Landmark sights in London
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Tower Bridge
London was still a thriving port in 1894 when elegant Tower Bridge was built. Designed to be raised to allow ships to pass, electricity has now taken over from the original steam engines. A lift leads up from the northern tower to the overpriced Tower Bridge Exhibition, where the story of its building is recounted within the upper walkway. The same ticket gets you into the engine rooms below the southern tower. Below the bridge on the City side is Dead Man's Hole, where corpses that had made their way into the Thames (through suicide, murder or accident) were regularly retrieved.
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B
Trafalgar Square
In many ways this is the centre of London, where rallies and marches take place, tens of thousands of revellers usher in the New Year and locals congre-gate for anything from communal open-air cinema to various political protests. The great square was neglected over many years, ringed with gnarling traffic and given over to flocks of feral pigeons. But things changed in 2000 when Ken Livingstone became London Mayor and embarked on a bold and imaginative scheme to transform it into the kind of space John Nash had intended when he designed it in the early 19th century. Traffic was banished from the northern flank in front of the National Gallery and a new pedestrian plaza…
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C
Speakers’ Corner
The northeastern corner of Hyde Park is traditionally the spot for oratorical acrobatics and soapbox ranting. It’s the only place in Britain where demonstrators can assemble without police permission, a concession granted in 1872 as a response to serious riots 17 years before when 150,000 people gathered to demonstrate against the Sunday Trading Bill before Parliament only to be unexpectedly ambushed by police concealed within Marble Arch. Speakers’ Corner was frequented by Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, George Orwell and William Morris. If you’ve got something to get off your chest, do so on Sunday, although you’ll mainly have fringe dwellers, religious fanatics and hecklers…
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D
Queen Victoria Memorial
Not many public buildings of note were built during the first 15 years of the 20th century, apart from Admiralty Arch (1910) in the Edwardian baroque style of Aston Webb (1849–1930), who also designed the 1911 Queen Victoria Memorial opposite Buckingham Palace and worked on the front facade of the palace itself.
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E
New Zealand Monument
The simple yet evocative New Zealand Monument, erected in 2006, consists of 16 cross-shaped bronze ‘standards’ set out on a grassy slope. Standards 1 to 10 are adorned with text and reliefs and each has a theme (flag bearer, army, Maori at war, the forest); standards 11 to 16 form the Southern Cross constellation.
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City Hall
Home to the Mayor of London, bulbous City Hall was designed by Foster and Partners and opened in 2002. The 45m, glass-clad building has been compared to a host of objects – from an onion, to Darth Vader’s helmet, a woodlouse and a ‘glass gonad’. Excellent green credentials include the use of cold ground water for its air conditioning system. The scoop amphitheatre outside the building is the venue for a variety of free entertainment in warmer weather, from music to theatre. Free exhibitions relating to London are also periodically held at City Hall.
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G
Australian War Memorial
Just southwest of Wellington Arch is the grey-green granite sweep of the Australian War Memorial, erected in 2004, which commemorates the men and women of Australia who served in WWI and WWII. The names of four-dozen battle sites from both world wars are etched onto the blocks of the monolithic upper wall.
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Cheese Grater
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