London Peculiars

by Peter Ashley

Published 15 November 2004
London is a city that continually changes to suit the age; an ever changing backdrop to what has survived from over the centuries. We are always conscious of the show-piece buildings, but London can never quite shake off the smaller details, the disregarded curiosities that connect us to a past that never goes away. London Peculiars goes in search of the strange, the unexpected and the downright odd: dinosaurs in Sydenham, stage-set housefronts in Bayswater, a funeral railway in Waterloo. Architecture that moves considerable distances, architecture that hides other purposes. The weird, the mysterious, the preposterous; this book is a manual for anyone wanting to scratch away at London's surface gloss, for everyone who looks beyond the immediate and obvious. Through a succession of atmospheric photographs and text, this fascinating book will send the reader on an enchanting journey of discovery through London's alternative histories.