London calling.
London Walks connecting.
This… is London.
This is London Walks.
Streets ahead.
Story time. History time.
A very good morning to you London Walkers. Wherever you are.
It’s Friday, August 1st, 2025.
———————
He’s arguably the best guide in London. The rave reviews he gets – and they’re all rave reviews, every last one of them – they come showering in after every walk he does. Like confetti on the newlyweds when they come out of the church. I’m talking about Adam, one of the brightest stars in the Constellation London Walks.
The only human being I know who talks like a well-written magazine article.
And speaking of eloquent – eloquence at its pithiest – it was like writing on the wall, this – writing on the wall encircled with tongues of fire – Adam once said, “it’s all about making connections.”
He was talking about our craft. The art – and artistry – of guiding.
A great guide is, in a sense, a lapidarist. You know, someone who cuts and polishes gemstones.
Cuts and polishes the diamond – or whatever the gemstone is – to realise its potential, bring out its beauty. And then – and this is hardly less important – comes the setting for the stone.
So, no, I don’t think it’s too far-fetched to say a walking tour is a gemstone and the guide is the lapidarist.
And a lot of the cutting and polishing your guide-lapidarist does is making connections. But the gem that’s the guided walk isn’t the whole story. Just as most gemstones, sooner or later are fitted into a setting, every walking tour, by definition, has a setting. The setting is the before and after of the walking tour. The surround. What you fit the walking tour into, what you piece it out with, before or after the walk. And here again, Adam’s sage pronouncement – “it’s all about making connections” – is no less applicable.
I’d chime in here with another piece of received wisdom: time is of the essence. Time. It’s our most valuable resource. It’s not replenishable. And it’s constantly diminishing. So – surely this goes without saying – it’s important to make the best possible use of it. And the way to do that is, well, making connections. Making good connections.
Which brings me to a walk we’re doing today. A walk we do every Friday afternoon. The Old Palace Quarter. It’s one of the finest gemstones in the London Walks jewellery case.
And it’s even better if you get the setting right. How’s that other old saying go – it’s a bit of folk wisdom, this – you can lead a horse to a trough but you can’t make him drink.
And that’s by way of saying, we’ve done our best with the timing of the Old Palace Quarter Walk. A Friday afternoon start means the après walk setting can’t be improved on. To start with Burlington Arcade – the oldest and grandest of London’s magnificent shopping arcades – is open until 7 pm. Ditto Fortnum’s. Ditto Berry Brothers. And Hatchards is open even later: until 8 pm.
And that’s before we mention the Royal Academy. And here’s where it’s supremely all about connections. You get this particular connection right you’ve drawn to an inside royal flush and hit it.
I’m talking about the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. This summer it runs from June 17th to August 17th. And here’s the kicker, on Friday nights – and Friday nights only – the RA Summer Exhibition is open until 9 pm.
That walk – the Old Palace Quarter at 2.30 pm on any of the first three Fridays in August – followed by a visit to the RA Summer Exhibition – that’s a fit made in heaven.
Let’s do a bit of planning, shall we? And a bit of savouring. Let’s have the rest of this be mostly about the RA Summer Exhibition.
After the walk and before you cross Piccadilly to the Exhibition, maybe pop into The Wolsey for a posh coffee and croissant. After all, art deserves a civilised preamble.
Or if you don’t want to splash out, well, grab a sausage roll from Benugo just inside the RA.
That’s one appetite seen to. Now let’s whet another one.
Here goes. Scotty, beam us to the RA Summer Exhibition.
Yes, the Summer Exhibition – that glorious, chaotic, utterly unique jamboree of British culture.
It’s the granddaddy of them all, the oldest in the world. Got started in 1769. Let that sink in. That’s back when Captain Cook was off discovering Hawaii, and Mozart was still a teenager.
And what were the Brits doing that summer. Other than Captain Cook, I mean. Well, of course. It’s obvious isn’t it. They were hanging paintings. As they’ve continued to do every summer for over 250 years. Yes, it’s been going every single year since that signal year of 1769 – war, fire, plague, recession, abdication, the American abrogation, you name it – the Summer Exhibition’s never missed a beat. It’s the world’s longest-running open-submission art show.
That’s the joy of it: anyone can submit. Anyone. You. Me. That bloke painting pigeons in the park. Your Aunt Doris. And yes, of course, the big beasts too: Tracey Emin, Grayson Perry, Cornelia Parker, David Hockney, Anish Kapoor – they all show up and show off.
It’s the most gloriously democratic thing in the art world. Every year, over 15,000 works are submitted. Around 1,200 pieces make the final cut. Some by Royal Academicians. Some by first-time hopefuls. All hung cheek by jowl in the grand rooms of Burlington House.
It’s the only show where you’ll find a Turner Prize winner squashed next to a retired teacher from Leeds who painted his Labrador in pastels. And it works. Somehow it works. Magically it works.
It’a a kaleidoscope of colour. Floor to ceiling, walls crammed, art of every size and sort. Giant sculptures. Tiny etchings. Photographs. Abstracts. Landscapes. Neon signs. Political satire. Big, bold, bonkers stuff.
It’s not polite little art whispering “contemplate me.” No. This is art shouting across the room: “LOOK AT ME!” It’s noisy. Brassy. Joyful. Slightly mad. Like a carnival collided with the Tate. What’s more, it’s all for sale. You want to buy that bright pink giraffe in a tutu? Go for it. Write your name down. Could be yours. Some pieces go for a few hundred quid. Some for tens of thousands. But browsing’s free, and dreaming’s even freer.
As for Friday night…There’s a bar in the courtyard. The crowd’s a mix of hip students, old-school art lovers, tourists, and people who accidentally wandered in thinking it was Fortnum & Mason.
They usually have live DJs or performances. You sip your gin and tonic surrounded by statues. It’s classy. It’s buzzy. You’ll feel like you’re in the coolest salon in Georgian London – if Georgian London had fairy lights and mojitos.
So to sum up. The Summer Exhibition is London at its best: eccentric, ambitious, and open to all. It doesn’t take itself too seriously – and neither should you. Go with curiosity. Get lost in the colours. Make up stories about the paintings. Eavesdrop on the art students. Buy something if you fall in love (even a postcard will do).
Because, as Turner once said – yes, that Turner – “It’s only when we’re lost in art that we find ourselves.” Yeah, what’s not to like.
And shall we lacquer on another setting? You want a good place to go to after your visit to the Summer Exhibition. Hey, it’s just a five-minute stroll to Duke of York Street. A five-minute stroll to a pint at The Red Lion. Yes, The Red Lion – a proper pub, panelled and proud. Or if you’d rather, maybe shimmer on over to Green Park. A proper alfresco wind down. Sit on the grass. Prop up a tree. Give free rein to your brain’s digestive juices. All that wonderful art – to say nothing of the totality of the experience – you’ve just feasted on, let your head make of it what it will.
It’s all about making connections.
———————-
You’ve been listening to This… is London, the London Walks podcast. Emanating from www.walks.com –
home of London Walks,
London’s signature walking tour company.
London’s local, time-honoured, fiercely independent, family-owned, just-the-right-size walking tour company.
And as long as we’re at it, London’s multi-award-winning walking tour company. Indeed, London’s only award-winning walking tour company.
And here’s the secret: London Walks is essentially run as a guides’ cooperative.
That’s the key to everything.
It’s the reason we’re able to attract and keep the best guides in London. You can get schlubbers to do this for £20 a walk. But you cannot get world-class guides – let alone accomplished professionals.
It’s not rocket science: you get what you pay for.
And just as surely, you also get what you don’t pay for.
Back in 1968 when we got started we quickly came to a fork in the road. We had to answer a searching question: Do we want to make the most money? Or do we want to be the best walking tour company in the world?
You want to make the most money you go the schlubbers route. You want to be the best walking tour company in the world you do whatever you have to do
to attract and keep the best guides in London –
you want them guiding for you, not for somebody else.
Bears repeating:
the way we’re structured – a guides’ cooperative –
is the key to the whole thing.
It’s the reason for all those awards, it’s the reason people who know go with London Walks, it’s the reason we’ve got a big following, a lively, loyal, discerning following – quality attracts quality.
It’s the reason we’re able – uniquely – to front our walks with accomplished, in many cases distinguished professionals:
By way of example, Stewart Purvis, the former Editor
(and subsequently CEO) of Independent Television News.
And Lisa Honan, who had a distinguished career as a diplomat (Lisa was the Governor of St Helena, the island where Napoleon breathed his last and, some say, had his penis amputated – Napoleon didn’t feel a thing – if thing’s the mot juste – he was dead.)
Stewart and Lisa – both of them CBEs – are just a couple of our headline acts.
Or take our Ripper Walk. It’s the creation of the world’s leading expert on Jack the Ripper, Donald Rumbelow, the author of the definitive book on the subject. Britain’s most distinguished crime historian, Donald is, in the words of The Jack the Ripper A to Z, “internationally recognised as the leading authority on Jack the Ripper.” Donald’s emeritus now but he’s still the guiding light on our Ripper Walk. He curates the walk. He trains up and mentors our Ripper Walk guides. Fields any and all questions they throw at him.
The London Walks Aristocracy of Talent – its All-Star Team of Guides – includes a former London Mayor. It includes the former Chief Music Critic for the Evening Standard. It includes the Chair of the Association of Professional Tour Guides. And the former chair of the Guild of Guides.
It includes barristers, doctors, geologists, museum curators, a former London Museum archaeologist, historians,
university professors (one of them a distinguished Cambridge University paleontologist); it includes a criminal defence lawyer, Royal Shakespeare Company and National Theatre actors, a bevy of MVPs, Oscar winners (people who’ve won the big one, the Guide of the Year Award)…
well, you get the idea.
As that travel writer famously put it, “if this were a golf tournament, every name on the Leader Board would be a London Walks guide.”
And as we put it: London Walks Guides make the new familiar
and the familiar new.
And on that agreeable note…
come then, let us go forward together on some great London Walks.
And that’s by way of saying, Good walking and Good Londoning one and all. See ya next time.