WEST END-CENTRAL LONDON
Soho
The traditional centre of London’s gay scene, Soho’s Old Compton Street is the main thoroughfare for boy watching and the multitude of bars and clubs that span the area from the greens of Soho Square to the seedier alleys off Brewer Street. Also the mainstay of media-types who work in the area.
Covent Garden
Spanish, French, German, Italian and any other language spoken here, but don’t bother asking for directions; this is tourist central. Street-performers, market stalls and boutique eateries dominate the main square of Covent Garden, which is also home to the Royal Opera House and the popular shopping district of Seven Dials and Neal Street.
Bloomsbury-Holborn
The legal minds of Holborn, university students and the literary glitterati of Bloomsbury coexist, noses in books, in one of the loveliest areas of London. With more than your average number of garden squares, and a proliferation of educational institutes and medical centres, it’s an intellectual’s world dressed up in candy box architecture.
King’s Cross
What was once a seedy, red-lit backwater, is now home to the new Eurostar terminal and a burgeoning arts and culture scene, courtesy of musical centre King’s Place, gallery-esque hotels like Rough Luxe, and a new development which will play home to art school Central Saint Martin’s new building.
Fitzrovia-Marylebone
The skinny BT Tower is one of Fitzrovia’s most prominent architectural features, dominating this creative area which plays home to businesses from the fashion industry to TV companies including MTV and Arcadia, as well as commercial art galleries. Neighbouring Marylebone is, apart from an unpronounceable space on the Monopoly board, home to affluent residents, patients of the Harley Street nip-and-tuck clinics, and the kind of high-end boutiques they frequent.
Mayfair-St James
Exclusive and superbly luxurious, the old-world buildings of Mayfair and St James house everything from major hedge funds and high-end brands, to the largest concentration of luxury hotels paying some of the highest rents in the city, as well as expensive art, Michelin-starred restaurants and the exquisite tailoring of Savile Row. And, oddly enough, London’s only Abercrombie & Fitch. Somebody should tell their door greeters about the tailors next door.
Westminster-Victoria-Pimlico
Where royalty and government converge. Westminster is home to the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey (where Kings and Queens – but only the blue-blooded ones – are coronated), and Buckingham Palace, stretching down towards the pigeon-haven that is Trafalgar Square. Residential Pimlico is a haven of garden squares and Regency architecture, separated from posh Belgravia by Victoria, dominated by the coach and rail stations.
