UNHIDDEN LONDON - Knightsbridge
Step into secret parts of the underground network!
An exclusive behind the scenes tour exploring time-capsule corridors unseen by the travelling public for decades.
For many years the London Transport Museum has run guided tours of secret subterranean spaces, exploring exclusive infrastructure hidden in plain sight. Stations currently receiving the Hidden London treatment include Aldwych, Baker Street, Charing Cross, Dover Street, Euston, Holborn and Moorgate, all for an eye-watering fee of £45.
But now you can walk into unseen passages, experiencing hidden history and heritage vibes, without forking out any more than the price of a zone 1 journey. It's all thanks to a multi-million pound project to reopen former storage areas at Knightsbridge station as part of a step-free access project, bringing history to life along the way.
There is thus no need to employ a tour guide and all the inbuilt staff costs this involves, allowing participants to walk through the installation at their own pace and explore freely, literally so. Simply bring the following script with you and read it out as you go round to get the full LTM tour experience.
Hello and welcome to Unhidden London, Knightsbridge. Before we kick off and explore the underworld please be aware of a few essential health and safety notices. It is advised that you have an adequate level of fitness to undertake this tour. Sturdy walking shoes are recommended. There are no cloakroom facilities available. You shall not bring on the tour any kind of weapon (potential or obvious). Photography, filming and audio recording is permitted for personal and non-commercial use only. No public toilets are available once on the tour route. OK shall we get started? Tap here to read full terms and conditions. Then make your way to Hoopers Court off Brompton Road - just look for the roundel.
Imagine the year is 1799 and you're standing here in a dark alleyway ripe with earthy smells. It's lined on both sides by crowded houses, these recently built by former market gardener John Hooper who owned the land, hence the name Hooper's Court. Unfortunately the Piccadilly line is still over a century distant so let's jump ahead to 1906 and the opening of the new Knightsbridge station, a fresh connection to the West End sited here off Basil Street. The walls still have the glorious oxblood tiles you see at all the best tube stations, courtesy of top Underground architect Leslie Green, so feel free to touch them if you like. Recently the rest of the alleyway was retiled and relit as part of a new office development that funded much of what we're about to see, so all very pretty but please focus on the red tiles instead. Tap here to read the story of Leslie Green and his oxblood faience. Then enter the ticket hall.
Imagine the year is 1931 and you're standing in the ticket hall of a busy Underground station. It's hard to imagine because it wouldn't have had ticket machines, dazzling illumination and a digital Next Train indicator, let alone a pushbutton Help Point in lieu of actual staff. But focus again on the tiles because the turquoise and dark green stripes would have been very familiar to passengers, perhaps a privileged banker in a bowler hat or a servant woman in a grey headscarf preparing for her working day of downtrodden drudgery. Focus too on the lift shaft at the far end of the concourse because this is the same lift shaft that rich and poor would have used to descend into the grimy depths, merely reimagined for modern accessibility. Tap here to read about oppression and inequality in Thirties London. Then enter the lift.
The lift was the lifeblood of the Edwardian Underground station, a gated portal to the netherworld avoiding steps. In particular you wouldn't have been allowed to press the button yourself because that was the life's work of a uniformed employee, whereas now the only member of staff nearby is paid to sit in a glass box and yawn. There are twolifts taking full advantage of both shafts, both labelled 'Lift A' because both descend to the same place. It's likely that the original lifts were used by duchesses, spies and prostitutes, which you might like to ponder as you go down. And contain your excitement because you're not descending all the way to platform level, merely to a spatially awkward intermediate level where, deep breath, you're about to emerge into the actual secret passageways. Tap here to read the story of Elsie Batten, the Underground's first female lift attendant, a biography which usually pads out the £45 tour by at least five minutes.
Wow, just breathe that in. These are the actual passageways the actual passengers would have walked down, all sealed off in the 1930s when the station gained proper escalators instead. How special it is to be able to stand in these unseen passageways, locked away behind the scenes for decades, just like on all the other Hidden London tours but cleaner. The tiles are again turquoise and green and positively gleam, the historic illusion only partly ruined by the stripe of modern illumination bolted to the ceiling. Easily the best part is the panel of tiles reading 'To The Trains' in a heritage typeface, so beautifully done that you can almost forgive the fakery of it. Again imagine making your way down this passageway past crinolines, flapper dresses and cheeky street urchins, because quite frankly half this tour is in your imagination. Tap here to look at the only known black and white photograph of the original passageway because nobody would have considered this mundane back passage to be of any heritage interest whatsoever.
After precisely 36 metres you reach the end of the passageway, which as you'll have seen slopes gently downhill. Here we find Lift B and also a short set of steps which will be ignored by those requiring step-free access. The lift and staircase both descend to platform level but at separate locations, there now being a surfeit of confusing access points slotted between platforms 1 and 2. Now steel yourself because there's still one more secret to come and that's because there's another passageway hidden in plain sight, you just haven't seen it yet. What you need to do is go back up in the lift, definitely not back up the stairs, and this time when you reach the intermediate level, hey presto, the doors open on the other side. Mind blown. Tap here to hear fascinating stories about how Knightsbridge's long-abandoned areas were ingeniously repurposed to serve London’s modern needs, including which cleaning products were once stored here.
The second passageway runs parallel to the the first, separated at both ends by lifts, ensuring you can only walk down one and up the other. Again the tiles are gorgeous, although this time the classic typeface says 'To The Lifts' not 'To The Trains'. You are essentially getting double value for your money here, or would do if this still cost £45. See also how the passageway crosses the westbound platform, here signalled by a pair of green arches embedded in the wall, suggesting you could always have known it was up here from down there had you only stopped to think. Also note the fire extinguishers strategically positioned everywhere, plus the bench at the far end where the infirm can sit and wait for the lift should this backwater be inexplicably busy. It is alas almost time to depart. Tap here to hear testimonies from crippled Edwardians whose lives could have been transformed had this station been step-free in the first place. Then return to ground level.
You'll soon be back in the ticket hall at Hoopers Court, possibly getting strange looks from the member of staff because you're not supposed to go all the way down and straight back up again. Simply smile because you now have seen what most people have not, the secret tunnels hidden in plain sight, unseen for decades but now seen again as part of Unhidden London. It's a fair bet the London Transport Museum could have opened these walkways for paid tours and punters would have stumped up in the hope of seeing a scruffy tiled passage pasted with old school adverts and maybe a surreptitious glimpse down a ventilation shaft. But how much better to have opened them up to the wider public through conversion to a step-free entrance, bringing accessibility where once was none, because Unhidden London is truly where it's at.
