Designed by George Coles and opened in 1937, the Gaumont State was one of the biggest auditoria in Europe, with seating for 4004 people. The name “State” is said to come from the 37 metre tower, inspired by the Empire State Building in New York City. It can be seen for miles around, and bears …
Kensal Green is the site of Kensal Green Cemetery, the oldest English cemetery still in operation, which contains many elaborate Victorian mausoleums, including those of William Makepeace Thackeray and Anthony Trollope. The origins of Kensal Green though go way back. The first part of the name Kensal Green was recorded as Kingisholt, meaning the king’s …
East Row is a road with a long history within Kensal Town.
The origin of the name of Frognal, first recorded in the early 15th century, is not known. The ‘house called Frognal’, lay on the west side of the road, probably on the site later occupied by Frognal House. The locality is of some importance as it contained the Hampstead Estate manor-house where the Courts Leet …
Erskine House is situated at Heath End, next door to the Spaniards Inn. Its most famous resident was Thomas Erskine (1750-1823). In 1912, Anne Maxwell wrote the book “Hampstead, its historic houses, its literary and artistic associations”. The rest of this post is taken from the book – any reference to “now” below refers to …
The Conduit Fields (or Shepherd’s Fields) surrounded the spring which flowed from a source which lies underneath what is now Fitzjohn’s Avenue. They were a gloriously rural spot in Hampstead before, as is common to the suburban story, becoming covered in roads, asphalt, houses and gardens. Anna Mazwell wrote a delightful book, published in 1912 …
The W6 section of Goldhawk Road runs down to Stamford Brook station.
NOTE: This page was overtaken by events as Google Maps changed their layout in 2018 and we in the meantime moved to Open Streetmap for own main mapping. However, at time of writing (October 2020), you can still click MAP on our main website to be taken to the Google Map where this slider still …
Eresby Road ran from Kingsgate Road to Kilburn High Road with a turning for Kingsgate Place about halfway down.
Watling Street has long been running through Kilburn. The road stretched in Roman times from Dover to Wroxeter in Shropshire. Kilburn was a stopping point on the way to Willesden’s ‘Black Madonna’ shrine, and in turn a destination in itself to take the waters at the Kilburn Wells. Around the turn of the nineteenth century, …