London Walks is described as the oldest urban walking tour company in the world and a benchmark for the craft of guided city walks. The podcast features stories and anecdotes from its guides about London. It offers listeners a way to hear the kind of local knowledge and commentary associated with the company's walking tours.
Episodes
Bohemia House
A little pocket of elsewhere in the heart of West Hampstead. Step inside Bohemia House and you step into another world. Czech beer, Czech hospitality, a generous helping of history, and a wonderfully convivial encounter with Tomas, the man who makes the place tick. Oh, and a little homemade ginger vodka for medicinal purposes.
Dead Dogs’ Hole
From the wooded bluffs of the upper Mississippi to a mysterious stretch of canal beneath my old office in Camden Town. A personal journey across the Atlantic, through centuries of London’s industrial history, with a wonderfully unexpected appearance by James Bond. And a final twist involving the Booker Prize.
London Calling: Changing Gear
Five hundred consecutive daily podcasts. Half a million listens. And now a change of gear. London Calling isn’t going away. Far from it. We’re trading seven daily editions for one longer, richer, more varied Saturday programme. The sidecar isn’t being abandoned. I’m simply climbing back onto the motorcycle. Come along for the ride.
The House of Bones
Where did London put its dead when the graveyards were full? A journey into a lost world of bones, burial, belief and some of the strangest chapters in the city’s history.
The Little Red Flower That Remembers
A little red flower. A terrible history. How the poppy became the emblem of remembrance, why we wear it, and how something so fragile came to carry the weight of millions of lives lost in war.
The Many Lives of a London Guide
Law, surveying, dispatch riding, art, even a black belt in judo. Brian’s had more lives than a cat. Meet the award-winning London Walks guide who’s done just about everything.
“Just Ourselves and Pirandello”
Meet “the Coalbox”, Lady Sibyl Colefax, one of London’s great hostesses. When the King came to dinner, he brought Wallis Simpson. Rubinstein played Chopin. Noël Coward sang.
Lady Chatterley in the Dock
A book in the dock. A nation on trial. How the 1960 Lady Chatterley obscenity trial became a turning point in British social and cultural history.
The Night the Year Turns
An ancient Celtic festival, a Hampstead chapel and the mysterious turning of the year. A journey into Samhain, where summer gives way to winter and the boundary between the living and the dead grows tantalisingly thin.
London Doesn’t Just Reward Curiosity. It Creates Curiosity.
A closer look at a tank memorial in Whitehall turns a familiar London sight into a story of five men, steel armour and seconds to escape. That’s London: even something you’ve passed a hundred times can send you somewhere you’ve never been.
The Unknown Prime Minister
They called him “the Unknown Prime Minister”. Bonar Law made it all the way to Number Ten, only to have his voice fail him and his premiership cut tragically short. A poignant London story about power, frailty and a man history has almost forgotten.
Hansard: The Man Who Gave Parliament Its Voice
A London printer. An extraordinary legacy. Luke Hansard gave his name to the official record of Parliament’s debates. Nearly two centuries after his death, every time Parliament speaks, Hansard remembers. And is remembered.
The Mews at Ten
The latest from the wonderful, occasionally baffling world of cats. Ann brings us feline news, curious discoveries and a few surprises from our whiskered friends. There’s never a dull moment in the world of the mews.
The Little Red Box That Rang Round the World.
The K6 telephone kiosk, a Massachusetts eccentricity, and a rather cheeky transatlantic marriage proposal.
The Beatles at the Palace: All You Need Is MBE
October 26th, 1965. Four lads from Liverpool. One Queen. Four medals. And a little bit of mischief.
The Knowledge: Into the Bullring
London’s black-cab drivers. They're the matadors of this town. They nail it. They don’t just learn the city. They remake their brains to hold it. The Knowledge is memory training at an almost preposterous scale, the intellectual equivalent of memorising the complete works of Shakespeare.
Lambeth Unbuttoned
Lambeth is a borough of extraordinary contrasts, where archbishops and radicals, palaces and poverty, royalty and rebellion have rubbed shoulders for centuries. Cross the Thames and discover a London that’s full of surprises, hiding some of its best stories in plain sight.
Fable & Mirth
Three hundred shops and half a million shoppers a day on Oxford Street. Six or seven little shops and perhaps 85 shoppers on Kensington Church Walk. But what this tiny London street lacks in physical size, it more than makes up for in charm. Step inside Fable & Mirth, a jewel of a gift shop, and meet the two sisters who’ve brought a little extra magic to Kensington.
Barnet: Blood, Battles and Bad Hair Days
A kingmaker killed in the fog. A fair that gave Cockneys a word for their hair. From bloody battlefields to ancient trees and world-changing ideas, Barnet is full of surprises.
Camden Town: Judith’s Home Turf
Meet Judith, veteran London Walks guide and Camden Town insider extraordinaire. She’s lived right above Inverness Street Market, in the thick of Camden Town, for half a century. Who better to show us round and tell us its stories?
Enfield: You Don’t Know the Half of It
Poets and palaces. Rifles and spies. The world’s first cash machine and a country house where German generals were secretly listened to. Welcome to Enfield, the London borough that’s full of surprises.
The Knock on the Door that Changed English Poetry
The young John Keats, a cottage on Hampstead Heath, and the remarkable Leigh Hunt, the poet, journalist and troublemaker who opened his door to some of the greatest literary talents of the age.
The Little Piece of Ely in London
Tucked away behind its gates, Ely Place is one of London’s strangest survivals, a little world of saints, bishops, strawberries, Tudor power and centuries-old privilege.
Tawdry
A seventh-century queen, two unconsummated marriages, an incorruptible body and a medieval fair. Meet St Audrey, the remarkable woman hiding inside the word “tawdry.”
A Brush with Fire
Parliament is burning, London is watching, and out on the Thames Turner is turning catastrophe into art.
The Night Edward Gibbon Had His Great Idea
On October 15, 1764, amid the ruins of Rome, a young Londoner had an idea. Edward Gibbon would spend the next 23 years turning it into one of the greatest works of history ever written.
William Penn: The London Rebel Who Founded Pennsylvania
Born near the Tower of London, jailed for his beliefs and determined to change the world. Meet William Penn, the London rebel who founded Pennsylvania, and the twelve stubborn London jurors who helped make legal history.
The First Knight of the Stage
Bradford may have got his death. But London got his life. Meet Sir Henry Irving, the first actor to be knighted and the man who made the Lyceum Theatre the centre of London’s dramatic world.
Sid and Nancy: Punk Rock in Little Venice
A stone’s throw from the quiet waters of Little Venice, Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen were living one of rock ’n’ roll’s most turbulent love stories.
Christie’s: The Gallery Where Everything’s for Sale
One of London’s greatest art galleries is hiding in plain sight, and everything on the walls is about to disappear.
The Boy Who Learned to Listen
A Hackney boy who talked to imaginary friends grew up to change the sound of theatre. Harold Pinter taught us to listen to the words, the silences, and especially the pauses.
The London Boy with the Rolleicord
Before the battlefields, there was Finsbury Park. Don McCullin had a Rolleicord, hard streets, hard men and an eye that missed very little. London taught him where to look.
Hats Off to 350 Years
Lock & Co has been putting hats on London heads for 350 years. Princes, politicians, dandies and ordinary Londoners have all passed through its St James’s Street door, and somehow the old firm is still standing, still fitting, still unmistakably itself.
109,915 People Under One Glass Roof
On October 7th, 1851, a staggering 109,915 people poured into Hyde Park for the Great Exhibition’s busiest day. So much silver changed hands that the takings needed two hackney cabs to carry them to the Bank of England.
“Burned out with London. Needed a bit of a break.”
Jason Lewis was "burned out with London and needed a bit of a break." Thirteen years, 46,000 miles, two broken legs, blood poisoning, oceans, rollerblades and a crocodile later, he came home to Greenwich.
The Day the Sixties Arrived
October 5th, 1962. James Bond walks onto the screen. The Beatles walk into the record shops. Britain wakes up in one decade and goes to bed in another.
Cable Street: The Day London Said No
Ninety years ago today, fascism came marching into London’s East End. Cable Street answered with barricades, defiance and one unforgettable cry: “They shall not pass.”
The Night the Bolshoi Conquered London
Seventy years ago today, the Bolshoi Ballet swept into Covent Garden and London rose to its feet. A dazzling cultural moment, with the Hungarian uprising only days away.
Blow-Up Bridge
A barge packed with gunpowder, sugar and nuts explodes beneath Macclesfield Bridge, hurling debris across Regent’s Park and waking London with a bang. The story of Blow-Up Bridge.
Croydon: Hiding in Plain Sight
I crossed Croydon knowing almost nothing about it. Forty-two miles into the London Camino, the borough at journey’s end turned out to be one of the biggest surprises of the lot.
Eight Years to the Day
One date. Two extraordinary moments. Eight catastrophic years. September 30 tells one of the darkest stories of the twentieth century.
The Man Who Walked a Thousand Miles Without Going Anywhere
One mile every hour. For 1,000 hours. Meet Captain Barclay, Regency Britain’s almost forgotten walking phenomenon, prize-fight trainer and human endurance machine.
The Mould that Changed the World
A mouldy dish. A sharp eye. A discovery in Paddington that changed medicine forever.
London Was Talking. I Wasn’t Listening.
Albany Street: a perfectly ordinary London street with an extraordinary amount of history packed into it. Scratch the surface and out tumble grand terraces, soldiers, workhouses, artists, rogues and the great restless churn of London life.
Four Men, One Zebra Crossing and the End of the Road
Four men cross a London road. The camera clicks. And one ordinary zebra crossing walks straight into history.
The Doctor Who Put Blood Back In
How do you save a dying patient when medicine’s answer is to take blood out? James Blundell did something revolutionary. He put blood back in.
Eternal London Haunts Us Still
Thomas Moore wrote one of the immortal lines about London. The delicious twist? He was in Venice when he wrote it.
W. G. Grace: The Grave That Changed Everything
W. G. Grace was a giant of Victorian cricket, a legend in his own lifetime. Then I came across his grave and read the names above his own, and suddenly the great cricketer became something else: a father.
The Palace Vanished. The Monsters Survived.
A palace of glass. Victorian dinosaurs. Six million visitors. And a fire that lit up the London sky. The extraordinary story of Crystal Palace, where the monsters survived but the palace didn’t.
Meet Your Guide: A Photographer’s London
There were 175 people in that room in the Royal Academy. 174 of them - including me – were standing. You were stretched out on the floor, your camera two inches off the floor. What had you seen that nobody else had clocked? What were you photographing?"
The Dinner that Invented Georgian Poetry
On September 20, 1912, a handful of poets sat down to dinner. By the time the evening was over, they had the beginnings of a literary movement, a new generation of poets and a name: Georgian Poetry.
Not Bad for a Girl from Neasden
A skinny, clothes-mad schoolgirl from Neasden became the face of Swinging London. On her birthday – Happy Birthday, Twiggy! – this is how Lesley Hornby became Twiggy, and Twiggy became an icon.
The History of Everything. On a Theatre Walk.
London is one of the great theatre cities of the world. So why don’t more people want to walk it? Adam makes the case for two hours of greasepaint, gossip, gorgeous buildings and, just possibly, the history of everything.
Second Only to Newton. And We’ve Forgotten Him.
Every time that blood-pressure cuff tightens around your arm, an eighteenth-century Teddington clergyman is standing invisibly beside you. Meet Stephen Hales: scientist, inventor, pie improver, painter of posts and a man whose reputation once stood second only to Newton’s.
The Day Biba Hit the High Street
On September 16, 1969, Biba hit Kensington High Street. Step inside the dark, decadent world of Barbara Hulanicki and the trendiest store in Swinging London.
The Day the Sun Rose Over Fleet Street
On September 15, 1964, the Daily Herald set and a new Sun rose over Fleet Street. But it wasn’t yet the brash red-top Britain came to know.
Who’s that Lady in Blue?
There’s a new woman in Trafalgar Square. Tschabalala Self’s vivid blue Lady in Blue has taken possession of the Fourth Plinth, and she’s already changing the conversation.
The Day They Bombed Buckingham Palace
On September 13th, 1940, the Luftwaffe bombed Buckingham Palace, bringing the Blitz to the King and Queen’s own front door and giving the Royal Family an unexpected bond with bomb-battered London.
The London Traffic Light that Changed the World
A red light. A London street in Bloomsbury. A Hungarian physicist steps off the kerb and has an idea that will change the world. This is the extraordinary London moment when Leó Szilárd saw the possibility of the nuclear chain reaction.
The Great Diamond Job
One fabulous diamond. One audacious plan. And one of London’s most extraordinary heists.
Two Sisters, a Fable & a Little Mirth
Tucked away on Kensington Church Walk is Fable and Mirth, a tiny cabinet of wonders created by sisters Neely and Sarita. We step inside to meet them and hear the story behind one of Kensington’s most individual little shops.
William Morris: the Revolutionary Who Made the Rich Beautiful
William Morris wanted to change the world, beautified the homes of the rich and somehow ended up on everything from nuclear submarines to egg cups.
He Poured London in Concrete
From Kensington boy to master of concrete: the story of Sir Denys Lasdun, the man who gave London a National Theatre that one future king called a nuclear power station and John Betjeman greeted with a gasp of delight.
Happy 493rd Birthday, Your Majesty
It all comes down to one little letter – the letter S.T
The Day London Dug Up a Roman Ship
In 1962, somebody dug a hole beside the Thames at Blackfriars. And London opened a trapdoor into its past. Down there, waiting beneath the city for eighteen hundred years, was a Roman ship.
Hampstead Invented Wellness
Hampstead was doing health and wellness when the rest of London was doing gin, smallpox and open sewers.
The Worst Day in London’s History
September 4, 1666. London was an inferno. The fire was still advancing. This wasn't just the worst day of the Great Fire. It was the worst day in London history.
Four Hundred Years Hiding in Plain Sight
An ordinary London street, three names, four hundred years and one astonishing reminder that nothing in London is ever quite what it seems.
The Comedian Who Went to Ground
What makes a young Londoner swap stand-up comedy for gardening? Meet Luke, the comedian who went to ground.
London Through a Cat’s Eyes
What happens when you look at London history through a cat’s eyes? Ann knows.
The Woman Who Invented Our Dream of England
Helen Allingham painted the thatched cottages, tangled roses and flower-filled gardens that became our enduring dream of England.
Six Foot Six in Village London
Meet George, the six-foot-six goalkeeper whose summer job in Kensington Church Walk reveals that, beneath the big-city bustle, London is still a village.
The Day English Cricket Died
When Australia beat England at The Oval in 1882, a cheeky newspaper obituary pronounced English cricket dead and gave the world the Ashes.
The Man Who Saved St Pancras
John Betjeman loved the London other people wanted to demolish, and when the wreckers came for St Pancras, the poet stood in their way
Naked, German & Going for Gold in King’s Cross
Long before the Olympic flame reached London, a German gymnasium in King’s Cross was limbering up, stripping off and helping to set the modern Games in motion.
The Prince Who Turned a Lamp White
Anniversary of Prince Albert's birth. His death left Queen Victoria inconsolable, changed the colour of a London police lamp and left a remarkable trail through the capital.
The Death of Chatterton: The Dead Poet Who Wasn’t There
The dead poet is George Meredith, the garret is in Gray’s Inn, and the painter is about to run away with his model’s wife.
The Night London Learned a New Word
A navigational error. Nine Londoners dead. Edward R. Murrow at his microphone in Trafalgar Square. And the night the Blitz began.
The Oxford Don, the Railway Laureate and Learning England
The railway laureate, an Oxford don, a baby, and infantry...
The Man Who Painted Joy
The more you know about Fragonard, the more beautiful The Swing becomes.
