Seven Dials Monument

The Seven Dials Monument in London is a 1989 replica of a 1693 sundial column featuring six dial faces positioned at the intersection of seven streets. Designed by Thomas Neale to maximize rental income, the original column was removed in 1773. The current monument features a one-tonne dialstone built on 60-foot-deep foundations, surrounded by seven buildings that once all housed interconnected pubs.

London Β· from the walk β€œLondon's Best-Kept Secrets” Β· audio ~4 min Β· Generated

Seven Dials Monument, Seven Dials, London WC2H 9HZ

Why does the Seven Dials Monument in London only have six dial faces for seven streets?

Look up at that golden orb glinting in the sunlight. You're standing at the very heart of Seven Dials... and you're looking at one of London's most Cunning pieces of urban design.......... This whole layout was created around sixteen ninety-three by a man named Thomas Neale, Member of Parliament... a man they called "The Great Projector." Neale was a renowned entrepreneur β€” the organiser of England's First lottery, a member of sixty-two parliamentary committees, and his projects ranged from mining in Maryland to lotteries after the Venetian manner.......... Now here's the trick. Count the roads meeting at this junction. You'll find seven. But look closely at the sundial column... and count the dial faces. Only Six. Why?......... Because Neale's original planning submission to Sir Christopher Wren showed only six streets and an estate church. In the event, Neale built seven streets... and no church. He essentially cheated β€” squeezing in an extra road and skipping the church entirely. The column itself was simply declared the seventh dial, and everyone moved on.......... But Why this strange star-shaped design? At the time, rents were charged by the length of a house's frontage. Neale's clever layout generated More rental income than the fashionable squares of the day. Pure financial genius.......... The first wave of tenants were respectable lawyers, merchants, and gentlemen. But it didn't last. A subsequent owner broke up the freehold and sold off plots individually. That's when Seven Dials began a headlong slide into decline β€” becoming one of London's worst slums.......... Now, for years, every London history book repeated the legend that an angry mob tore the original column down in seventeen seventy-three, searching for buried gold beneath it. But research revealed something quite different. The column was deliberately removed by the Paving Commissioners in an attempt to rid the area of undesirables. It didn't work... the troublemakers stayed, and the beautiful column was gone.......... The remains were acquired by architect James Paine, who kept them at his house in Surrey, and they were eventually re-erected in Weybridge as a memorial to a Prussian princess. The original dial stone was so heavy it was removed and β€” believe it or not β€” used as a mounting block for horse riders.......... What you see today is a meticulous nineteen eighty-nine replica. Creating it required sixty-foot-deep foundations and trainee masons who needed Three attempts to carve the one-tonne dialstone with absolute accuracy. All six faces tell the time accurately to within Ten seconds.......... And here's one last detail most people walk right past. At one point, each of the seven buildings facing this monument housed a pub β€” and their cellars were connected underground, providing handy escape routes should the need arise. A whole network of tunnels, right beneath your feet!

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