Dennis Severs’ House

This quirky hotchpotch of a cluttered house is named after the late American eccentric who restored and turned it into what he called a ‘still-life drama’. Visitors find they have entered the home of a ‘family’ of Huguenot silk weavers, who were common to the Spitalfields area in the 18th century. However, while they see the fabulous restored Georgian interiors, with meals and drinks half-abandoned and rumpled sheets, and while they smell cooking and hear creaking floorboards, their ‘hosts’ always remain tantalisingly just out of reach. It’s a unique and intriguing proposition by day, but ‘Silent Night’ tours by candlelight every Monday evening (bookings essential) are even more memorable. Dennis Severs’ House is not the only fine Georgian house in Folgate St, north of Spitalfields market: the street is lined with them, and they too were once occupied by the Huguenots who fled religious persecution in France to settle here in the late 17th century, bringing with them their skills as silk weavers. Their presence is still recalled by such street names as Fleur-de-Lis St and Nantes Passage. There are yet more restored Georgian houses along Fournier St.