Monuments & Ruins

Not every statue in London. The ones worth crossing the road for: Roman wall, medieval ruins, and the monuments that earn a detour.

Tell us what we can do better, or what you’re trying to discover.

Eleanor Cross

A Victorian Gothic cross in front of the station, standing in for the medieval one that gave the place its name.

MemorialsFree

Photo by Tony Hisgett from Birmingham, UK, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

When Eleanor of Castile died in 1290, Edward I had a stone cross put up at each of the twelve places her body rested on the way to Westminster. The Charing cross was the last and grandest and was pulled down by Parliament in 1647; three of the twelve survive, none of them in London. This one is not a copy but a Victorian evocation, designed by E. M. Barry for the railway company in 1865 to give their new hotel something to look at, twenty-one metres high with eight statues of the queen. It was restored in 2010 and is much better than it needed to be.

Where
Charing Cross station forecourt, Strand, WC2N 5HF
Nearest station
Charing Cross · 1 min walk

NearbyMonuments & Ruins

NearbyOther Categories

See more nearby listings

Submit a correction for this listing.

Data is compiled from public sources including OpenStreetMap, under the ODbL. Hours change often, so check before making a journey.

Which area are you in?