Piccadilly Circus

Piccadilly Circus is a road crossroads and a pedestrian space located at London, with the crossing of four large arteries of the West End: Piccadilly, Shaftesbury Avenue, The Haymarket and Regent Street. The place, formerly considered as the center of the British Empire, still nowadays constitutes one of the nerve centres of London, is famous for the enchantment which the flutter of the pleiad of neon signs gets which recovers it, but it is also surrounded by several tourist curiosities, of which a fountain set up in 1893 in memory of Lord Shaftesbury and overhung by a Ange of Christian Charity (commonly called Eros ), or the theater Criterion , the London Pavilion and several stores famous. Not far are the London Trocadero , shopping mall and of leisures, and the statue Horses off Photogravure .

The place was built in 1819 to connect Regent Street, then major element of the project of town planning of John Nash (the architect appointed of George IV), with the large commercial street Piccadilly.

Its site in full heart of the West End, like its proximity with commercial places or of entertainment make that it is still today an appreciated place of the Londoners like tourists of the whole world.

History of Piccadilly Circus

The name of Piccadilly Circus is directly derived from the street name Piccadilly, one of the five streets which lead to the crossroads, to which was assistant the name " circus ". Literally, circus means circus, but here it should simply be heard in the figurative direction of an open space (of more or less circular form) where meet several roads. Only in London, one finds this name in several places such as Holborn Circus, Oxford Circus, Finsbury Circus or Ludgate Circus. It is necessary however to keep in mind that a place of greatter importance and more or less oval form will see more often named " Public garden " : thus of Grosvenor Public garden, St Jame' S Public garden, Berkeley Public garden, Bedford Public garden, etc

Until the 16th century, the district of Piccadilly was the property of Eton College and Mercer' S Company, before a tailor called Robert Baker indirectly gave him his current name. This man had grown rich in the trade by the " piccadils ", high collars empesés very in favor at time of the Stuarts near the Dandy S. With this money, it made the land acquisition in the west of London, part of the city little inhabited at the time, and will make there build a luxurious house in 1612, at the southern end of Great Windmill Street. Its residence will quickly be called " the Piccadilly Hall ". Even if the current street Piccadilly, in 1692, accepted officially the name of Portugal Street in the honor of Catherine de Bragance, wife of the king Charles II of England, it is attested as of 1743 that the name used for the street had already become the current name, i.e. that of Piccadilly.

Piccadilly Circus was creates in 1819, in the prolongation of Regent Street. At that time, the crossroads Piccadilly Circus was in fact indicated under the name of Regent Circus, because included/understood in the surface of town planning of John Nash (the Architecte appointed of the king George IV) whose Regent Street was the major element. The place was built on the site of the house and of the garden of Hutton Lady and it lost her circular aspect in 1886, during the construction of Shaftesbury Avenue and of the junction with the latter. As of this time, Piccadilly Circus knew an intense traffic.

The Piccadilly Circus Tube Station (the complete name, in English, of the underground station of Subway of Piccadilly Circus) was open the March 10th 1906 with regard to Bakerloo Line and the December 15th 1906 with regard to Piccadilly Line .

Because of its great proximity with Soho, Piccadilly Circus was quickly a point of appointment for the homosexual , and a high place of the Prostitution. When Alfred Kinsey visited London to study the sexual behavior of the British there, he immediately asked to discover Soho. The universe around Piccadilly Circus and of Leicester Square astonished it so much so that by comparing manners sexual of South America with those of London, he never stated not to have seen as much prostitution, except for Havana.

The crossroads knew its luminous first Publicité S in 1910, and in 1923 the frontage of London Pavilion sees being born its first display panel. The first tricolor fires were installed the August 3rd 1926 and Piccadilly Circus underwent its last great renovation works in the current of the Années 1980.

The fountain " Shaftesbury Memorial " , built in 1893 to celebrate the benefits of Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 7th count de Shaftesbury, knew a deep transformation during the Second world war. The Statue which crowns it, the Ange of Christian charity, was removed during the war to be temporarily replaced by billboards. After the war, the fountain was entirely moved center of Piccadilly Circus towards the south-western corner of the place.

Places and centers of interest

Neon signs

  • Historique :

Since the whole beginning of the 20th century, Piccadilly Circus is a place where were installed luminous billboards. Nowadays, they all are gathered on only one building, the north-western side of the place, between Shaftesbury Avenue and Glasshouse Street. The building, property of Land Securities Group since the Years 1970, although not having really a name, is sometimes called Monico in reference to the Café Monico which was formerly at this place. Construction on which are placed the advertizing signs corresponds to the following addresses: 44/48 Street Regent, 1/6 Sherwood Street, 17/22 Denman Street and 1/17 Shaftesbury Avenue.

The first advertizing illuminations used bulbs with incandescence which were then replaced by neon lights. Then in the Years 2000, the technology of the electroluminescent diodes gradually was essential. In same time, the increasing cost of hiring of the sites, the number of advertisers represented has, him, decreased.

  • Panneaux actuels :

In 2005, the site has five giant neon signs overhanging a building on the northern side of the place, occupied by large marks such as Boots, Burger King or GAP, but also by small shopkeepers, restaurants and offices.

The five current signs represent the marks Samsung, Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Sanyo and TDK. They are laid out as follows: on the left, Samsung forms a square; in height and on all the remainder length Coca-Cola is reproduced; under Coca-Cola and in the extreme-right-hand side two marks with in high TDK and all in bottom on the right Sanyo appear. McDonald's, finally, is represented in the medium, bellow, on the right of Samsung, under Coca-Cola and on the left of TDK and Sanyo.

Until 2001, Nescafe had a sign of the same size as TDK and Sanyo, placed just at the top of these two marks, but it was replaced by Coca-Cola which could extend its ensign in length. In September 2003, Coca-Cola made besides install an ultramodern screen LED according to the curves of the building in which various publicities are diffused, in particular for the championship of English football.

In the West of the place, the mark Vodafone made install on a roof a neon sign, accompanied in lower part by an unrolling text whose contents come from Internet site of the mark, where everyone can write a personal message which will ravel on Piccadilly Circus at the date and the desired hour.

Shaftesbury Memorial and Eros

In the south-west of Piccadilly Circus is held the Shaftesbury Monument Memorial Fountain , more simply called Shaftesbury memorial . This fountain was set up in 1893, the honor of the philanthropist and parliamentary British Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 7th count de Shaftesbury, more commonly called Lord Shaftesbury . By its legislative work and its political standpoint, he fought against the Travail of the children in the mine S, and these are precisely these benefits that this fountain aims at commemorating. It is surmounted by a winged naked statue in gilded Bronze, work of Alfred Gilbert, who became the mascot of London as the Manneken Pis can be that of Brussels. It is about the Ange of Christian charity even if, with the passing of years, the angel were associated with Eros ( Eros in English), divinity of the love at the Greek , and that this name remained to him. The angel also was taken again like Logotype of the quotien British general practitioner Evening Standard and appears the every day in top of the one of the newspaper.

The use of a naked angel was not essential without evil and was décriée in its time. However, according to an artistic review of the time (the Magazine off Art ), the unit offered: “… a contrast striking with the dull and monotonous ugliness our usual urban sculptures. (…) Work, while embellishing a space up to that point sorry, should contribute much to the rise in the tastes of the public as regards decorative sculptures, and henceforth guarantee the city against all new monumental monstrosity whose old style watered us. ”. This statue is one of very first in the world to be realized in Aluminum. At the beginning, the point of Eros was directed to north, towards Shaftesbury Avenue. But during the Second world war, it was moved center towards its current site, i.e. opposite the Criterion theater and with the variation the motor vehicle traffic. By doing this, the point of Eros from now on is directed towards the south, towards Lower Regent Street. At this same time, at the beginning of the swinging sixties, the root circus of the place was going to give rise to the Circlorama , a circular cinema with eleven screens but which could not present truths films to the spectators obligatorily upright. They were rather extracts in concerts Yéyé and documentary seizing… for the time because well in on this side current géode S.

The Criterion theater

The theater Criterion ( Criterion Theater ) is a building located on the southern part of Piccadilly Circus and classified like Grade II listed building . The theater is built entirely under ground, and its current capacity of reception is of 594 seats. To reach it, it should be followed a tiled staircase, and the columns, used to support the first and the second balconies, restrict inside the enclosure the sight since many seats.

The theater was designed by Thomas Verity and opened the March 21st 1874. Although the original plans were carried out in order to exploit the place like a concert hall, it was never the case, and since the origin, the building was always used like theater.

In 1883, the theater was forced to close to make renovation works. One year later, it again opened its doors, ventilation having been improved and the lamps with gas having been replaced by electric lights. The theater closed once again 1989 with 1992 to be deeply renovated.

Since 1997, the Criterion theater accommodates the Reduced Shakespeare Company. Created in 1981 by Daniel Singer, this company of actors plays of the parts of great fame in a very rythmée way, the parts being excessively shortened and a priori highly impromptu, while at the same time the text is written by advance with precision. Their most known part is The Complete Works off William Shakespeare (abridged) (complete works of William Shakespeare in summary) that is to say thirty-seven parts of Shakespeare summarized in… 97 minutes! Among their other parts, let us quote, All the Great Books (abridged) (All largest books in summary), The Complete History off America (abridged) (complete history of the the United States in summary), The Bible: The Supplements off Word God (abridged) (the Bible: whole word of God in summary, All The Great Movies (abridged) (All largest Film S in summary).

London Pavilion

In the North-East of Piccadilly Circus, with the angle of Shaftesbury Avenue and Coventry Street, London Pavilion is. Initially Variety, it was rebuilt in the middle of the Années 1980 to make of it an commercial arcade accommodating shops and restaurants. It is part from now on of the London Trocadero. Decorated of thirteen Sculpture S of beauties victoriennes, it was first of all built in 1859, before being rebuilt in 1923 at another place of the place.

  • Historic of London Pavilion:

The first building named London Pavilion and located at Piccadilly Circus, the London Pavilion Music Hall , was built in 1859 by Loibl and Sonnhammer. It was used as variety. In 1885, Shaftesbury Avenue was traced at this exact place, and so a new house was built by James Ebenezer Saunders and R.J. Worley, to act as variety again. In 1900 and 1918, one noted the first degradations inside the building. In 1923, electrical panels were installed on the side of the building. Into 1934, the building, which started to undergo important deteriorations on the level of its structure, is transformed into cinema by F.M. Chancellor and Cecil Massey. In 1986, the building almost completely is destroyed then rebuilt by Chapman Taylor, except for the frontage of 1885 which is kept intact, and becomes an accessible commercial mini-center shops and stores. This same year 1986, opens to the second stages the Rock Circus , property of the museum Tussaud, which brushes a portrait of the history of the Rock' roll thanks to wax statues representing the stars of the music rock'n'roll and pop the exposure of the Rock Circus closed its doors in 2001.

In 2000, the building is connected to the Trocadero Center near, and in 2003 the name of Trocadero Center is modified to read there London Trocadero . The basement gives directly on the subway station of Piccadilly Circus.

Principal stores

For a long time, with number 1 of the street Piccadilly , on the west coast of the place, with the crossing of Regent Street and of Piccadilly , the " was; ship amiral" of Tower Records, American chain of stores of discs. The building is from now on property of the Virgin Group which installed a Virgin Megastore there, a British chain of cultural goods. The basement of the store has an exit leading directly to the station of Métro built under Piccadilly Circus. Inside the London Trocadero , one can find a store competitor, HMV (for His Master' S Voice , in French “the voice of its Master”, in the past The Gramophone Company).

On the southern part of the place, close to the fountain set up in commemoration of Lord Shaftesbury, is Lillywhites, important detailing sports equipment, installed at this place since 1925. Previously, the store existed already (since 1863) in the street Haymarket, near to Piccadilly Circus, but it had ended up moving to gain in surface of sale.

The London Trocadero

What had been a big room of ball where the Valse S Vienneses at the era victorienne resounded and Edwardian for summer reconverted in a commercial space and of relaxation, sheltering restaurants, bars, stores and a futuristic complex dedicated to the image, the sound, data processing, virtual reality and the special effects. With the Fall 2005, the London Trocadero is made up as follows:

  • Bars: One Haddock , Bar Rumba and Bar M .

  • Stores: Accessorize , Claire' S Accessories , Crest off London , Herbal King , HMV (see also here the section " Principal the magasins"), Millie' S Cookies , Octopus , Sweet Center , The Body Shop , The Sock Shop , Theater & Sports Tickets Dirty (sales of tickets for the principal sports events, the plays and the concerts the pop one/rock'n'roll of the capital), Travelex , Wall Street Forex and Whittard off Chelsea .

  • Entertainments: Funland , Golden delicious Nugget Casino , UGC Cinema and William Hill .

Although its main entrance is on Coventry Street, the London Trocadero is also accessible by Piccadilly Circus, to which it is very close.

The fountain Horses off Photogravure

The fountain set up in the honor of Lord Shaftesbury is certainly that which is known by the tourists, but often the Londoners prefer to him another fountain located not far from there, with the angle of the streets Piccadilly and Haymarket: Horses off Photogravure (in French " Horses of Hélios"). Carved by Rudy Weller, this statue in Bronze accounts for the four horses of Hélios, the Greek god of the Sun and the Lumière: Pyroïs, Eoos, Aethon and Phlégon.

The service road of Piccadilly Circus by public transport

  • Par the métro:

Piccadilly Circus is directly accessible by Métro, Piccadilly Line and Bakerloo Line serving this crossroads on the level of the underground station of Piccadilly Circus Tube Station . The entry is done with each corner of Piccadilly Circus. Rare fact, it acts of one of the rare stations of Métro of London entirely underground and non-aligned to a building on the surface. The station is classified Grade II listed building.

The station is thus on the layouts of two underground lines: on the one hand on the Piccadilly Line , between the stations Green Park Tubes Station and Leicester Square Tubes Station , and on the other hand on Bakerloo Line between the stations Charing Cross Tubes Station and Oxford Circus Tube Station . The subway station of Piccadilly Circus was inaugurated in 1906.

Metronet, one of the three private operators of the London subway (London Underground), invested fourteen million pounds sterling to renovate the station. The purpose of work is planned to last of March 2005 with the Printemps 2007 and is to remake, in all or partly, the coatings of the grounds and the walls, the network of Vidéo monitoring, to envisage new display panels, new clocks, to create additional points of assistance, to increase the luminosity, to make more accessible the station to the handicapped people and finally to replace the escalators.

  • Par the train:

Stop at the railway station of Charing Cross-country race.

  • Par the bus:

Buses 3,6,9,12,14,15,38,88 and 159 make it possible to go to Piccadilly Circus.


Piccadilly Circus in the popular culture

In the language anglaise'

With the the United Kingdom, the sentence " It' S like Piccadilly Circus. " is very much used and refers to a place or a situation where many people meet. The popular proverb affirms that a person who goes to Piccadilly Circus will have a great probability of crossing a person of her knowledge. This expression is the equivalent of the American expression " It' S like Great Exchange Station . ".

In English, the homosexual Argot devoted the expression " pick-a-willy ", derived from the name willy (or willie ) concerning childish language and meaning " zizi" and of the verb to pick meaning " to choose, sélectionner". This name of pick-a-willy refers to the fact that Piccadilly Circus is a place considered for its presence of homosexual male prostitutes.

In musique'

The Swedish singer Pernilla Wahlgren made a named song with success in 1985 Piccadilly Circus , just as the group Punk of Northern Ireland Stiff Little Fingers. In their fourth album, Go for it (1981), the group tells the true story of a friend of the group living with Belfast and left to take refuge with London to flee the conflict north-Irish. Arrived on the spot, he was stabbed in Piccadilly Circus. Lastly, a compilation of the British group of pop-rock'n'roll Squeeze left in 1996 is entitled Piccadilly Collection .

Piccadilly Circus is the name of a group Japan board, made of Masamichi Sugi, Kiyonori Matsuo and Tetsu Hashimoto with the Guitare, Hiroyuki Izuta with the keyboards, Masatoshi Ueda with the battery and Azuma Kazamatsuri with the low Guitare. Their first album, left in February 1999, is also called Piccadilly Circus .

In 1978, in the first album of the group To say Straits, simply entitled To say Straits , figure a song, Wild West End , which refers to the places close to Piccadilly Circus.

In painting and sculpture

Piccadilly Circus was used as subject and gave its name to a Peinture of the British painter Charles Ginner (1878 - 1952). Realized in 1912, this table is part from now on of the collection of the London museum Tate Britain (one of the four components of the Tate Gallery, with Tate Liverpool, Tate St Ives and Tate Modern).

The American artist Paul McCarthy published an edition in two volumes of 320 pages entitled Piccadilly Circus recalling his career and the exposure of his exuberant installations all over the world.

Others

Piccadilly Circus is the name of a pub club (bar-brewery the day and discotheque the night) located at the Canada, in the town of Toronto, province of Ontario.

References

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