Qualla: Piccadilly Circus

Piccadilly Circus: Introduction

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Txllxt TxllxT, CC BY-SA 4.0. The British have a phrase for any place too crowded to navigate: it's like Piccadilly Circus. The expression has the same useful imprecision in 2026 as it did a century ago, because the junction it describes has never stopped being overrun. Built in 1819 as Regent Circus South - the southern hinge of John Nash's grand processional Regent Street - the Circus lost its circular form in the 1880s when Shaftesbury Avenue cut through. What it kept was its talent for accumulating people. During the Second World War, the Allies code-named the D-Day invasion fleet's assembly point in the English Channel "Piccadilly Circus," because every ship in the operation had to pass through it. The metaphor was already there, ready to use.

Read more: Piccadilly Circus on Qualla

Image: Txllxt TxllxT | CC BY-SA 4.0

Piccadilly Circus: Collars, Tailors, and Lady Hutton's Garden

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Fred Romero from Paris, France, CC BY 2.0. The name Piccadilly first appears in 1626, when a tailor named Robert Baker built a house called Piccadilly Hall on the road. Baker had made his fortune selling piccadills - a term used for various kinds of fashionable collars in the early seventeenth century. The street was brie...

Read more: Piccadilly Circus on Qualla

Image: Fred Romero from Paris, France | CC BY 2.0

Piccadilly Circus: Eros Who Isn't Eros

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit LondonHistoryatHome, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 1893, the Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain was erected in the centre of the Circus to commemorate the philanthropic work of Anthony Ashley Cooper, the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury - a Victorian politician and social reformer. On top of the fountain stands a winged archer in aluminium,...

Read more: Piccadilly Circus on Qualla

Image: LondonHistoryatHome | CC BY-SA 4.0

Piccadilly Circus: The First Neon Sign

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 3.0. The advertising signs that define modern Piccadilly Circus began in 1908 with an electric Perrier sign. Electric billboards followed on the facade of the London Pavilion from 1923. The first neon sign was for the British meat extract Bovril, installed in 1910. Coca-Cola has had a...

Read more: Piccadilly Circus on Qualla

Image: Bernard Gagnon | CC BY-SA 3.0

Piccadilly Circus: Piccadilly Commandos and a Plan That Failed

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit LondonHistoryatHome, CC BY-SA 4.0. During the Second World War, American servicemen stationed in Britain used the West End's clubs and bars, and so many sex workers gathered at Piccadilly Circus to find them that they earned the nickname "Piccadilly Commandos." Both Scotland Yard and the Foreign Office worried abo...

Read more: Piccadilly Circus on Qualla

Image: LondonHistoryatHome | CC BY-SA 4.0

Piccadilly Circus: The Junction That Catches Everything

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Cristian Bortes from Cluj-Napoca, Romania, CC BY 2.0. Surrounding the Circus today is a small constellation of significant buildings. The Criterion Theatre - Grade II* listed, designed by Thomas Verity, opened in 1874 - sits on the south side; nearly all of its 600 seats are underground, reached by descending a tiled stairway. The L...

Read more: Piccadilly Circus on Qualla

Image: Cristian Bortes from Cluj-Napoca, Romania | CC BY 2.0