Covent Garden

Covent Garden is an area of central London most noted for its flower, fruit and vegetable market (now moved to Nine Elms[?]) and the Royal Opera House[?]. 'Covent Garden' is properly the area of London bounded by High Holborn[?], Kingsway[?], the Strand and Charing Cross Roads. However that phrase is commonly used to describe the open area at its centre - for which 'Covent Garden Piazza' is the proper name.

History

Although a settlement has existed in the area since the Roman times of Londinium, the modern-day Covent Garden has its roots in the early seventeenth century when land ("the Convent's Garden") formerly owned by the Church of England was redeveloped by the 4th Earl of Bedford. Inspired by the grand piazzas of Rome and other Italian cities, the Earl created a large open public space at the centre of the Garden. The area rapidly became a focal point market traders, and following the Great Fire of London of 1666 which destroyed 'rival' markets towards the east of the city, the market became the most important in the country. Exotic items from around the world were carried on boats up the River Thames and sold on from Covent Garden. The first mention of a Punch and Judy show in Britain was recorded by diarist Samuel Pepys who saw such a show in the square in May 1662. In 1830 a grand building reminiscent of the Roman baths[?] such as those found in Bath was built to provide a more permanent trading centre.

By the end of the 1960s, traffic congestion in the surrounding area had reached such a level that the use of the square of a market, which required increasingly large lorries for deliveries and distribution, was becoming unsustainable. The whole area was threatened with complete redevelopment. Following a public outcry, in 1973 the Home Secretary gave dozens of buildings around the square listed building status, preventing redevelopment. The following year the market finally moved to a new site ( called The New Covent Garden Market ) about three miles south-west at Nine Elms. The square languished until its central building re-opened as a shopping centre and tourist attraction in 1980. Today the shops largely sell novelty items. More serious shoppers gravitate to Long Acre, which has a range of clothes shops and boutiques, and Neal Street, noted for its large number of shoe shops. The London Transport Museum[?] is also located on the Piazza.

The marketplace and Royal Opera House were memorabily brought together in the opening of George Bernard Shaw's play, Pygmalion, where Professor Higgins is waiting for a cab to take him home from the opera when he comes across Eliza Doolittle selling flowers in the market.