INVITE: Midweek Midday Mulberries this Wednesday 16th of January

This Wednesday, 16th of January, the Museum of Walking is inviting to one of its famous London lunchtime walking tours. Please meet at 12.30 pm at Belsize Park Underground Station for about an hour of exploring the wealth of London’s food-productive urban landscape.

This is what the Museum of Walking says:

This lunchtime walk starts at Besize Park Tube station and ends at Hampstead Tube station (both on the Northern Line). Linking up some old and some-not-so-old mulberry trees, we explore this historic part of northwest London, with its village atmosphere and heritage of writers, artists, musicians… and celebrities. Starting at Belsize Park, we pay homage to an old black mulberry tree on a street corner, once the site of Belsize Manor House, with its celebrated Pleasure Garden. A short walk away is Keats House, home of the poet John Keats, who would have known the fabulous, reclining old mulberry tree in the front garden. Passing a mulberry tree in a garden in Willow Road, we walk through Hampstead village and along Church Row, one of the finest Georgian streets in London. It was once home to Lord Alfred Douglas (Oscar Wilde’s lover), H.G. Wells and comic Peter Cook. In the churchyard of St John’s church is the tomb of celebrated landscape artist, John Constable. Behind the church, in Frognal Way is the last mulberry on our walk, overhanging a wall. The Holly Bush pub serves a great lunch for those who are hungry, or any of the many eateries in Hampstead, before taking the Tube again at Hampstead station.

The tour is being led by Dr Peter Coles who weaves a fascinating history of the mulberry, busting myths and letting the trees reveal their hidden stories.

The lunchtime walks are a project by the Museum of Walking, an initiative and network developed by Andrew Stuck with whom Bohn&Viljoen collaborated many years ago on London-based events that aimed to rethink the city by engaging its urban landscape in novel ways.

Numbers are limited, so booking is essential. £12 in advance / £15 on the day.

Details of the walk can be found here.

Information about the Museum of Walking is here.

Image: A Mulberry Tree in the London Borough of Hampstead (source: Museum of Walking / Peter Coles www 2019)