Author Archives: adrianprockter

Above: Looking across the large garden in the square at houses on the south side. The square was laid out between 1775 and 1783 as an upper-middle-class residential area. It takes its name from the main title of the Russell … Continue reading →

Above: Looking across Russell Square early in the year, before the foliage on the trees obscures the view. The large terra-cotta building on the right is Hotel Russell. Russell Square and Great Russell Street derive their name from Lord William … Continue reading →

Above: View from the southern side of Bloomsbury Square, looking north. One of the fine squares of Bloomsbury, it was laid out in 1661 and was at first known as Southampton Square, after the developer, Thomas Wriothesley, the Earl of … Continue reading →

Above: Looking north in Bedford Place towards Russell Square. Bedford Place runs almost NW from Bloomsbury Square to Russell Square. As you walk around Bloomsbury, you will find the same names repeated in the streets, the squares and sometimes on … Continue reading →

Bloomsbury is the name for an area of London that, until 1965, was mainly part of Holborn although the northern end extended into the old Metropolitan Borough of St Pancras. Today all of Bloomsbury lies within the London Borough of … Continue reading →

Above: The tiny pub stands in the narrow passageway called Ely Court. According to the sign outside the tavern, the hostelry was established in 1546 – only ten years after the Dissolution of the Monasteries. It may well have been … Continue reading →

Above: The exterior of the chapel which stands beside the cul-de-sac called Ely Place. This place of worship has had a long and quite unusual history. In 1250 John le Francis, Treasurer of England, rented a house and land opposite … Continue reading →