Hotels in Belgravia

Belgravia, describing the residential area between Buckingham Palace and Chelsea’s Sloane Square is pound-for-pound probably London’s most expensive district in which to live – even the millionaires have been priced out of the prime townhouses around Belgrave and Eaton Squares by the capital’s recent influx of billionaires like Roman Abramovich, owner of a tasty £28m pad in the latter.

These are Central London’s most regal streets, gleaming with brilliant whiteness and the trappings of money old and new; and with brilliant proximity to the big royal parks – Hyde Park, Green Park and St James’s, the home of Buck P. Knightsbridge follows the fringe of Hyde Park along to South Kensington’s world-famous museums – Science Museum (Exhibition Road, 0870 870 4868, www.sciencemuseum.org.uk), Natural History Museum (15 Cromwell Place, 020 7942 5000, www.nhm.ac.uk) and the Victoria & Albert Museum (Cromwell Road, 020 7942 2000, www.vam.ac.uk) – and amongst its wealth of upmarket shops stands the venerable Harrods (87-135 Brompton Road, 020 7730 1234, www.harrods.com).

Head south to Sloane Square in Belgravia for the conspicuous and terribly classy boutique shopping consumption around Sloane Street and the famous King’s Road; there’s a vast range of quality restaurants and individual bars serving the monied ‘Sloane Rangers’ of Kensington and Chelsea too.

Closest Tube stations to Belgravia are Hyde Park Corner (Piccadilly Line), Victoria (Victoria, District and Circle), Knightsbride (Piccadilly) and Sloane Square (District and Circle).