Under The Arches

A Memory of London.

I remember visiting this spot when I first moved to work in London. It is described in Nairn's London, as follows:-
" A very fine passage called The Arches runs underneath Charing Cross station from Villiers Street to Craven Street. The steps at the western end announce a different world. Hungerford Lane; and this is like meeting a person five hundred years old. It starts by the Wimpy Bar in Villiers Street, and ends opposite the Strand Corner House. In between there are Piranesian brick vaults tunneled into the foundations of the station, and a crevasse running uphill to the Strand, embroidered with wine vaults and tiers of fire escapes. Where it passes under The Arches, there is just one grating - linking the underworld with the overworld which is itself under the bustle of the trains to suburban Kent. Once experienced, this threefold relationship is the kind of thing that nails you to a place. The New Towns will never have it in a thousand years."
I think this area has now been redeveloped........!!