On 9th May 1662, Samuel Pepys wrote in his diary “Thence to Covent Garden… to see an Italian puppet play that is within the rayles there, which is very pretty, the best that ever I saw, and a great ...

Today I publish Novelist & Historian, Gillian Tindall‘s exploration of the lost mansions of Stepney that came to light during the Elizabeth Line construction Three hundred years ago, Stepney was still ...

May Day 1835 by George Cruikshank. Meet me this Bank Holiday Monday on the steps of St Paul’s for a jovial ramble through the alleys of the Square Mile in search of the wonders and the wickedness of ...

Centenarian Alie Touw has lived in this country for over half a century and made Spitalfields her home in recent decades. Yet if circumstances had been different, or if Alie had followed her father’s ...

I don’t know how it happened!’ declares centenarian Alie Touw, shaking her head and raising her hands with a smile of mock bewilderment if you ask the secret of her longevity. ‘I have so many things ...

Today I thought you might take inspiration from these recipes – culinary and medicinal – from Thomas Newington‘s book that he wrote in 1715 while in domestic service in Brighton, illustrated with wood ...

I have known Paul Rothe’s Delicatessen & Cafe in Marylebone Lane for as long as I can remember. Back in the late sixties and early seventies, my mother used to travel up to town from Putney with me ...

People often ask where they can find authentic Bengali food in Spitalfields and I have found the answer in Oitij-jo Kitchen, a women’s collective who run the catering operation at Rich Mix Arts Centre ...