Soho and Covent Garden: the back story

About Soho and Covent Garden: the back story

By the ULTIMATE London Editorial Team

Editor-in-Chief: Jai Michael

Soho and Covent Garden are the beating heart of the West End: theatres, restaurants, bars, jazz clubs and shops packed into a web of narrow streets between Regent Street and the Strand.

Soho

Soho’s name is thought to come from an old hunting cry, from the days when the area was royal parkland. From the 17th century it became home to French Huguenot refugees and later to Italian, Greek and other communities, whose delis, cafés and restaurants gave Soho its cosmopolitan character. Artists, writers and musicians followed, and its jazz clubs and pubs became legendary.

Covent Garden

Covent Garden was once the convent garden of Westminster Abbey. In the 1630s Inigo Jones laid out London’s first planned square, and a fruit, vegetable and flower market grew there, lasting until 1974, when it moved south of the river. The old market building, saved from demolition, is now full of shops, cafés and stalls.

Soho never really sleeps; Covent Garden never stops performing.

Theatreland

The West End’s theatres crowd around Shaftesbury Avenue, the Strand and Drury Lane, and the Royal Opera House and the London Coliseum anchor its musical life. Pre-theatre dining is a local art.

Our advice: explore Soho on foot in the late afternoon, eat early before a show, and come back after the curtain for a nightcap at The French House or a late set at Ronnie Scott’s.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with Soho and Covent Garden: the back story before you go.