Royal Exchange
Three buildings face one another across the traffic at Bank: the Bank of England, Mansion House and the Royal Exchange. The Exchange was founded by Thomas Gresham in 1565 as a meeting place for merchants, and Elizabeth I opened it and gave it its royal title in 1571. Gresham’s grasshopper, his family crest, still turns on the weathervane above the roof.
The building that stands today is the third on the site. The first burned in the Great Fire of 1666, and the second in 1838. William Tite’s replacement was opened by Queen Victoria in 1844, and its eight-column Corinthian portico, raised on a flight of steps facing west down Cheapside, is the grandest classical front in the City. It is listed Grade I. The Exchange stopped trading in 1939, and since 2001 the courtyard and the arcades around it have been shops and restaurants.
The steps still have a job. Royal proclamations are read from them, and the accession of King Charles III was proclaimed here in September 2022, as his mother’s had been in 1952.
From above the Exchange is a low pale building with a pitched roof, held in the tight space between Tower 42, the Bank of England and the towers along Bishopsgate. Zoom in and the portico and the grasshopper can both be found.
Click any of the thumbnails below to explore the Royal Exchange images.
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