Short Tour
May. 27th, 2023 08:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
poliphilo My bro-in-law, who is a professional tour guide, took us on a short tour of a part of the City of London.
We poked our noses into places I didn't know existed. Like...
The King's Wardrobe. Now a pleasant leafy enclosure but once the site of a building where Henry VIII kept all his bling.
And Playhouse Square. Which is where the gatehouse of the Black Friars monastery once stood. Also where Shakespeare built his last theatre- the indoor venue known as the Playhouse- very upmarket, very pricey and a commercial failure. A small domed stone in a corner of the square is said to be all that's left of the fabric of the Playhouse. It looks very like a lingam. The wonder is that there's anything left at all.
Also a couple of Wren churches. St Martin, Ludgate Hill and St Bride, Fleet Street. St Martin is grand, St Bride is glorious. Ailz gave her attention to a placard in St Martin- designed to snag the American trade- that recorded the marriage there of William Penn's father and mother. Trust her to light upon something Quakery. St Bride's has a Roman pavement and Norman masonry in its crypt. It got bombed to buggery in the War and has been restored to what I suppose is its former splendour. Rupert Murdoch married Jerri Hall there (Boo, hiss...)
But first we had lunch in the Black Friar, which is- according to wikipedia- "the finest Arts and Crafts pub in London" (How many are there?) It's a wedge shaped building, like the Flat Iron in New York- and decorated in and out with mosaics and reliefs. The food is your regular pub grub- fish and chips, banger and mash etc- but superlatively well done...
London, if you're paying attention to it, is kinda overwhelming...
We poked our noses into places I didn't know existed. Like...
The King's Wardrobe. Now a pleasant leafy enclosure but once the site of a building where Henry VIII kept all his bling.
And Playhouse Square. Which is where the gatehouse of the Black Friars monastery once stood. Also where Shakespeare built his last theatre- the indoor venue known as the Playhouse- very upmarket, very pricey and a commercial failure. A small domed stone in a corner of the square is said to be all that's left of the fabric of the Playhouse. It looks very like a lingam. The wonder is that there's anything left at all.
Also a couple of Wren churches. St Martin, Ludgate Hill and St Bride, Fleet Street. St Martin is grand, St Bride is glorious. Ailz gave her attention to a placard in St Martin- designed to snag the American trade- that recorded the marriage there of William Penn's father and mother. Trust her to light upon something Quakery. St Bride's has a Roman pavement and Norman masonry in its crypt. It got bombed to buggery in the War and has been restored to what I suppose is its former splendour. Rupert Murdoch married Jerri Hall there (Boo, hiss...)
But first we had lunch in the Black Friar, which is- according to wikipedia- "the finest Arts and Crafts pub in London" (How many are there?) It's a wedge shaped building, like the Flat Iron in New York- and decorated in and out with mosaics and reliefs. The food is your regular pub grub- fish and chips, banger and mash etc- but superlatively well done...
London, if you're paying attention to it, is kinda overwhelming...
