Shopping in London

You do not "go shopping". You go to the shops or to market.

The Royal Exchange, built by Sir Thomas Gresham, was opened by the Queen in 1571, just in time for the shopping season, as sort of an Elizabethan shopping mall. A very prestigious building in the classical style, fine merchants of all sorts have set up shop here.

The main building features a huge, gilded grasshopper on the roof: Gresham's personal badge.

One-stop-shopping includes: Feather shops, Milliners, Wig makers, Ready made clothes (drapers), Imported accessories, Embroidered goods, Perfumes, Starches (used for ruffs).

When you can't find it at the Exchange...

Trade Street, Neighborhood, or District

[from John Stowe, A Survey of London, 1603]

Mercers and Haberdashers West Cheape & London Bridge

Goldsmiths Gutherons Lane

Pepperers and Grocers Bucklesberrie

Drapers Lombard Street and Cornhill

Skinners St. Mary Pellipers, Budge Row, & Walbrooke

Stock-fishmongers Thames Street

Wet-fishmongers Knight-riders Street & Bridge Street

Ironmongers Ironmongers Lane, Old Jurie, & Thames Street

Vintners The Vintree and various

Wigmakers Silver Street

Brewers Near the river (it's the water!)

The most exclusive jewelers and mercers are in Cheapside.

You can buy second-hand clothes in Birchin Lane, but people "of appearance" do not shop there.

There are no zoning laws. Shops, taverns, and residences live noisily side by side all over the city.

Most of the really low company you may be looking for is probably hanging out in Southwark across the river. (Pronounce it SUTH-ook, "th" as in "bathe" and "ook" as in "book".) Naturally the bear garden (for bear baiting) is here, as are (eventually) the play houses and many of the stews.

  Money: the Basics
  A Map of Tudor London
  The City of London

26 March 2000 pkm