We carried on along Throgmorton Ave https://goo.gl/maps/dzLbvTfPJyJ3emAt9 - admiring the Drapers garden and their pavement light
The Draper's hall is interesting because was the former home of Thomas Cromwell.
At the end of the street is an old restaurant (sadly closed) that dates back to 1900 and was a city institution - https://www.standard.co.uk/reveller/restaurants/playtime-at-throgmorton-s-7383370.html
Next door is the main entrance to the Draper's Hall
We pootled on stopping to look through vents in the road to see running water!
Throgmorton St become Lothbury around the side of the Bank of England and there is a surprise Venetian Palazzo.
The Walbrook supposedly runs along the Palazzo and then under the Bank of England. We skirted the Bank and arrived at the busy Bank junction.
The road here is called Walbrook (a clue perhaps) to what lies underneath it.
St Stephen Walbrook on the corner is a Wren church and one he practised his dome building on.
We loved looking at what people had chose to put in the corner of their corner office in the
A more discrete Shakespeare tribute on the side of the pub.
The beautiful shiny development "The Stage" has a manky old substation in the middle of it - I assume this gets moved or incorporated into the next stage of the building...
We carried on walking through the Principal Place development (the new HQ of Amazon UK) then past this interesting looking building on Worship Street - it has exceptional levels of security - assume it is some key piece of infrastructure.
And then next to it in a funky adult/youth/trendy/hipster BINGO parlour.
The fountain is not working:
Over the road and up towards the backside of Liverpool Street station or the bottom of the Broadgate Tower. There's some charming public sculpture that is in better repair.
Keep keeping on - see this is Liverpool Street Station
Nice one - through Broadgate circle and onto Blomfield Street - to inspect a piledriver and see the site of St Mary Moorfields - the Pro-Cathedral of the RC Church.
All Hallows-On-The Wall - okay - we are in the City of London now as we cross the old line of the wall!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Hallows-on-the-Wall
It was constructed by George Dance the Younger!
The Carpenters have a good coat of arms - ooooh look at those compasses.
A rather nice listed phone box next to the company of Drapers
After our mammoth Wandle wander Andy and I decided to walk the far shorter and much more urban Walbrook. We used the following guide:
london walks, free walks, secret London walks, walks in london, walks near me, city walk london, best london walks, Walks Past, walkspast
Here are some photos and assorted other comments about our walk.
The key thing with the Walbrook is that is the saddest of rivers - it is entirely underground and it's path incorporate sewers. Indeed parts of it haven't seen the light for hundreds of years.
We met at Liverpool Street and then walked up to the source of the Walbrook. The first potential source of the Walbrook is a fairly uninspiring pocket urban park - Fairchild's Garden - https://goo.gl/maps/jyjWwq34RRL3xyJo6 - Thomas Fairchild was an important horticulturist whose most important contribution to science was discovering that plants can have a male and female sex.
There's a nice write up here: https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/londons-pocket-parks-fairchilds-garden-e2-29054/
Not much has changed since Ian's visit the large concrete expanse is a disused tennis court and it all feels very unloved.
We mooched on towards Shoreditch Church - https://goo.gl/maps/cpEh8pp49rvgtmRk7 - on the walk we observed interesting street furniture that suggests a drain/sewer/lost river lies beneath our feet.
Here is the alternative source of the Walbrook - at the drinking fountain in the grounds of Shoreditch Church. The actual church was locked up and so we couldn't go instead - but the gardens are charming and relatively well kept. The crossroads outside the front of the church are historied - with pre-Roman, Roman roads meeting.
There is a rather lovely shop front - for Wells & Company - more here: https://lookup.london/shoreditch-commercial-ironworks/ - we were passed by a probably hen-do on some kind of bar/bicycle combination that looked fairly hazardous and tiring. The funky urban vibe of Shoreditch was all around us - street art, bearded men on skateboards, backpackers with sleeve tatoos.
We wandered through the streets admiring the graffiti.
Before arriving at the "Box Office" - the site of a former theatre for Shakespeare - commemorated with a mural of Romeo and Juliet and a statue of the Bard.
Back over towards the Ring Road and more funky grafitti.
Helch has been at it again above the American Carwash - https://www.artofthestate.co.uk/london-graffiti/helch-graffiti/
The Queen is said to be upset about a HELCH opposite Windsor Castle – and the artist’s change to a ‘GIVE PEAS A CHANCE’ slogan prompted a pe
There's a lovely ghost sign saying something about "Net Factory" above the Manteca restaurant which was doing a roaring trade.
There's a big redevelopment on another former site of a Shakespeare theatre - it's called the Stage - https://www.thestageshoreditch.com/ - they are leaning pretty hard into the history - the Horse & Groom pub on the corner is feeling pretty squashed by the massive shiny new towers but it has a pretty impressive mural of Romeo and Juliet by the street artist Otto Schade.
