1994. This was a warehouse and works for a metal merchant in the 1890s with iron cranes on the outside of the building.
39 Sh – feminist sex shop
45 Standpoint Gallery

Cottons Gardens
A narrow cobbled cul-de-sac which at one time went out into Hackney Road.
1-15 3-storey warehouse buildings are finely in red brick. There are remaining roof-mounted pulleys. These buildings were owned by John Carter and Sons Ltd and were built as Leather and Boot works by RC Hitch
6-10 4-storey warehouse building converted into flats. In 1921 a cabinetmaker and tin box maker were here and in 1944 6 was occupied by an upholsterer and. 8-10 by a glass works. Built in red brick there are still three columns of wooden loading doors with a pulley above each set.

Crooked Billet Yard
There were 17th cottages here in the 1930s
4 Shoreditch Prototype House.  Low energy house on a brownfield site. Glazed and planted façade.  Designed by the architects Cox Bulleid, this is a 3-bedroom live/work house with studio entered via a gated south-facing courtyard garden which has fragrant climbing plants on all sides.

Curtain Road
120-124 Strongroom. Recording Studio and Bar. This was a site for James Latham who began importing hardwoods into Liverpool in 1759. The firm used a site in Clapton site from 1912 but have since move to Hemel Hempstead. This site would have been to fulfill the timber needs of the local furniture trades. Strongroom started when Richard Boote opened it as a single studio in 1984. Their first album was John Cale’s ‘Artificial Intelligence’, released in 1985, followed by Nico’s ‘Camera Obscura’. Classic albums from the Housemartins and Nick Cave followed. Richard opened a second studio dedicated to emerging MIDI technology, and featured an Atari 520ST and an early Apple Mac.
127 Barley Mow Pub
134-146 Built 1880s and for C & R Light. Five-storey warehouse for storing furniture much of which was bought in from local makers. Light's sold to West End retail stores, like Maples for whom they produced catalogues. Buyers would come here and the grand facade was built to impress them.
135-139 this was the warehouse for Saul Moss & Sons, cabinet makers, and later for Beresford & Hicks.
148-150 warehouse, crane,

Drysdale Street
Previously called Edward Street
26 Formerly this was The Weavers Arms Public House.  It is in yellow stock brick. Facing Drysdale Place a recessed blind arch which once was a doorway. The wooden shop front is still there with a corner entrance with double-doors, that went into the bar

Fanshawe Street
This was once called Aske Street and a large block of flats is Aske House.
1-7 Academy Buildings. Three storey warehouses, built in the 1890s. On the front are bays containing wooden loading doors. They are now flats. The 'Academy ' refers to Hoxton Dissenting Academy which was in Hoxton Square in the 19th
Enfield Cloisters. This is a Victorian Mansion Block It was originally built around 1900 as a tenement but has since been done up
46 Lion and the Lamb. This 1950s pub is now an art gallery.

Great Eastern Street
Granite column which marks the junction with Old Street. It is inscribed ‘Great Eastern Street opened by The Metropolitan Board of Works, 187’ and ‘Neither is he that planteth any thing neither he that watereth, but God that giveth the increase’ and ‘This column erected by the vestry of St. Leonard, Shoreditch, 1880’ and  ‘The vestry of St. Leonard Shoreditch, constituted, 1855’.  Another metal plate says that it was resited in 2002. It was designed by A. Nicholson, was a local stone merchant from Lane.


Hackney Road
1 Browns strip club. This was called Horns but changed its name in the early 1980s

Hoxton Market
The actual street market is not held here but in Hoxton Street. The square and its name results from a 17th project to promote a market here.
3 Alexander Fleming Halls. Plain yellow brick student lodgings, rebuilt 1997-8
5 The Juggler Cafe
13-14 Shaftsbury House. This was previously a Christian Mission building. On a tall rear facade of 1913 added to an earlier building; well-detailed Neo-Georgian, the windows freely grouped.  On it a plaque which says” Lewis "Daddy" Burtt, 1860 - 1935, John Burtt, 1855 - 1925, Honorary Secretary & Superintendent, Founders of Hoxton Market Christian Mission, founded in 1886. Operating from these premises from 1915, for the benefit of local people”. This was a Greek restaurant now a meat eaters restaurant
Sculpture of a juggling figure. By Simon Stringer, 1994.  To recall the music hall traditions of the area


Hoxton Square
Laid out after 1683. The square was relandscaped in 1995 and some buildings are set back behind what were once front gardens. 
Hoxton Square Academy. This settled in Hoxton in 1762.  It was started with support from the Congregational Fund Board. Its first tutor was an American Isaac Chauncey. It closed in 1785. A dissenting academy was also here in 1834 which became the first Wesleyan 'theological college'.
1 James Parkinson. Doctor and author of An Essay on the Shaking Palsy, was in practice here and there is a plaque on the site. It is now a restaurant and bar.
2-4 Lux Centre. New Burrell Foley Fischer cinema opened in 1997 a fit-out in a shell by another architect and for cutting edge, art-house films. .The interior space was designed specifically for the London Filmmakers' Co-operative. Programming was a mix of experimental and independent films. It opened in autumn 1997 and closed in 2001. It is now offices and a restaurant,
6-7 former furniture workshops built in the 1800s
8-9 former furniture workshops workshop windows. By the mid 19th the residential building of the square had been replaced by furniture workshops. Dated 1897, windows extending full width between the party walls.
10 Gothic with angular oriel, was built as a vicarage in the 1870s, probably by Drew the architect of St Peter's, which stood at the corner
Saint Peter's Church. It was established in 1869 designed by R.Drew. It was united with Saint Leonard, Shoreditch, in 1937 and the church was demolished. The site is now new buildings used as offices and a pub
St Monica’s Catholic Primary School. Built in 1870, plain Gothic. It became the Hoxton Apprentice.
16 Hoxton Apprentice. This was a charity set up to train young people as restaurant workers. It has since closed.
19 St.Monica’s Roman Catholic Church. Bui1t in 1864 and designed by Pugin. The parish was founded as a mission of the Irish Augustinians to the East End and the church was the first permanent foundation of the Augustinian friars in England since the Reformation. A gilded wooden altar with reredos was installed in 1875: consecrated by Cardinal Manning and in 1880 a Lady Chapel was created. In the front of the chapel's altar was a copy of the image preserved at the Basilica of Our Lady of Good Counsel, Genazzano. Sadly, the statues of Ss Monica and Augustine have disappeared but decorative inscriptions from Pugin’s original design have been uncovered.  Four stained glass windows by M.E. Aldrich Rope from 1924.
St. Monica’s Roman Catholic Primary School. Newer build school on a different site.
28-30 Pongees. Originally Swiss this silk merchants moved to Old Street in 1931 and to this site in 1995
32 An impression of the square’s original character can be gained from this house – the red brick front is a re-creation of a 17th house
33-34 Lincoln House. Offices and exhibition space.
36 The Rectory. This is the house for the vicar of St.Leonard, Shoreditch
37 Red Dog Saloon
39a  Shoreditch Electricity Showrooms. Art gallery and bar. The Showrooms were opened by Shoreditch Borough Council in 1929 and sold and demonstrated all sorts of electrical items here. Local residents could sign up here for the council’s “Rental Wiring Scheme” which was launched in 1926.
48 White Cube art gallery, known for representing a number of the movement of young British artists in old industrial buildings.  Closed 2012
56 18th with later bowed shop front. In the lane
Gardens. The central garden belonged to the Hoxton Square Trustees, who leased it to Shoreditch Borough Council for £12 a year. In 1901 a granite drinking fountain was put up here by the Metropolitan Public Gardens Association, given by J. Passmore-Edwards. The layout has changed very little – there are two grassed areas surrounded by paths, shrubs and mature trees. There are plane trees and seats beside the drinking fountain, and a small pavilion. The garden is maintained by the Hoxton Trust, founded in 1982 as a charity

Hoxton Street
12-18 Hoxton Street studios
41 Red Lion –pub with a roof top bar and convictions for ecstasy in the food.
46 Open Kitchen. Training kitchen run by London City Hospitality Centre
46-48 site of Castlefrank House. Workers flats erected before the Second World War
Jewish cemetery a quarter-acre ground used between 1707 & 1878 by the Hambro Synagogue of Fenchurch Street. It was officially open until 1878, although it had not been used for many years before that. The lease on the ground expired in the mid-1960s, and human remains were transferred, to West Ham Cemetery.
70 Macbeth. Brick and stucco public house painted blue. In the pediment is ‘Hoxton Distillery’ - when it was first built it was a gin distillery, using water from an underground spring.  Inside are huge tiled pictures with scenes from the play.


Kingsland Road
The Old Shoreditch Station Bar. Coffee shop and bar in the old station buildings. There is an exhibition space and pop up events.
Shoreditch Station. This was opened in 1865 Built by the North London Railway at the Junction of Old Street and Kingsland Road in their usual style. There were only three platforms, and there was nothing to serve the west side fourth line.  In 1928 the street level building was rebuilt. On 3rd October 1940 the station was bombed and closed, but the booking office remained open for another year for replacement bus services.  In the 1970s the street level building was demolished but investigators found that the inside appeared intact, even down to its ticket window. At the southern end of the station there were iron balustrades, which originated from the island platform stairway. The platforms have now been demolished for the East London Line Extension.
Signal Box. There were also traces of a brick structure on the platform in the 1960s , thought to have been the remains of the original No.1 Box here and which had been moved northwards in the 1870s.  No.2 Box. was added later opposite to it.
Railway Viaduct: in some places on the west side there are railings instead of the usual brick parapet. These are thought to have been to allow more light into adjoining buildings, when the line was widened in the 1870s
1-3 Spread Eagle Pub. A pub of this name has been on this site since at least the early 17th. It was rebuilt in the early 20th and in recent years has also been called the Penny Farthing, and been a strip club
7 Four Vintners off-licence with mushroom sculpture by Christian Nagel
19-23 The building has signage on it about ownership by a shoe factors established inn 1860. There were a number of shoe factors operating in this area in the late 19th – it is possible that this was firm called Doughty.
25-27 Basing House. Pub and nightclub.  This was previously called The Castle, and before that The Old Basing House. A pub of that name seems to have been here since at least the 18th.
41-49 stained glass studios of Goddard & Gibbs. These buildings were constructed for glass merchants supplying the furniture trade with mirrors and glass for cupboard decoration. The premises were built in the 1880s for The Eaton & Co, plate glass merchants.
48 Bells of Shoreditch. Night club names after the ‘Oranges and Lemons’ rhyme.
53 19th commercial building with the word 'GLASS' etched above the first-floor central window and the street number on the bay. This is another address for Goddard and Gibbs
74 The Printspace. This claims to have been Europe’s first walk-in DIY professional photographic printing lab which opened in 2007
Hackney Community College – parts of the campus centred on Falkirk Street. Student accommodation in Kingsland Road is built round what was Mail Coach Yard.
4 Ladbrokes. The building has a plaque ‘girls’ school rebuilt 1802’. This was the St.Leonard’s parish school. The parish charity school had opened in 1705 in Pitfield Street, funded by subscriptions from the liberties, and was for fifty boys to be trained for apprenticeships. It school later moved to a house at the end of Kingsland Road.  The girls' school opened in 1709 with the aim of preparing them for domestic service. In 1799 Kingsland Road was widened and a new school built and remained until 1889. 
Perseverance Works. Cluster of 19th industrial buildings containing a range of small business. Said to be an old match factory.

New North Road
Drinking fountain on the pavement outside St. John’s Gardens. There is a drinking fountain presented by the Metropolitan Drinking Fountain and Cattle Trough Association set in the railings, which are shaped around it to allow access from both street and gardens.

Old Street
This was widened in 1872-7, but a few battered buildings of 18th and early 19th Remained
275 Holiday Inn Hotel.
325-329 This was Parry & Sons (Tools), Ltd., in 18th, domestic buildings. It had the Royal Warrant displayed on the first floor front and a mosaic floor inside with Parry’s sundial. It is now the Central London Sports Injury Clinic. With a giant model spine going up the front of the building and hiding the drainpipe.
333 London Apprentice. This pub is recorded from 1756, and rebuilt around 1895.  It was a well known as a landmark in the 18th and 19th and there are a number of stories, some of which may be true, about its associations with the resurrectionist trade and criminal low life generally. In the 19th it was known as somewhere where furniture trade cheques could be cashed weekly. Since the 1990s it has operated as a nightclub than a pub Having been a focal point of the Shoreditch gay scene of the 1980s, and building which held the first ever Terence Higgins Trust meeting. It has had a number of changes of name through these years and on some web sites is thought not to operate as a pub at all.
336 The Reliance Pub
380 Theatre Centre. This is the headquarters of a professional theatre company touring to children and young people. It was founded in 1953 to make theatre for high quality theatre for young audiences
Fuller’s Almshouse.  These were established under the will of John Fuller, a judge whose left money in 1592 for two almshouses, one for twelve women, in Shoreditch.  His widow bought a site on the south side of Old Street and built the almshouses before 1605. This administered by Shoreditch Parish, was rebuilt in 1787 and moved to in Wood Green in 1865. The site was used for the new Town Hall.
Shoreditch Town Hall. Built in 1866 on the site of Fuller’s Hospital as Shoreditch Vestry Hall. It is said to be an ‘evocative survival from the era of the reformed vestries’. The original vestry hall was built in 1866-7 to the east designed by Caesar A. Long; the vestry surveyor; with big vestry room at the back and a first-floor public hall for 1,200 people. In 1893 Charles Barry added offices to the west and in 1901 William G. Hunt added committee rooms for the new Metropolitan Borough of Shoreditch. A tower was added, a broken pediment and sculptures of the municipal achievements of Shoreditch - reclining figures of Light and Power and Progress. Inside an imperial stair leads to the first-floor public hall, an original feature rebuilt with a new roof in 1904 by A. G. Cross. In 1937-8 a brick built rear wing was added by the borough architect C. T. Fulcher. After the creation of the London Borough of Hackney in 1965 it was used by the Borough Heath Department and the council chamber used as a hall. It is now used as an entertainment and event venue including the ‘real gem’ the ‘untouched and distressed’ basement.
Weavers Company Almshouses stood at the junction with Kingsland road. They were funded by a William Watson for twelve widows of weavers and retired weavers and built on land leased from the parish for 200 years in 1669 rebuilt in 1826. In 1859 they were rebuilt in Wanstead together with other charitable provision by the Weavers.
Badger Almshouses, adjoined the Weavers Almshouses at the south east end of Hoxton Street. They had been founded under the terms of Allen Badger's will in 1674/5 and erected in 1698. Although intended for men they appear to have been solely used by women. Towards the end of the 19th the buildings were condemned but The Charity Commissioners, advised the Trustees to discontinue the almshouses altogether
The Refuge for the Destitute . This stood behind the Weavers and Badgers almshouses and had been founded by Rev. Edward Whitaker originally in Lambeth. The Male Refuge at Hoxton opened some time before 1819.  It was intended for the relief of destitute young people released from prison. It closed in 1849 when the government’s grant was drastically reduced.
Walters' and Porter’s Almshouses.  These were on the site of the Magistrates Court and to the east of the Weavers and Badgers. The Drapers ‘Company managed these which had been founded in 1656 under the terms of the wills of John Walter and his widow, Alice.  They were for eight almspeople, appointed through public election by the Drapers Company and Shoreditch parish. They were extended and rebuilt through the gift of Thomas Porter in 1826. Demolished 1902
Police Court and Magistrates Court built on the sites of a number of almshouses by J. D. Butler. In 1906 it had accommodation for 37 constables 1906. It is in brick above a granite base with a stone front. There is a court on both ground and first floors, approached from a central waiting area.  It closed in 1996 and was empty until part of the Occupy London movement moved-in in 2011 and it is now being reconfigured as a boutique hotel.
Rail bridge. Part of the Kingsland viaduct built as the main part of the North London City Extension of 1861. The viaduct closed in 1986 until proposals in 1993 to extend the East London Line from Shoreditch to Dalston. This opened in 2010 and the viaduct has been refurbished

Pitfield Street
This is named after Charles Pitfield, who owned a mansion in the area in the 17th. It was also once called St.John’s Street. The street still has some 19th granite setts and many buildings were joinery workshops.
8 Beershop. This was an off-licence with a large range of British bottled beers, and a selection of Belgian and German beers. The Pitfield Brewery' next door was founded in 1982 and started selling beer from the real ale revival. A five barrel brewery was installed and the first brew produced was 'Pitfield Bitter'. In 1985 another beer produced was Dark Star which in 1987 won the title of ‘Best New Beer’ came runner up in ‘The Champion Beer of Britain’ And in 1988 was awarded ’The Supreme Champion Beer of Britain.’ In 2006 the brewery closed and moved to Essex. The shop is now a Cypriot supermarket.
17-21 Early 19th front to an older building behind. 19th and 20th shop fronts.
32 The Hop Pole. 19th pub. It is has a ground floor is faced with dark green faience, ands cream tiles with raised green lettering with the pub name also saying 'TRUMAN'S ALES' and 'TRUMAN'S ALES & STOUT'. And 'TRUMAN HANBURY BUXTON & CO LTD’. The pub closed in 1985. And in 2005 was converted to flats.
45 Charlie Wright’s International Bar. This was the Queen’s Head, renamed after the landlord in 1910 and now a jazz venue
55 This was a Varieties Music Hall built by C. J. Phipps in 1870. It opened as a cinema in 1914, known as the Cinema by architects were Lovegrove and Papworth. It was taken over the Hyams Circuit and in 1928 by Gaumont British Theatres. It was closed in 1956 and sold by the Rank Organisation in 1960 and was used as meat packers, a delicatessen importer and an artists' studio. In 2004 it was hoped to open it as a community cinema but the plans were revised and the auditorium was demolished. The facade has been preserved and it is hoped to build a new 4-screen cinema.
Aske's Hospital . This was established by the Haberdashers' Company under the will of Robert Aske, 1689.   The charity acquired the Pitfield Street site, and invested the remaining money in lands in Kent. Scientist Robert Hooke designed the buildings finished in 1695. A statue of Robert Aske was set in a niche over the central doorway. It was for twenty poor freemen of the Company and a school for twenty sons of freemen.   The original buildings were demolished in 1822 and replaced by others a designed by David Riddell Roper with big four column portico on the plain brick building. In 1873 the almshouses closed and were demolished while the school expanded and extended as a National School in 1873. Shoreditch Technical Institute was housed there from 1898.
City and East London College in what were Haberdashers’ almshouses. This was taken over by the London County Council in 1898. In 1951 it became the London College of Furniture. Private luxury housing is now in these charitable premises.
Aske Gardens. The open space in front was then designated as public open space when the LCC took over. The gardens remain a public amenity, laid out with recreational facilities despite private housing in the old charity buildings. The boundary with Pitfield Street still has its 19th railings on stone coping and stone gate piers.
George and Vulture. With tall striped gable. Claims to be built in 1870 and to be the tallest pub in London.
Public Baths. These were built by Spalding & Cross, with exterior by Hare alongside the generating station in Coronet Street to use the waste heat in 1899. They were also used for boxing matches as part of the local boys club.  They were demolished in 1962 after war damage. . 
Shoreditch Library. This is a Passmore Edwards donation  Library.  It was designed in 1895-7 by H. T. Hare brick and terracotta, in a style said to be derived from Norman Shaw's New Scotland Yard. The inside was restored after Second World War damage in 1955-6 by J.L. Sharratt.  Inside is a bust of Charles Bradlaugh. It was used for a time by English National Opera for rehearsals and workshops, but is now flats upstairs and downstairs performance spaces and rehearsal studios for the Courtyard Theatre. The Courtyard has a 150 seater Main House, an 80 seat Studio Theatre, and also rehearsal space such as the White Room

Rivington Street
A winding back lane to Old Street. The buildings are mainly workshops of the 1870s and 1880s, built for furniture makers.
10-26 workshops with downstairs shop windows.
32 LCC Electricity Sub-station. Built in 1907 it received current from Greenwich Power Station to use on London County Council tramways. It was probably designed by E. Vincent Harris an LCC architect who worked on several electricity generating stations.  This station served trams running from Stamford Hill to Bethnal Green and the docks. It housed switch gear in the basement and a generator in the room above.  It is now a restaurant complete with a Damien Hurst stuffed cow in formaldehyde on display.
54 Through the arch here were the works of Thomas Cox chair and couch makers. It has since been converted into offices
55-57 this was C & R Light's finishing workshop, where furniture bought in 'in the white' could be polished and upholstered. It was built in 1897. Sunburst archway. The trade was becoming increasingly fragmented, and. though they kept a 'house style'. Light's were typical in segregating their workshops from their salerooms
62-70 cabinet makers' workshops. Standard from workshops. Part of this is now the Bedroom Bar and some the Comedy Cafe, home of British stand-up
74 This was built around 1922 for Borst Brothers, manufacturers of plywood. Now offices and arty spaces. In front are bollards with the mark “ST L S 1836”
81 Offices built in the 1930s as an extension to Shoreditch Town Hall.   Coat of Arms over the door. Now private office, art gallery etc.
91-95 workshops.
Rivington Place. Building for the dissemination of ideas in contemporary art. Sustainable architecture with use of colour and design. Adjaye Associates 2007
The railway bridge is part of the line built in 1865 connecting the North London Railway at Dalston with the new Broad Street Station.

Shoreditch High Street,
118 ½ Clerk’s House. Built in 1735 with its gable to the road and four windows to the churchyard. It was used to lodge the schoolmaster or parish clerk, and for church meetings. There was a previous house on this site, which provided accommodation for a chantry priest before the  Reformation. There was a corresponding house in the opposite corner of the churchyard, which was demolished and replaced with a watch house.      It is now a shop, previously a boutique owned by Boy George.
125-130, built c. 1878 as Edward Wells & Co.'s Commercial Ironworks, probably as showrooms.  The windows have a mosaic decoration in Islamic style.  They advertised themselves as ‘contractors to HM dockyards, Metropolitan Board of Works, Corporation of London, School Board etc’, had left there by 1895
St.Leonard's Churchyard. The area of the churchyard was extended in 1671 when adjoining land on the east was granted for use as a burial ground as a result of a donation of £100 to the parish and was further extended in 1792 and again in 1820. It was closed for burials in 1857.  It became a public garden in the late 19th and some gravestones were cleared. The 18th cast-iron railings and wrought iron gates remain as do stocks and whipping post under a thatched roof like a lychgate. A plaque on the railings says 'More Light, More Power' – the motto of Shoreditch Borough Council. The churchyard was bombed in the Second World War. Around the back of the church stood the original air raid shelter
St.Leonard’s. The original church on this site was here in 1140s when it was granted to the Priory of Holy Trinity, Aldgate. This church is the medieval parish church rebuilt in 1736-40 by George Dance Sen., after the tower of the old church had partly collapsed during a service in 1716.  It is the 3rd church on the site and it stands at a datum point from which distances were measured. It was originally built of chalk and rubble, later brick and stone’. A chantry chapel was added in 1482. The steeple has a stone cupola with a lantern and a square obelisk top. The front of the church is in Portland stone with a four-column portico. Butterfield redecorated the church in 1870 but his work has been removed. The pulpit is from 1740 with a sounding board and a staircase. There is a top quality clock and a mahogany organ case made in 1756 by Richard Bridge. There are two 18th bread cupboards and four benefactors' and two commandment boards, as well as carved royal arms of George II. The bell boards frames date from 1777 - eight bells were cast in 1739; there are now twelve. - the tower originally held five bells, according to the nursery rhyme ….: 'When I grow rich, say the bells of Shoreditch'. In 1817 it was the first church in London to be lit by gaslight.  There is a stained glass window by A.K. Nicholson Studios from 1955. And many great monuments - Elizabeth Benson 1710, by Francis Bird of an oak tree carrying an inscription on drapery driven by two skeletons pulling hard at the branches. There is a memorial from the London Shakespeare League in 1913 to Shakespeare's theatre associates, including James Burbage and many actors of his generation are buried in the church. . Also buried here was Dr James Parkinson who first described Parkinson's Disease.


Tabernacle Street
Old Fire Station. Red brick 19th fire station built by the London County Council in 1895-6. The original fire doors are still visible but the ground floor is now a restaurant and the rest of the building is offices


Waterson Street
Walbrook – possible source of the eastern arm side of the Walbrook
23-35 site of what was the largest timber mixed-use building in the UK-with 11 flats and 7 workshops. There are also public artworks throughout.

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