Hotel in Soho, London

Central London’s most bohemian and cosmopolitan district, the grid of alleys and roads compromising Soho are many things to many people. Located between Shaftesbury Avenue and Oxford Street, it’s a theatrical, liberal and political quarter where anything goes – its reputation for debauchery was sealed in the 30s and 40s when playwrights, poets and theatrical queens sunk champagne all day in the likes of the shabbily brilliant Coach and Horses (29 Greek Street, 020 7437 5920) and Charles de Gaulle ran the Resistance during WWII in the back room of the French House pub (49 Dean Street, 020 7437 2799).

It’s the home of the UK’s film, advertising and media industries so there’s a go-getting creative atmosphere all around, and different streets have wildly different characters. Old Compton Street, denominated by rainbow flags, is the centre of London’s gay community – bars like the once-bombed Admiral Duncan (54 Old Compton Street, 020 7437 5300) and ultra-decadent G-A-Y (30 Old Compton Street, 020 7494 2756, www.g-a-y.co.uk) are packed day and night, there’s a vibrant pavement café scene and the culinary institution that is Balans (60 Old Compton Street, 020 7439 2183, www.balans.co.uk/balansoho) offers essential fried breakfasts.

Berwick Street is the place for record shopping in venerable institutions like Sister Ray (34-35 Berwick Street, 020 7734 3297, www.sisterray.co.uk) and Vinyl Junkies (94 Berwick Street, 020 7439 2775, www.vinyl-junkies.com), and Carnaby Street, famed for its mod stylings in the Swinging London of the 60s, now has contemporary fashion stores by the gallon.

Frith Street has the legendary Ronnie Scott’s (47 Frith Street, 020 7439 0747, www.ronniescotts.co.uk), 50 years young in 2009 and, though expensive, still a pilgrimage for jazz lovers. Great Windmill Street was where Soho resident Karl Marx drafted the Communist Manifesto in the Red Lion of Soho – now converted into luxury flats, oh the irony; the big man lived on Dean Street, home to Soho’s most famous of many private members’ clubs where celebrities go wild behind closed doors, The Groucho Club (45 Dean Street, 020 7439 4685, www.thegrouchoclub.com) and the excellent Soho Theatre (21 Dean Street, 020 7478 0100, www.sohotheatre.com).

Soho wouldn’t be Soho without its seediness – for years one of the world’s most notorious red light districts, there’s a tolerant, if considerably less in-your-face attitude to the world’s oldest profession around these parts and a profusion of sex shops and table-dancing bars around Brewer Street if you like that sort of thing; if you don’t, be careful of walking up an open staircase marked only with a postcard offering ‘French Lessons’.

Underground stations near to Soho include Piccadilly Circus (Piccadilly and Bakerloo Lines), Oxford Circus (Victoria, Central and Bakerloo) and Tottenham Court Road (Central and Northern).

Related Links

West End Hotels | Hotels Regents Street | Hotels Carnaby Street | Hotels London Palladium | Hotels Oxford Circus | London Hotels Soho | Bateman Street Hotels | Beak Street Hotels | Brewer Street Hotels | Berwick Street Hotels  | Broadwick Street Hotels

Soho: Tube (underground)

Soho: Rail (overground)