With a long history dating back hundreds of years, cultural heritage including the invention of fish and chips and multi-sensory museums, the area of Shoreditch in East London has long been one of the most popular tourist destinations in the city and it’s unsurprising then, that every year sees the Montcalm Hotel London City teeming with guests eager to experience the surrounding area.
There’s a lot to see and do in Shoreditch, especially if you want to scratch beneath the surface of London’s tourist hot spots. Shoreditch is a warren-like sprawl of independent boutiques, art galleries, music and above all - personality, all of which it’s difficult to get a handle on in just one visit. There’ll always be some nook or cranny that a guest at the nearby spa hotels in London might have missed. This blog will outline some of the more overlooked attractions, landmarks and oddities that guests in Shoreditch might have missed the first time around.
Escape the hustle and bustle with one of the best hotels in the city. The Montcalm Royal London House is located just off of Finsbury Square and has rooms, bars and Finsbury Square restaurants for all occasions. One of our highlights though, is the Aviary, a rooftop bar with jaw-dropping views over the city of London. This is the perfect place to drink in the vastness of London and map out your journey through the East End from above.
Dennis Severs House is situated on Folgate Street between Liverpool Street and Shoreditch High Street stations. This museum may only be open sporadically and through the evenings of the week, but artist Dennis Severs has created an experiential deep dive into the history of the area. Each room depicts tableaus of a different generation of Huguenot immigrants in London, dating from the 18th century to the turn of the 20th. In each room, it’s not just architecture and interior design that weave the rich tapestry, but the smells and sounds of the chosen time period too. Over four storeys, you can chart the journey of multiple generations of this family, and experience this one of a kind Shoreditch time capsule.
Though not quite as multi-sensory as Dennis Severs House, this Kingsland Road museum still comes with quirks in its specificity of focus. The Geffyre Museum explores and studies the life of the home between the 16th century and modern-day through themed exhibitions and displays in an 18th-century almshouse, a relic of Shoreditch’s past in and of itself.
Another unique museum in the Shoreditch and Bethnal Green area, the Museum of Childhood is an offshoot of the Victorian era Museum of Design in West London. This museum is usually free to visit and exhibits toys, games and childhood artefacts from throughout history. However, the Museum has been closed since the COVID pandemic and is currently undergoing refurbishments, so you might have to wait till 2022 to actually visit it.
For those enjoying a relaxing weekend, London hotel package at the Montcalm Royal London House, the icing on the colourful cake of your London visit could be a Sunday trip to the Columbia Road Flower Market in Haggerston. This beautiful street comes alive every Sunday morning into the afternoon with great value stalls of house plants, bouquets and more all manned by local - and loud - business owners.
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