As the fountainhead of maritime insurance Lloyd's is the most famous coffeehouse. Its story is emblematic of the rise and fall of London’s coffeehouses: part of their meteoric rise was the appeal of auctions; their fall came when these public spaces turned private. Exploring Lloyd’s also reveals the coffeehouse's deep links to the slave trade, from auctions and escaped enslaved Africans to the insuring of slave ships and their human cargo.

In 1911, when Vaslav Nijinsky returned from Paris to dance at the Mariinsky, his revealing costume raised eyebrows in the Tsar's box...

Pause on the Anichkov bridge to take in the distinctive architecture of Petersburg, and consider how the city itself could thematise looking.

How did the square behind the Paris Opera Garnier come to be named for a Russian aristocrat?

Jonathan's Coffee House was at the heart of what has been dubbed ‘the financial revolution’ in late seventeenth-century London. It was home to the stock-jobbers, the scene of the 1720 South Sea Bubble, and the beginning of London's Stock Exchange.

Paris is well-known as a centre of fashion and luxury. The elegant stores on the Rue de la Paix offer a glimpse into the sensations of the early twentieth century, and the class distinctions which structured women's spaces.

In March 2021, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle were interviewed by Oprah Winfrey about their decision to step down as working members of the British Royal Family as a result of racism in the monarchy and the media. This had taken a toll on both of their mental health and following stepping down, they have settled in California with their children. During this interview, Oprah and millions of viewers were treated to a brief look into their backyard.

There, as reported in Architectural Digest: They invited Winfrey into a sizable chicken coop, adorably named “Archie’s Chick Inn” after their 22-month-old son. “She’s always wanted chickens,” Harry told Winfrey of his wife as the trio knelt down in the coop to feed the flock of hens, which they recently rescued from a factory farm. “I just love rescuing,” Meghan added.

For most viewers, the significance of these chickens as part of the fabric of The Sussexes’ new life was likely largely unnoticed. As a historical geographer with a long-standing interest in chickens, I couldn’t help but compare these (post-)royal birds with a much longer lineage of royal chickens, starting in the mid-19th Century. In this PlaceCloud Essay, I’m taking you to the Royal Aviary in Windsor Park to talk about chickens: a very royal bird.

This place was a beloved walking spot of two nineteenth-century lovers, Edwin Atherstone and Hannah West. Learn about their love affair, and of what kept them apart.

Visit the old palace at Hatfield, childhood home to the future Elizabeth I. It was the place where she learned of her accession to the throne, in 1558, while sitting reading under an oak tree in the palace's park.

Journey to the site of Henry VIII's most spectacular building project, a palace that was intended to rival to great Chateau de Chambord in France.