London calling.
London Walks connecting.
This… is London.
This is London Walks.
Streets ahead.
Story time. History time.
And a very good evening to you. From London. It’s August 11th, 2024.
Today’s pin – Grit and Glitz. That’s London. Well, that’s the Museum of London’s crystallisation of London. And I’ll buy into that. I’ll take it. You want the vast coalfields of London compressed into a diamond there you’ve got it: Grit & Glitz.
Now this one really is news from London. Many of you will know, the Museum of London is moving. And not only is it moving. It’s rebranding. Including, going in for a name change. It’s not the Museum of London anymore. It’s London Museum. Or if you prefer, the London Museum. That name change is pretty controversial. Though not as controversial as the other thing. But I think they’ve got it right. Brilliantly so. The old name – the Museum of London – is pretty pedestrian. It’s a B-List name. Not so, London Museum. It’s a big hitter of a name. Front row. Front and centre. Winner’s Circle. Museum of London to London Museum, that’s a Clark Kent to Superman transformation. It stakes a claim, says we’re Numero Uno. London Museum. The London Museum. It’s going to be right there with the British Museum and the National Gallery. Maybe fractionally ahead of them because what it’s doing is taking ownership of London. London Museum says London is the setting, we’re the Koh I Noor diamond in the setting.
Anyway, hats off to you, London Museum, that teensy change is huge.
And they’re not just changing their name, they’ve also come up with a new logo. And OMG has it been a stick in a hornets’ nest. New name, new logo – wait for it – the new logo is a pigeon making a deposit. Yes, having a bowel movement. But here’s the thing, the bit of pigeon poo that’s just popped out is gold. Yes, a bit of gold poo. Gold pigeon poo. That’s not a gold pigeon. It’s an ordinary grey London pigeon who’s pumped out a pat of gold poo. And for sure, it’s come in for a lot of stick. But I’m not adding to that stick. I think it’s brilliant. It’s simple. It’s witty. It’s a little bit shocking. It’s very London – pigeons after all are the quintessential London bird. And hey, is the Pope Catholic, are we in the woods – bump into any bears lately doing their thing in Piccadilly Circus – enough of that, let’s cut to the chase, do pigeons poo? Do pigeons poo in London? And is it not the case, that the London Museum’s spot on distillation of London – spot on indeed – the London Museum’s reductio ad fundamentum – if I can put it that way – of London to grit and glitz – grit and glitz, the essence of London – is it not the case that a pigeon dropping a pat of gold poo is at once the stuff and spirit of grit and glitz. Of London.
And I’m glad to say the London Museum is sticking to its guns. It’s come in for a lot of flak. And it’s more than bearing up. “A good logo gets people talking,” says the Museum’s director Sharon Ament, “The pigeon and splat speak to a historic place full of dualities, a place where the grit and the glitter have existed side by side for millennia.”
Gets my vote.
Anything else? Yes, the bigger, much older news is the museum is moving from its high-in-the-sky, slightly remote London Wall eyrie to the best location in London: historic, magnificent old Smithfield Market. Which of course is undergoing a major transformation, a re-tooling, re-purposing re-generating for its new incarnation: the new home of the London Museum. The old Museum of London closed in 2022. The London Museum will open in its new, old, old home in 2026. Old old because the market building is Victorian. But there’s been a market on that site for 800 years. And not just a market – Smithfield has a good claim to being in the top five of London’s most important historical stages. The smooth field – the name, Smithfield, is a corruption of the smooth field – is a palimpsest of London history. The history that’s been enacted there is like a series of chapter headings, it’s been that important, that dramatic.
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Ok, today’s Random. Cats have been making the running here. That’s because of Ann’s Cat Tails walk – A Feline Take on London History. And I’ve got some more news about that walk but you’ll have to wait, it’s in the pipeline. But yes, cats have been making the running here. So let’s redress that just a little bit. The BBC’s Mark Easton puts it pithily but eloquently, he says, “Britain is fluent in dog.” And of course, class-ridden as this country is, that all-important fact of British life has percolated through into dog ownership. As Easton puts it, canine companions reflect personality and class identity. An English setter is likely to mean, “I am posh.” A French poodle might be saying, “I am gay.” A Staffordshire bull terrier suggests, “I am hard (or afraid).” And so on. What I’ve noticed is that you can tell a lot about a London neighbourhood by taking survey of its dogs. Hampstead, for example, it’s wall to wall white fluffy really cute dogs. There are no Rottweilers in Hampstead. Well, you can draw your own conclusions.
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Ok, Today’s Ongoing. A walker who’s become a great friend – Tom – we’ve got a lot in common, we both suffer from an incurable case of bibliomania, Tom’s a professor of English Lit at an Ivy League university – and of course I did a stint of university teaching here in London – we’re both deeply in love with London – anyway, Tom pitched up a couple of days ago. And he came bearing gifts. Wonderful gifts. Including – I was floored a very old, 1853, guidebook of sorts. It’s called Reynolds New Map of London and Visitors Guide. And what a treasure chest it is. Let’s approach it by putting it in context, let’s think about what was going on in 1853.
Item: the Crimean War. Item: Dickens’ Bleak House was being published. Item: The clothing company Levi Strauss – blue jeans anyone – was founded in 1853. Item: Queen Victoria gave birth to her eighth child and youngest son, Prince Leopold. Item: The first passenger railway opened in India. Item: The world’s first public aquarium opened at the London Zoo. Item: U.S. Commodore Matthew Perry arrived in Edo Bay, Japan. And thus began the so-called opening up of Japan. Item: George Crum first prepared potato chips. That was in Saratoga New York. Item: The Taiping Rebellion was underway in China. Item: Vincent Van Gogh was born. Well, that’s the world stage. How about our stage here? London. My new prized possession – my 1853 Reynolds New Map of London and Visitors Guide has a section titled Advice to Strangers. Here’s what they say.
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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 Museum of London archaeologist, historians,
university professors (one of them a distinguished Cambridge University paleontologist); it includes
criminal defence lawyers,
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.