Crown Passage

Crown Passage is a narrow alleyway off Pall Mall in London, built before 1673 as a service corridor to hide shopkeepers from wealthy local residents. The passage houses the Red Lion pub, gas street lighting, and the historic rear entrance of Lock and Company, the world's oldest hat shop founded in 1676. Local legend claims King Charles II met Nell Gwyn in secret cellars beneath the alleyway.

London Β· from the walk β€œSecret London: Hidden Alleys, Ancient Stones & Forgotten Stories” Β· audio ~4 min Β· Generated

Crown Passage, Pall Mall, London SW1Y 5BL

Why was Crown Passage in London originally created before 1673?

Take a deep breath. Look around you... and notice this narrow lane slipping away from the grand sweep of Pall Mall. This is Crown Passage... one of London's most enchanting secrets, hiding in plain sight.......... This alleyway was built sometime before sixteen seventy-three, when King Street to the north was first laid out. And the reason it exists? To Hide the smaller trades from the posher eyes of aristocrats buying up grand homes in the area. That's right... this whole passage was designed as a backstage corridor for a neighborhood that didn't want to see its own shopkeepers.......... Crown Passage has had a number of different names over the centuries. On Ogilby and Morgan's map of sixteen eighty-one, it appears as Golden Lion Court. On Blome's map of sixteen eighty-nine, it's Crown Court. And on Rocque's map of seventeen forty-six... Old Paved Alley. The name Crown Passage is thought to come from a former tavern of this name.......... Now, notice the shopfronts around you. Many of these little facades are Georgian, and in a narrow street like this β€” little more than an alley, really β€” shopkeepers were only allowed to push their windows out five inches or less into the pavement space.......... And here's something wonderful. The famous hat shop Lock and Company, over on Saint James's Street, has a back entrance right here in Crown Passage... and this facade is even Older than the main one. Lock and Company is the world's oldest hat shop, founded in sixteen seventy-six by Robert Davis. And This is the company responsible for inventing the bowler hat! In eighteen forty-nine, Edward Coke requested a hat to protect gamekeepers from low-hanging branches. Traditional top hats were too fragile and too tall for the job, so the company commissioned hat-makers William and Thomas Bowler to solve the problem. And when Coke returned for his new hat, he reportedly dropped it on the floor and Stamped on it twice to test its strength... then paid twelve shillings and left satisfied.......... But the real jewel of Crown Passage is the Red Lion pub. This narrow street is home to the Red Lion, one of the oldest pubs in London's West End still in business. The alleyway is still lit by gas lamps β€” and here's a delightful connection: Pall Mall, just steps away, was one of the First streets in London to be lit by gas, after Frederick Albert Winsor set up experimental lighting on the fourth of June, eighteen oh seven, to celebrate King George the Third's birthday.......... And one more thing. There's a legend about this place. The Red Lion is said to have been the location for secret trysts between King Charles the Second and Nell Gwyn. The famous orange-seller lived just around the corner at seventy-nine Pall Mall, and legend has it she would sneak along Crown Passage into the pub's cellars to meet the king through a hidden tunnel. Now, skeptics have poked around the cellars and found no trace of any tunnel. But who needs proof... when you have a story this good?

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