Frith Street
Encyclopedia
Soho
Soho is an area of the City of Westminster and part of the West End of London. Long established as an entertainment district, for much of the 20th century Soho had a reputation for sex shops as well as night life and film industry. Since the early 1980s, the area has undergone considerable...
area of London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, England. To the north is Soho Square
Soho Square
Soho Square is a square in Soho, London, England, with a park and garden area at its centre that dates back to 1681. It was originally called King Square after Charles II, whose statue stands in the square. At the centre of the garden, there is a distinctive half-timbered gardener's hut...
and to the south is Shaftesbury Avenue
Shaftesbury Avenue
Shaftesbury Avenue is a major street in central London, England, named after Anthony Ashley Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury, that runs in a north-easterly direction from Piccadilly Circus to New Oxford Street, crossing Charing Cross Road at Cambridge Circus....
. The street crosses Old Compton Street
Old Compton Street
Old Compton Street runs east-west through Soho, London, England.- History :The street was named after Henry Compton. who raised funds for a local parish church, eventually dedicated as St Anne's Church in 1686...
, Bateman Street and Romilly Street.
History
Frith Street was built in the years around 1680, and was apparently named after a wealthy builder named Richard Frith. In the 18th and early 19th centuries many artistic and literary people came to live in Soho and several settled in this street. The painter John Alexander Gresse was here in 1784, the year of his death. John Horne TookeJohn Horne Tooke
John Horne Tooke was an English politician and philologist.-Early life and work:He was born in Newport Street, Long Acre, Westminster, the third son of John Horne, a poulterer in Newport Market. As a youth at Eton College, Tooke described his father to friends as a "turkey merchant"...
, philologist and politician, lived here in about 1804; John Constable
John Constable
John Constable was an English Romantic painter. Born in Suffolk, he is known principally for his landscape paintings of Dedham Vale, the area surrounding his home—now known as "Constable Country"—which he invested with an intensity of affection...
lived here 1810–11; John Bell
John Bell (sculptor)
John Bell 1811 - 1895 was a British sculptor, born in Bell's Row, Great Yarmouth, Norfolk. His family home was Hopton Hall, Suffolk.Bell moved from Suffolk to London to attend the Royal Academy Schools in 1829. His "Babes in the Wood" was exhibited at the Royal Academy summer exhibition in 1839...
, the sculptor, in 1832–33 and William Hazlitt
William Hazlitt
William Hazlitt was an English writer, remembered for his humanistic essays and literary criticism, and as a grammarian and philosopher. He is now considered one of the great critics and essayists of the English language, placed in the company of Samuel Johnson and George Orwell. Yet his work is...
wrote his last essays while he was lodging at No. 6 Frith Street prior to his death there in 1830.
Samuel Romilly
Samuel Romilly
Sir Samuel Romilly , was a British legal reformer.-Background and education:Romilly was born in Frith Street, Soho, London, the second son of Peter Romilly, a watchmaker and jeweller...
, the legal reformer, was born at No. 18 in 1757, and the young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
lodged at No. 20 with his father and sister in 1764–65. In 1816 the actor William Charles Macready
William Charles Macready
-Life:He was born in London, and educated at Rugby.It was his intention to go up to Oxford, but in 1809 the embarrassed affairs of his father, the lessee of several provincial theatres, called him to share the responsibilities of theatrical management. On 7 June 1810 he made a successful first...
was living at No. 64, and over a hundred years later, from 1924 to 1926 John Logie Baird
John Logie Baird
John Logie Baird FRSE was a Scottish engineer and inventor of the world's first practical, publicly demonstrated television system, and also the world's first fully electronic colour television tube...
lived at No. 22 where on 26 January 1926 he demonstrated television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
to members of the Royal Institution
Royal Institution
The Royal Institution of Great Britain is an organization devoted to scientific education and research, based in London.-Overview:...
.
In 1989 Frith Street Gallery was founded here, originally occupying two adjacent townhouses. Initially it was a forum for contemporary drawing, then it expanded into a wide range of artistic media. In 2007 the gallery moved to Golden Square
Golden Square
Golden Square, Soho, London in the City of Westminster is one of the historic squares of Central London. The square is just east of Regent Street and north of Piccadilly Circus....
, just a short distance from Frith Street.
Today
The coffee shop Bar ItaliaBar Italia
Bar Italia is a coffee shop located on Frith Street in Soho Central London.On January 26, 1926, John Logie Baird gave the first public demonstration of television at 22 Frith Street, the building where Bar Italia is located. The blue plaque above the front door commemorates this event...
occupies No. 22 and there is a blue plaque
Blue plaque
A blue plaque is a permanent sign installed in a public place to commemorate a link between that location and a famous person or event, serving as a historical marker....
over the door to commemorate Baird's TV experiments. Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club
Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club
Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club is a jazz club which has operated in London since 1959.The club opened on 30 October 1959 in a basement at 39 Gerrard Street in London's Soho district. It was managed by musicians Ronnie Scott and Pete King. In 1965 it moved to a larger venue nearby at 47 Frith Street...
has been at No. 47 since 1965.
Popular culture
Frith Street is mentioned twice in the lyrics of the 2007 song GloriousGlorious (Natalie Imbruglia song)
"Glorious" is the single taken from Glorious: The Singles 1997-2007, the 2007 hits compilation by Natalie Imbruglia.-Music video:The music video for "Glorious" was directed by Frank Borin , and roaded in California.The video is inspired by the movie Y Tu Mamá También, in which Imbruglia...
by the Australian singer Natalie Imbruglia
Natalie Imbruglia
Natalie Jane Imbruglia is an Australian singer-songwriter, model and actress. In the early 1990s, Imbruglia was known to audiences as Beth Brennan in the popular Australian soap Neighbours. Three years after leaving the programme, Imbruglia launched a singing career with the international hit,...
, in the first verse of the song and the end of it.
External links
- LondonTown.com information
- Restaurants in Frith Street
- East side and west side of Frith Street
- Frith Street Gallery, 59–60 Frith Street