London WC1

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The University of London's Senate House towers over Bloomsbury in WC1.

London WC1 is the London postal district covering the area of central London roughly bounded by Gray's Inn Road to the east, High Holborn to the south, Tottenham Court Road to the west and Euston Road to the north. It falls predominantly within the London Borough of Camden, although a small part is administered by the London Borough of Islington.

1 The area today
2 History
3 Places of interest
4 Tube stations in WC1
5 References

[edit] The area today

WC1 is a diverse and densely populated area. Students from all over the world are housed in the University of London's Intercollegiate Halls, and contribute both to the cosmopolitan nature of the area and to the "Bohemian" nature of many shops, bars and restaurants. The area covered by this postal code is a tourist magnet, attracting five million visitors annually to the British Museum alone^[1]. Recently completed was the Brunswick Centre project, which has popularised Bloomsbury in particular as a new location for designer goods shopping ^[2].

The area is also noted for its multitude of green spaces, including Russell Square, Tavistock Square and Coram's Fields.

[edit] History

The area covered by WC1 has a rich cultural and academic history. At the time of the Great Fire of London, 1666, it was agricultural land just outside the limits of urbanisation. In the programme of regeneration which followed that event, Russell Square was laid out and limited building began.

On 7 June 1753, Parliament passed an Act creating the British Museum. Originally housed in Montagu House which stood where the museum stands today, it opened in 1759. Due to a lack of space Montagu House was demolished in 1845, and the neoclassical design of Sir Robert Smirke which was to replace it was finished in 1852.^[1]

In 1835, University College, London was founded. A site was needed which was cheap enough to build an adequate campus but close enough to the centre of London to be convenient. Bloomsbury — at that time not the popular area it is now — was found to be the perfect site. Today much of the area is dominated by buildings owned by the federal University of London or its constituent colleges and institutes.

From around 1905 to 1939, the area was synonymous with the Bloomsbury Set, an influential group of writers and intellectuals whose members included Virginia Woolf, Vita Sackville-West and John Maynard Keynes.