I spent an uplifting hour today being introduced to the Special Collections at the Bishopsgate Institute, an amazingly impressive public resource, usefully independent of the control of either Tower Hamlets or the City, apparently funded by a well managed historic endowment: very remarkable, particularly when I was taken down into the basement vaults.
Outside, there is fine, low relief decoration on the Townsend façade:-
| Charles | Saumarez | Smith | 
In the past I have been to some of the Bishopsgate lunchtime concerts which range from everything from classical to musical theatre to drumming. All free and some utilising Myra Hess’s piano in the spirit of her National Gallery wartime concerts. For each concert there is a display of some archive material helmed by the wonderful Michelle Johansen. One of the best features is the audience which really is a mix of the locally employed and the (like me) unemployed/at a loose end. The Bishopsgate concerts don’t seem to be running at the moment but I always like the idea that, within a short walk of Liverpool Street station, you can find yourself at a free concert at the Bishopsgate or by members of the London Symphony Orchestra at St Luke,s.
I must keep an eye out. Charles