Hotels in Covent Garden London Discounted Covent Garden Hotels

The worlds of music and merchants come together at Covent Garden in London. One of the city’s more attractive and oldest markets blends is also the only licensed area for street entertainment. Who knows what you will come across? All we can say is that could be very interesting. One proviso before continuing: the original market has been moved to Nine Elms and is now called the New Covent Garden market. London dates back to the Romans, but the first mention of Covent Garden is during the reign of King John in the first half of the XIIIth Century. It represented 40 acres of land bordered by present day High Holborn, Kingsway, the Strand and Charing Cross roads. The term covent comes from convent as the monks of the Convent of St. Peter maintained a fruit and vegetable garden. It quickly became a local source of food. Political disputes led King Henry VIII to appropriate the land in 1540. Later on, King Edward VI granted it in perpetuity to the Earl of Bedford in 1552. About 60 years, the 4th Earl of Bedford, Francis Russell, commissioned Inigo Jones, the leading architect of the English Renaissance, to redesign the area. Inspired by the piazzas of Rome and under pressure to economize, he created a grand open public space. The St. Paul's Covent Garden church is in his words "the finest barn in Europe."

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Squares attract people and the market that we know today began in 1661. A year later, entertainers made their first reported appearance. The fire of London in 1666 was propitious as it burnt down markets in the east of the city making Covent Garden market the major one in the country. It grew so quickly that the city erected permanent buildings for it in 1830, which created issues as lack of space impeded on the ability to use it by the 1960s. Thankfully, the government listed all the buildings preventing them from being redeveloped and moved the flower, fruit and vegetable market to Nine Elms in 1974. Until 1980, the area was left more or less vacant until its principal building was reopened as a shopping centre and tourist attraction.
The best shops are in Long Acre and Neal Street. The place is covered with craft shops and wine bars. Nearby are the Transport Museum and Royal Opera House. The area played host to the George Shaw’s play Pygmalion on which the musical My Fair Lady was based. Look around and you will realize that you are surrounded by stars, not the astrological kind, but celebrity ones on the Avenue of Stars.