From couvre feu to Cockney – how St Mary-le-Bow’s bells became the sound that shaped London’s identity. Once they told Londoners to bank their fires; centuries later, they told Dick Whittington to turn again. These were the curfew bells, the comeback bells, the heartbeat of a city that never stops ringing.
Read MoreAnn’s Foodies London – The West End walk is coming up By way of an appetiser, she’s whipped a little dish of culinary history (and nostalgia) for us. About Lyons’ ice creams (this is their centenary, after all). And make not mistake, Lyons’ ice creams were more than desserts – they were time capsules. From the Zoom rocket to the Fab lolly, each one tells a tale of pop culture, post-war hope, and good old British fun in the sun.
Read MoreEvery November, London flares with fireworks and half-forgotten history. London Walks Capo David traces the story behind the rhyme – Guy Fawkes, the Gunpowder Plot, and the strange endurance of a failed revolution. From the haunted cellars beneath Parliament to the Tower’s shadowed ramparts, the ghosts of 1605 still stir. The gunpowder never exploded, but its charge is still humming under London’s stones.
Read MoreWhat is it about October 31st?
This piece roams from Luther’s hammer on a church door to the end of the Battle of Britain, from Houdini’s final curtain to the Celtic bonfires of Samhain. It traces how Halloween began as an ancient threshold between worlds and became the world’s biggest fancy-dress party. Along the way we glimpse Mexican marigolds, Austrian bread for ghosts, Japanese lanterns, and a universal truth: that once a year, humans everywhere like to dance with the dark and laugh at their fears.
It’s funny, atmospheric, and full of surprises – a story of thresholds, history, and a date that refuses to stay quiet.
Two parter today. Forget the fake cobwebs and the pumpkin punch – this is the real Halloween experience: history, mystery, and magic in the world’s greatest treasure house. Guided by Marc – host of the award-nominated Extraordinary Stories of Britain podcast – you’ll explore the British Museum after dark, when the crowds are gone and the marble whispers. From the Rosetta Stone to the Elgin Marbles, five thousand years of civilisation glow under the glass dome of the Great Court. Spine-tingling, civilised, unforgettable – it’s Halloween the London Walks way.
Followed by: Tucked behind Victoria Gate Lodge lies one of London’s tiniest and most tender secrets – the Hyde Park Pet Cemetery. Born of a little girl’s grief in 1881, it grew into a miniature city of marble headstones for beloved dogs, cats, parrots and rabbits. It’s the Victorians at their most human – sentimental, heartfelt, and quietly profound. Join us among the mossy stones and whispering trees for a story of love, loss, and loyalty – a forgotten corner of London where even the ghosts have wagging tails.
Slip off Oxford Street and into another world – chandeliers, Rembrandts, and the best cakes in Marylebone. Housed in a stately mansion on Manchester Square, the Wallace Collection is London’s most beautiful secret: an 18th-century treasure chest of art, armour, and elegance. A museum that still feels like a home – and, thanks to Rick Mather’s sunlit café, the sweetest spot in the city for tea.
Read MoreHe gleams through the London fog – a man made of gold. The Albert Memorial isn’t just a monument; it’s a love story cast in marble and gold leaf. This episode of London Calling tells the tale of Queen Victoria and her beloved Albert – the earnest, intelligent prince who believed civilisation could be improved by plumbing and hard work – and how his death broke her heart so completely she built a temple to him in Kensington Gardens. It’s absurd, magnificent, and completely sincere: London’s grandest love letter.
Read MoreThey’ve already got the money, the houses, the jets – so why the fever when the bidding starts? Why the thrill of the gavel? In this Daily London Fix, we step inside Sotheby’s, where wealth turns to theatre and possession becomes performance. From a Strand bookseller’s auction in 1744 to today’s multimillion-pound spectacles, it’s part ritual, part sport, part confession. And – grace notes before the curtain falls – we discover why it’s called Sotheby’s, and why the man bringing down the hammer is, delightfully, named Barker.
Read MoreThe world’s most famous auction house was born on a quiet London street. From polite Georgian book sales to multi-million-pound bidding wars, Sotheby’s has mirrored the city’s rise from mercantile capital to cultural powerhouse.
Read MoreOctober 25th — St Crispin’s Day. On this date in 1400, Geoffrey Chaucer, London’s first great poet, breathed his last. Fifteen years later, on another St Crispin’s Day, Henry V’s tiny army triumphed at Agincourt. Two centuries after that, Shakespeare turned that muddy field into legend with “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers…” This episode of London Calling links those moments – Chaucer’s passing and his London voice, Shakespeare’s stage thunder, and the date that binds them. A tale of bells, battles, and words: how the vintner’s son and the glover’s son together made English – London English – the language of poetry and power.
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