The Little Central London Kinks Tour
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Follow the Kinks through the dark alleyways and passages of

L O N D O N

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For people with limited time available, this is a walking-only tour of Kinks locations in the most central area of London. You will need this map.

TCR

Start at Tottenham Court Road tube station (2), where you can start singing “Denmark Street”, as you walk down Charing Cross Road and turn left into Denmark Street (3) itself.

denmark street
montagu pyke

Walk back to Charing Cross Road (4), turn left and cross over. Start singing “The Road” - the place Ray took a trip to see the Rolling Stones may well have been the famous Marquee Club, which was, for a time, situated at number 105, which is now an interesting pub called the Montagu Pyke. It could be time for a pint! 

Actually, it turns out that when the Stones played the Marquee, it was at a different location - we will go there now.

floridita

Walk on down Charing Cross Road and turn right into Old Compton Street. We are now getting to the heart of Old Soho (5). There are some nice pubs around here, but try to avoid the clubs - the champagne tastes like Cola and there are some strange types that visit them!

Turn right into Wardour Street and walk up to number 90, which is now called Floridita, but was actually the old location of the Marquee Club (6). It bears an interesting blue plaque

keith moon plaque
Henrits

 Carry on up Wardour street to number 112, which is now Printroom, but in the 1970s was Henrit’s Drumstore (7), owned by Bob Henrit.

Next door is the Ship Inn, an attractive little pub, which would have been frequented by Bob’s customers, who included Keith Moon, Ginger Baker and Michael Charles Avory. (Although according to Bob, Keith was likely to bring a bottle of brandy with him!) It seems only right to have a pint here.

leicester-square-london-1

Now walk back down Wardour Street to New Coventry Street and turn left up to Leicester Square (8), where you can either sing “Dedicated Follower of Fashion” or “London Song” - or both!

cafe de paris outside
cafe de paris inside

Now walk back down New Coventry Street  to Coventry Street. - just past Wardour Street on the right is the Cafe de Paris (9) - you could re-enact the “Come Dancing” video here.

fortnum

Continue on Coventry Street to Piccadilly Circus, then cross to Piccadilly (10) and sing a bit more of “Life On The Road”. On the left is Fortnum & Mason, an extraordinarily posh Grocery store.

If this was the grocery that Tom the Grocer’s Boy ended up owning, it is not surprising that Daisy married him!

fortnum inside
afternoon tea

Here you can partake of an excellent Afternoon Tea, but it isn’t cheap and it won’t be the same without Donna!

Alternatively, you could by a tin of the appropriate blend of tea.

Burlington_Arcade,_north_entrance

Continuing the posh theme, cross over and continue on Piccadilly, then right into Burlington Arcade(11), which featured in Ray’s story, “The Shirt”.

You can certainly buy some smart - and extremely expensive - clothes here, although the shirtmaker that Ray mentions, Hilditch & Key, is actually in Jermyn Street, just south of Piccadilly.

savile row

Turn right into Burlington Gardens, then the 3rd left into Savile Row (12), where you can sing “End Of The Season”

regentst_low

Turn right into Conduit Street, then left into Regent Street (13) - time to sing a bit more “Dedicated Follower Of Fashion”

Kingly_Street

Turn right into Great Marlborough Street, the immediately right into Kingly Street (14), site of the offices of Boscobel Productions.

carnaby

Turn left into Beak Street, left again into Carnaby Street (15) - time to sing still more “Dedicated Follower Of Fashion”

Congratulation! You have now completed the Little Central London Kinks Tour.

Numbers in brackets refer to locations on the LCLKT map