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Fitzrovia is a small district in central London. It is an informal designation, and is not and has never been an administrative district of any kind. The eastern section of the district is in the London Borough of Camden and the western section is in the City of Westminster. It is bounded to the north by Euston Road, to the east by the Tottenham Court Road, to the south by Oxford Street and to the west by Great Portland Street. Fitzrovia is a busy district, but its name is uncommonly obscure compared to those of most central London districts, including its neighbours such as Soho to the south and Bloomsbury to the east. The area was unnamed until the mid-twentieth century when, in the light of the area's burgeoning reputation as the home of bohemian and literary London, it adopted the name of its most renowned public house and literary salon, the Fitzroy Tavern. There have been repeated failed attempts to rename the area in the New York fashion, Noho (north of Soho).

The northern part of the area was first developed in the 18th century by the Hon. Charles FitzRoy, (later Baron Southampton), who purchased the Manor of Tottenhall and built Fitzroy Square to which he gave his name. The square is the most distinguished of the original architectural features of the district, having been designed in part by Robert Adam.

Much of Fitzrovia was developed by small landowners, and this led to a predominence of small and irregular streets, in comparison with neighbouring districts like Marylebone and Bloomsbury, which were dominated by one or two landowners, and were thus developed more schematically, with stronger grid patterns and a greater number of squares. Unlike its neighbours to the south, east and west, Fitzrovia never really had a spell as a fashionable residential district. In its early days, it was largely an area of well to do tradesmen and craft workshops. Nowadays property uses are diverse, but Fitzrovia can't claim to be the focus of any particular activity in London. It is however reasonably well known for its fashion industry, but this is mainly the "back-stage" side of the industry, comprising a good number of wholesalers and associated offices. Charlotte Street was for many years the home the British advertising industry but is now known for its many and divers restaurants. A number of television production and post-production companies are based in the area and Broadcasting House, home of BBC radio, is on the west fringe of the district. There are many offices of all kinds, but few if any of them are headquarters of major companies. There are also some hospitals, a few mid-market hotels, a good deal of residential property and one or two minor embassies. Retail uses spill into parts of Fitzrovia from Oxford Street and Tottenham Court Road, which are two of the principal shopping streets in central London.

The most prominent feature of the area is the BT Tower, which is one of London's tallest buildings.

Fitzrovia and the Arts

Fitzrovia became London's main artistic and bohemian centre from a period dating roughly from the mid 1920s until the mid to late 1950s. Amongst those known to have lived locally and frequented public houses in the area such as the Fitzroy Tavern and the Wheatsheaf are Augustus John, Dylan Thomas, Aleister Crowley, the racing tipster Prince Monolulu, Nina Hamnett, and George Orwell. Another pub in the area, the Newman Arms, features in Orwell's novels 1984 and Keep the Aspidistra Flying and in the Michael Powell film Peeping Tom. George Bernard Shaw and Virginia Woolf lived at different times in the same house in Fitzroy Square. Ian McEwan lives in the square and set his novel Saturday in the area.

The UFO Club, home to Pink Floyd during their spell as the house band of psychedelic London, was held in the basement of 31 Tottenham Court Road on the eastern border of Fitzrovia. The rock band Coldplay formed in Ramsay Hall, a University College London hall of residence within the area.

External link

Map of Fitzrovia and the surrounding districts - note that this widely used street atlas does not bother to designate Fitzrovia.

• Districts of London
• Camden
• City of Westminster