Early evenings are upon us, bringing the concomitant pleasure of looking at dusk into the lit rooms of strangers. To assuage the curiosity partial views of private places elicit we have London Open House, the scheme which allows you to get inside quite a number of the buildings that these glimpsed rooms make you wonder about. This year it fell on 17 and 18 September. Walking the streets of Bloomsbury, I crossed the paths of others in search of Open Houses, recognisable as much by their determined walk as by the green cover of the guidebook they held. It is an excellent scheme, particularly revealing in the case of buildings of the last 150 years, which often achieve their best effects in unpredictable atriums, entrances and, when function demands it, interiors of industrial proportions.

LRB 6 October 2005 | PDF Download