Founded by 16th-century merchant Thomas Gresham as a centre to trade stocks, the Royal Exchange was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth I in 1571. Today's colonnaded neoclassical building is the third on the site, built in 1844. It ceased functioning as a financial institution in the 1980s and now houses upmarket retailers and a plush bar-restaurant from Fortnum & Mason.
Royal Exchange
London
Lonely Planet's must-see attractions
22.42 MILES
The world’s largest and oldest continuously occupied fortress, Windsor Castle is a majestic vision of battlements and towers. Used for state occasions, it…
1.98 MILES
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0.66 MILES
One of London's most amazing attractions, Tate Modern is an outstanding modern- and contemporary-art gallery housed in the creatively revamped Bankside…
4.03 MILES
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0.48 MILES
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0.62 MILES
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0.57 MILES
Seeing a play at Shakespeare's Globe – ideally standing under the open-air "wooden O" – is experiencing the playwright's work at its best and most…
1.74 MILES
With almost six million visitors trooping through its doors annually, the British Museum in Bloomsbury, one of the oldest and finest museums in the world,…
Nearby London attractions
0.05 MILES
This surprisingly interesting museum explores the evolution of money and the history of the venerable Bank of England, founded in 1694 by a Scotsman. Its…
0.1 MILES
Opposite the Bank of England stands porticoed Mansion House, the official residence of the Lord Mayor of London since 1752. Built by George Dance the…
0.13 MILES
St Stephen Walbrook (1679) is one of Wren’s finest parish churches and, as it was his first experiment with a dome, a forerunner to St Paul’s Cathedral…
0.15 MILES
It takes a little stagecraft to bring these ruins to life, but it's amazing what low lighting and Latin chanting can do. This Roman temple was dedicated…
0.16 MILES
The ancient Romans had their forum on this site, but this covered shopping arcade harks back to the Victorian era, with cobblestones underfoot and 19th…
0.21 MILES
While the world’s leading specialist insurance brokers are inside underwriting everything from astronauts’ lives to Taylor Swift's legs, people outside…
0.21 MILES
More commonly known as the Cheesegrater, this wedge-shaped 50-storey skyscraper opened in 2014 is angled at 10 degrees to protect views of St Paul's…
0.23 MILES
The City of London has had centuries to acquire an impressive art collection, which it's shown off since 1885. The original gallery was destroyed in the…