Top 55 Fun Facts about London England

Top 55 Fun Facts about London England:

London is such an incredible city and after living here for many years I’m still finding out fun and interesting facts. If you are like me and like to learn weird facts about places that you travel to then this blog post is for you. I have made a list of my Top 55 fun facts about London England and hope you enjoy them!

1. London was founded by the Romans in AD 43 and was originally called Londinium.
2. The London Underground, also known as the Tube, is the oldest underground railway system in the world. It opened in 1863.
3. The British Museum in London houses over 8 million objects and is one of the largest and most comprehensive museums in the world.
4. London is the first city to host the Summer Olympics three times – in 1908, 1948, and 2012.
5. Big Ben is not the name of the clock tower; it’s the name of the bell inside the tower. The tower is called Elizabeth Tower.

6. More than 300 languages are spoken within London, making it one of the most linguistically diverse cities in the world.
7. London has a population of over 8 million people. More than double the population of all of Ireland.
8. The famous Tower Bridge is the only bridge on the Thames in London city that hasn’t been rebuilt.
9. London’s Regent’s Park houses the London Zoo, the world’s oldest scientific zoo, which opened in 1828.
10. The British Library in London is the second largest library in the world by the number of items cataloged.

11. The Great Fire of London occurred in 1666 and destroyed much of the city. Started by a baker on Pudding Lane.
12. Buckingham Palace, the official residence of the British monarch, has 775 rooms and 78 bathrooms.
13. London was the first city in the world to have a population of more than one million, in the 19th century. 
14. The City of London is actually a small area within Greater London, sometimes referred to as the Square Mile. The start and end are Marked with cast iron dragons in the street. 
15. Black cab drivers in London, known as cabbies, have to pass a test called The Knowledge, which involves memorizing every street in London.

16. More than half of the London Underground network actually runs above ground. The Victoria Line and Waterloo & City Line are the only lines that run completely underground.
17. The Monument to the Great Fire of London is a column that stands 202 feet high and is located 202 feet away from where the fire started.
18. London’s double-decker buses were not originally red. Before 1907, different routes had different-coloured buses.
19. The Houses of Parliament are officially known as the Palace of Westminster. The Parliament is made up of two houses, differentiated by their seat colour. The Lords and The Commons.
20. The Shard, standing at 309.6 meters, is the tallest building in London.

21. The first performance of a Punch and Judy show in England was recorded in London’s Covent Garden in 1662.
22. The notorious serial killer Jack the Ripper operated in the Whitechapel district of London.
23. London was the first city in the world to have an organized police force, the Metropolitan Police Service, founded in 1829.
24. The smallest statue in London is of two mice fighting over a piece of cheese. It’s on Philpot Lane.
25. About 40% of Greater London is green space making it the world’s largest urban forest. Known as ‘The Forest City’

26. Harrods, a luxury department store in London, once had a dress code that banned people for being too casually dressed.
27. There is a parking lot in London on the spot where the first-ever London performance of Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet took place.
28. The Thames is the longest river entirely in England, and it flows through London. You Used to Be Able to Skate on the River in Winter.
29. The London Eye can carry 800 people in each rotation – equivalent to 11 London red double-decker buses.
30. St. Paul’s Cathedral has the second-largest unsupported cathedral dome in the world. The largest one is The Pantheon in Rome

31. There are over 7,000 licensed bars and pubs in London.
32. The Millennium Dome, now called The O2, is the largest structure of its kind in the world.
33. London’s West End is famous for its theatre shows, it’s one of the most prominent theatre districts in the English-speaking world.
34. Jimi Hendrix lived in London, and his former flat is now a museum.
35. The Queen’s London residence, Buckingham Palace, was built in 1703.

36. The first-ever traffic signal was erected in London in 1868; it exploded less than a month later, injuring the policeman operating it.
37. Sherlock Holmes, the famous fictional detective, ‘lived’ at the very real address 221B Baker Street. 
38. Cleopatra’s Needle on the Victoria Embankment is over 3,500 years old, significantly older than the city of London itself.
39. The dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral was used as a navigational point for pilots during WWII.
40. Covent Garden is spelled incorrectly; it was meant to be “Convent Garden”.

41. London has 20 subterranean rivers flowing beneath its streets. You can see one in a pipes in Sloane Square station.
42. The Beatles played their last gig on the rooftop of their Apple Corps headquarters in London, on January 30, 1969.
43.  St. Jame’s Park station 
44. Harrods is London’s most famous department store, and it’s so big that it has 330 departments covering 1.1 million sq. feet of retail space.
45. The Globe Theatre is a reconstruction of the theater where Shakespeare performed. The actual theatre was destroyed by a fire in 1613, rebuilt in 1614, and then demolished in 1644.

46. There’s a law that forbids placing a postage stamp with the Queen’s head upside down on an envelope.
47. There’s a law that forbids you walking into Parliament in a suit of armour. 
48. London has had an annual Christmas tree in Trafalgar Square since 1947, donated by Norway as thanks for British support during WWII.
49. The Tower Bridge, often mistaken for London Bridge, has a walkway 42 meters above the river, originally built to allow pedestrians to cross while the bridge was lifted.
50. The Tower of London is home to the Crown Jewels, which includes the world’s largest cut diamond.

51. The zebra crossing in front of the Abbey Road Studios is a popular spot for tourists to recreate The Beatles’ Abbey Road album cover. It was designated a site of national importance in 2010.
52. The lions in Trafalgar Square are not identical and have slightly different faces.
53.  There is a policy known as the ‘St Paul’s Heights’ to protect and enhance important local views of the Cathedral from the South Bank, Thames bridges and certain points to the north, west and east. No new building can obstruct these views.
54. There’s a cereal café in London called the Cereal Killer Café, which serves over 100 types of cereals from around the world. 
55. The top of the iconic Gherkin building (30 St Mary Axe) is made up of over 700 pieces of glass.

Conclusion

I hope you liked this blog post and share any more facts in the comments below. If you are thinking of moving to this incredible city then check out my guide for everything you need to know before moving to London.