A special Bloomsbury London walking tour to the location used in one of my all-time favourite sitcoms.
Related videos:
Fantastic Tales of Bloomsbury https://youtu.be/XSzXaMMwHps
Gray’s Inn and Lamb’s Conduit Street & Coram’s Field https://youtu.be/8_hbvtkcnOo
Sunday Stroll Bloomsbury, Soho, Piccadilly Circus https://youtu.be/10meAfPEwcc
We start at Holborn Station and look at the Kingsway Tram Tunnel before walking up Southampton Row and visit Tavistock Square with its associations with Charles Dickens and Virginia Woolf. Dickens lived at the location where the British Medical Association and Woolf lived at 52 Tavistock Square, now the Tavistock Hotel. We cross Marchmont Street Leigh Street and find the Norfolk Arms a favourite pub of Kenneth Williams’ mother Louie Williams.
Opposite the Norfolk Arms we find Collinge & Clark booksellers at 13 Leigh Street which was used as the exterior location for Black Books starring Dylan Moran and Bill Bailey.
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Decision to Leave – Anna Landstrom
Minor Emotions – Megan Wofford
from Epidemic Sound
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42 Comments
Great walk John, lovely part of London. Im also glad you returned to your senses in the final scene of this video, the Sabbath is all about the refreshment treat!! 🍺
This made me search out YouTube's old Pathe films on the tram tunnel. They are definitely worth seeing.
Thanks John for another journey through your connection to the sublime. The windows in the ?? shop to the left of the "Black Books" shop front were very interesting and industrial. Can you recommend any books related to the Bloomsbury Group in the 1920's?
So love watching your walks especially ones like this, which is a trip down memory lane. As a carer, I've been unable to get into London since Feb 2020. It's like going on a day out. Love Black books, re-watched it recently, was just as good second time around.
Some great books shops in liverpool john🤓
Roger. Great video as usual. I use to collect all the Medical Waste around the area. Especially from UCH Buildings. Wakefield St. Etc. In a lorry. And one day. Had to stop driving because a film crew were doing a shoot. Right outside Mary Ward House. It was a scene from The BBC of SPOOKS. This part of London means a lot to me. Also because of the sad day of the Bombing
Great book called Rebel Footprints by David Rosenberg all about the radicals and political exiles who lived in various areas of London, including a chapter on Bloomsbury. Each chapter has a little walk to accompany it as well.
Why would you drink 0% beer ?
This one is an absolute joy. The only way it could have been better is if John had been sidetracked in true perambulatory tradition, not made it to Black Books but got slightly hammered in the Lord John Russell instead …. and yes, it is indeed going to be difficult to resist the unsubscribe button after that confession: zero alcohol pint in the Norfolk!! WTactualF ; ] Please reassure me that didn't happen.
I always like walking around Bloomsbury whenever I visit London, and this gives fascinating points of context and history. Never knew that the Black Books shop was so central. I've got the DVD of one of the series somewhere collecting dust, so might have to seek it out!
Sorry to be mischievous John but the other location behind you at the start is Sicilian Avenue, also an interesting short walk-through.
Thanks for another cracking trip around London ❤
London Transport Museum have a great video about the tunnel on their channel as one of the Hidden London Hangouts series
I love your videos, if I feel stressed, I watch your videos and it calms me
Yes John, I also like to believe a tribe of troglodytes are thriving down in that tunnel
Nice One John
Bloody brilliant John! I love these central London films. There’s so much that’s important to discuss! So many memories.
love the bloke waving to camera at 4.30
Charming walk, and funny that you would want to keep your final destination a surprise, it was an ingenious comedy..
Hope you enjoyed your pint….
Makes up for the terrible weather 😊
Ah, such poignant music to take me down memory lane. I lived here in the early 80's in Compton Place (McNaughten House) – a police section house for single officers but now a Hostel style hotel I believe. I used to be a regular at the Brunswick cinema (recall seeing Purple Rose Of Cairo amongst many others). Also, quite often used to see Alexie Sayle buying his Sunday paper … Lenin, Alexie & Kenneth Williams …that would have been a great sitcom. I believe Mr Sayle still lives there. Another great video. Thanks Mr Rogers. 👍
Thank you for your posts, I live in the Forest of Dean, my views could not be more different from those on your post's. Watching your videos is like enjoying a trip to London with out the effort or cost, the history you tell is fascinating too. Thank you for your work and effort.
Love this area too, is there still evidence of the Kingsway Tunnel at the other end? Wonderful video as always!
The other University of London facility you may have been trying to remember was The Warburg Institute in Woburn Square – where I work!
Black Books my most favourite comedy series ever. I’ve watched it over and over many times. Thank you so much John for showing us the iconic place ❤
Hi John, great insight into historic London, as always! Thank you. Do you have any further info on Giuseppe's refuge location in Clerkenwell? Many thanks
love this – and your enthusiasm for it..
WoW John I worked right beside that and never knew, unbelievable, thank you
'Pardon me boy is that the Chattanooga choo choo?……(Black Books)
I worked in kingsway House in Kingsway in 70s.. eating sarnies in Lincoln Inn Park a nice area to work at the time and sarnies in Embankment gardens Happy Days..
I lived off Tavistock Square for 5 years between 1980-85. I used to walk to my school (LSE) down Southampton Row and Kingsway to LSE every day. I also used to go into the British Museum Library which at at time was located in Bloomsbury, Dillons bookshop, SOAS etc. Brought back lots and lots of memories of my youth. Thank you.
Gratified to see you had a proper pint. Gawd you dragged that out, but, i hasten to add, in your usual cheery and interesting fashion. I think Kenneth Williams ended up living off Baker St somewhere because i used to bump into him quite often as i walked into town and it was always around the same place (Blandford st) I was always impressed to see him but he had perfected an intimidating scowl presumably to stop its like me jabbering on at him. Anyway it worked.
Short but sweet.
Kenneth Williams https://youtu.be/YAqf9Xv6uZs
The pub was the boot not the Norfolk. And his mother drank in the Wellington now mcglynns.
Great video as always John. Never watched Black Books-my bad. Love the Kingsway Tram Tunnel thought of that before for the prolog of a novel- still might use it especially as it is haunted.
Another great film. Southampton Row is an important street for me too, brings back fond memories of trips there to Alan Alan's Magic Spot as a 14 year-old budding magician and trips into town to get tricks from an amazing character! Right choice of beverage at the end of the walk too!!
Well I think in the 3.5 years I have been living in Australia this is the first time I’ve felt homesick….my favourite part of London. Dad worked in John St WC1 so often walked and bused through the area to Euston with him when I was a child, then worked in the Aldwych for 10+ years and loved Kingsway and Southampton Row, Sicilian Avenue and the Princess Louise…then lived in the west country but needed my fix of London every year so stayed in Bloomsbury near Coram Fields…oh what memories and how lucky you can just pop out for a walk in this fascinating part of London. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Jacqui
a favourite area of mine also, I would sit among the Plane trees in Russell Square drinking cold beers from the nearest off sales, infact all the squares around that area were well worth an hour or so of relax and soak in the History…Southampton Row again and the long walk towards the City or Trafalgar square and onwards…..thanks John, reliving old memories..
Another wonderful video! I used to visit a supplier in the building you showed with blanked out windows, converted to offices of course with the creakiest floorboards ever and all the woodwork had many many layers of paint. Full of character. There’s a tenuous Noggin The Nog link with Cosmo Place – that’s your homework tonight! I’m often in town, in a flâneur style, but never see you, the odds must very high- I’m always looking for the orange cap.
I went to lectures in Mary Ward House when I was a student at Birkbek, as well as Tavistock Square. This is one of my favourite parts of London. Thanks!
There’s a comment above John that says Kenneth Williams lived on Cromer Street and I think that’s right. I’ve seen the film you mention in which he takes viewers around his Bloomsbury and into The Boot on Cromer Street (rather than the Norfolk Arms) close to the corner of Judd Street where he would go with his mother and the Bloomsbury characters of the day and where he did do a turn accompanied on piano.
Great film as ever. I studied at Birkbeck as an undergraduate and postgraduate. Love Bloomsbury and have very fond memories of those days. It’s the part of London I first started to go on the drift around and which drove my fascination with the city that brought me to you.
I used to work on Southampton Row back in 1999 to 2001. Some old memories rolling back