# Where's London's thinnest building/narrowest street/doorway?



## editor (Oct 21, 2010)

This one on Coldharbour Lane has to be a contender for one of the narrowest buildings (although I'm sure I've seen thinner): 







More: http://www.urban75.org/blog/a-very-very-thin-house-coldharbour-lane-brixton-sw9/






I reckon this could be London's narrowest doorway, while my earlier assertion that Brydges Place was the narrowest street looks to have been proved wrong by Emerald Court, WC1.






Feed me facts people! Are there thinner places to be found?


----------



## Crispy (Oct 21, 2010)

Well, that Coldharbour one is only thin at one end.

This one's on my way to work:





- can't be more than 4 meters wide? And it stands all alone which I think is cute


----------



## Dr. Furface (Oct 21, 2010)

Crispy said:


> Well, that Coldharbour one is only thin at one end.
> 
> This one's on my way to work:
> 
> ...


That's  - where is it?


----------



## Crispy (Oct 21, 2010)

Near Whitecross Street and the Barbican


----------



## ATOMIC SUPLEX (Oct 21, 2010)

Japans pretty bonkers for this kind of stuff because of the odd way they build. New houses etc are individually stuck on a plot and don't touch each other leaving gaps you can't possibly walk down. If there is a small gap left for whatever reason you sometimes get madness like this. 




I have always wanted to go inside these crazy slim buildings. A while ago the guys sitting next to me at work did a TV show on some of londons thinest real estate but I never really got a chance to look at it.


----------



## editor (Oct 21, 2010)

Of course, if we miss out the fact that people have to live in them, then this surely has to be the thinnest building in London:











http://www.urban75.org/london/leinster.html


----------



## ATOMIC SUPLEX (Oct 21, 2010)

Well that's obviously a cheat but 'hilarious' to new pizza delivery boys in the area. 

Three crazy London ones here


----------



## editor (Oct 21, 2010)

The 'Thin House' in Thurloe Square, Knightsbridge looks a contender, although it may be wider than the Coldharbour Lane one at its thinnest point.


----------



## Biddlybee (Oct 21, 2010)

There was a programem on a few years ago about a house in London that was very narrow (only a room wide iirc), about 4 or 5 stories, but very narrow. Will try and google


----------



## Crispy (Oct 21, 2010)

The Thurloe Square one's just another wedge - look on google maps: http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?clien...4145,-0.171361&spn=0.000508,0.001222&t=k&z=20 and you can see how it's really a triangle. That photo is shot at a clever angle to hide it


----------



## Biddlybee (Oct 21, 2010)

editor said:


> The 'Thin House' in Thurloe Square, Knightsbridge looks a contender, although it may be wider than *the Coldharbour Lane one at its thinnest point.*


I think Crispy is right... that one doesn't count really


----------



## editor (Oct 21, 2010)

Biddly said:


> I think Crispy is right... that one doesn't count really


Where did I specify that the _entire building_ had to be narrow?!

I'm just as interested in finding the thinnest wedge/part of a building.


----------



## Biddlybee (Oct 21, 2010)

Ah, this is it: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_pictures/4196916.stm

Was in the news because it was on the market for half a million.


----------



## teuchter (Oct 21, 2010)

There's the other one in Brixton -


----------



## Biddlybee (Oct 21, 2010)

editor said:


> Where did I specify that the _entire building_ had to be narrow?!
> 
> I'm just as interested in finding the thinnest wedge/part of a building.


hmmm, ok.


----------



## Crispy (Oct 21, 2010)

The CHL one is thin all the way along http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en...ughborough junction&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wl so I think it counts. Under 5m wide at the boundary with the next unit in the terrace.


----------



## Crispy (Oct 21, 2010)

I think scrolling along railway lines in google is a good way to find them


----------



## teuchter (Oct 21, 2010)

editor said:


> Where did I specify that the _entire building_ had to be narrow?!
> 
> I'm just as interested in finding the thinnest wedge/part of a building.


 
That's a bit meaningless though because any building becomes narrower, the closer to a corner you measure it. Eventually reducing to an atom or two across.


----------



## teuchter (Oct 21, 2010)

I think the test should be: how narrow is the widest part of the building.


----------



## editor (Oct 21, 2010)

teuchter said:


> That's a bit meaningless though because any building becomes narrower, the closer to a corner you measure it. Eventually reducing to an atom or two across.


I think most normal people get the concept, Mr Picky Pedant.


----------



## editor (Oct 21, 2010)

OK, to make it easy for the picky ones: the thinnest building/or wedge _that has windows or doors_ at its thinnest part.


----------



## Biddlybee (Oct 21, 2010)

editor said:


> OK, to make it easy for the picky ones: the thinnest building/or wedge _that has windows or doors_ at its thinnest part.


ok, I realise now that the house I posted up doesn't count


----------



## fogbat (Oct 21, 2010)

Moving the goalposts


----------



## ATOMIC SUPLEX (Oct 21, 2010)

Officially this is the winner. 






10 Hyde park place. It has had a resident but the only real room is a toilet.


----------



## editor (Oct 21, 2010)

fogbat said:


> Moving the goalposts


Hey, I wasn't me who started to get heavy by laying down the rules, maaaaan.


----------



## teuchter (Oct 21, 2010)

So do bridges between buidings, if they are enclosed and have windows in them count?






What about the Monument?






Do those slits count as windows?


----------



## DrRingDing (Oct 21, 2010)

I've never been in there but the Old Ship on Mare Street must be a contender for narrowest pub...


----------



## fogbat (Oct 21, 2010)

editor said:


> Hey, I wasn't me who started to get heavy by laying down the rules, maaaaan.


 
Ah. It was teuchter again, wasn't it? 

I don't understand how his endlessly disruptive posting hasn't resulted in a permaban, tbh.


----------



## Crispy (Oct 21, 2010)




----------



## teuchter (Oct 21, 2010)

fogbat said:


> I don't understand how his endlessly disruptive posting hasn't resulted in a permaban, tbh.


 
I think you should remember that the moderators are unpaid fogbat. You should cut them a little slack.


----------



## Onket (Oct 21, 2010)

I'm just thankful I've not been dragged into this mess.

DrRingDing- The Ship in Hackney is a normal pub at the end of an entrance corridor. 

Great thread.


----------



## FridgeMagnet (Oct 21, 2010)

This one is just down my street from me, and at least *used* to be London's narrowest house apparently - it ranges from 5'5" to 9'11" wide.



It was sold a few years ago and currently has a hat with a lightbulb in it dangling from a cable in the front window (it was originally a hat shop it seems). Never seen anyone going in or out of it.


----------



## 19sixtysix (Oct 21, 2010)

ATOMIC SUPLEX said:


> Officially this is the winner.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I can imagine the estate agents blurb.


----------



## AverageJoe (Oct 21, 2010)

DrRingDing said:


> I've never been in there but the Old Ship on Mare Street must be a contender for narrowest pub...


 
If thats Mare Street in Hackney, then that pub is Fucking Huge. Just has a narrow passageway to the entrance.

Isnt the smallest pub the one in Holborn that has the tree growing inside it? (Not Waxy's - there's a tiny little pub in Holborn with a big of fuck off tree growing inside)


----------



## teuchter (Oct 21, 2010)

AverageJoe said:


> If thats Mare Street in Hackney, then that pub is Fucking Huge.


 
But the sign says Old Ship


----------



## AverageJoe (Oct 21, 2010)

teuchter said:


> But the sign says Old Ship


----------



## ATOMIC SUPLEX (Oct 21, 2010)

teuchter said:


> Do those slits count as windows?


 
Even if they did it's not all that narrow in the monument. There is a pretty nice size room in the basement and in the roof. I've stuck my head out the top of that gold thing btw (just a bit of showing off).


----------



## teuchter (Oct 21, 2010)

Does a phone box count as a building?


----------



## Dr. Furface (Oct 21, 2010)

At just 2.5m wide, Little Green Street at the north end of Kentish Town is one of the narrowest streets in London. With just 8 houses on one side and 2 on the other, it must be one of the shortest too. The houses were built in the 1780's, so it's also one of the few intact Georgian streets in the capital.


----------



## klang (Oct 21, 2010)

FridgeMagnet said:


> This one is just down my street from me, and at least *used* to be London's narrowest house apparently - it ranges from 5'5" to 9'11" wide.
> 
> View attachment 12150
> 
> It was sold a few years ago and currently has a hat with a lightbulb in it dangling from a cable in the front window (it was originally a hat shop it seems). Never seen anyone going in or out of it.


I pass it several times a day. A few times I have lingered outside to say what strange creature must inhabit a place like this. Whoever lives in there must be too narrow to be seen.


----------



## quimcunx (Oct 21, 2010)

I've heard claims that Clennam Street is the shortest in London. 

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&s...noid=Bp2VqoqOIjdKiUNFSRddNQ&cbp=12,75.75,,0,5


----------



## IMR (Oct 21, 2010)

J Edward Hart's little book _101 London Oddities_ claimed the narrowest alleyway was off Baker Street somewhere, more of a squeeze even than Emerald Court or Brydges Place.


----------



## IMR (Oct 21, 2010)

Speedy Place off Cromer Street is one of the tiniest dead-end alleyways to warrant its own street sign, also has a good name. It's next to The Boot pub, which has its own curiosities which are maybe best not related here.

Google street view


----------



## uk benzo (Oct 21, 2010)

Artemidorus on Half Moon Lane, Herne Hill

Google street view


----------



## JWH (Oct 22, 2010)

IMR said:


> Speedy Place off Cromer Street is one of the tiniest dead-end alleyways to warrant its own street sign, also has a good name. It's next to The Boot pub, which has its own curiosities which are maybe best not related here.


 
I think The Boot is mentioned in Conrad, The Secret Agent, but it might have been Dickens. It's also a dump.


----------



## ymu (Oct 22, 2010)

ATOMIC SUPLEX said:


> Japans pretty bonkers for this kind of stuff because of the odd way they build. New houses etc are individually stuck on a plot and don't touch each other leaving gaps you can't possibly walk down. If there is a small gap left for whatever reason you sometimes get madness like this.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


That is bonkers, but not uniquely Japanese bonkers. You see exactly the same thing on middle-class housing estates here. The importance of being detached is so great that they leave a completely useless inch or two gap between the houses. They also make the garages too small to fit anything other than a sports car (if you want to be able to open the doors to get out, that is) and cram in more bedrooms and bathrooms in than the space can reasonably take.

I know these things because my brother was mug enough to buy one. Utterly ridiculous cramped little rooms, made more cramped by the need to tick the middle-class boxes. Costs a bloody fortune, mind. The aspirational middle class - just begging to be mugged off. There must be some way we can take advantage of this and get them to pay off the deficit without complaining about it.


----------



## ATOMIC SUPLEX (Oct 22, 2010)

quimcunx said:


> I've heard claims that Clennam Street is the shortest in London.
> 
> http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&s...noid=Bp2VqoqOIjdKiUNFSRddNQ&cbp=12,75.75,,0,5


 
No chance. I've lived on a shorter thiner street than than with fewer houses. Mind you there is a pretty damn thin peabody building a few feet away from there.


----------



## Bungle73 (Oct 27, 2010)

IMR said:


> Speedy Place off Cromer Street is one of the tiniest dead-end alleyways to warrant its own street sign, also has a good name. It's next to The Boot pub, which has its own curiosities which are maybe best not related here.
> 
> Google street view


Hen and Chickens Court, off Fleet Street is a really small and narrow dead end alleyway.  There are loads of small alley ways in the City



ymu said:


> You see exactly the same thing on middle-class housing estates here. The importance of being detached is so great that they leave a completely useless inch or two gap between the houses.


I grew up in a Victorian house in Nunhead that a gap between it and the next house literally a couple of inches wide.


----------



## ska invita (Oct 27, 2010)

teuchter said:


> Does a phone box count as a building?


old red  phone boxes are listed buildings, so kind of, yes


AverageJoe said:


> Isnt the smallest pub the one in Holborn that has the tree growing inside it? (Not Waxy's - there's a tiny little pub in Holborn with a big of fuck off tree growing inside)


 what is that pub? i want to go!


----------



## Onket (Oct 27, 2010)

ymu said:


> That is bonkers, but not uniquely Japanese bonkers. You see exactly the same thing on middle-class housing estates here. The importance of being detached is so great that they leave a completely useless inch or two gap between the houses. They also make the garages too small to fit anything other than a sports car (if you want to be able to open the doors to get out, that is) and cram in more bedrooms and bathrooms in than the space can reasonably take.
> 
> I know these things because my brother was mug enough to buy one. Utterly ridiculous cramped little rooms, made more cramped by the need to tick the middle-class boxes. Costs a bloody fortune, mind. The aspirational middle class - just begging to be mugged off. There must be some way we can take advantage of this and get them to pay off the deficit without complaining about it.


 
WOW!

Glad you got that off your chest?!!!


----------



## ATOMIC SUPLEX (Oct 27, 2010)

I'm just going down the hall to the toilet. . .


----------



## ATOMIC SUPLEX (Oct 27, 2010)

Where in London is this?? 






Anyone know?


----------



## Crispy (Oct 27, 2010)

Looks like a film set from Brazil


----------



## strung out (Oct 27, 2010)

ATOMIC SUPLEX said:


> Where in London is this??
> 
> 
> 
> ...


read the thread, bozo


----------



## ATOMIC SUPLEX (Oct 27, 2010)

strung out said:


> read the thread, bozo


 
Oh I didn't see it before, I even posted the first picture and link about it. Woha, time for a sit down.


----------

