I know we don’t make it particularly obvious or anything, but over on this little corner of the internet, we’ve got quite a sizeable soft spot for London. We love exploring each and every nook and cranny of our capital city – and on discovering a new neighbourhood, often find ourselves thinking: ‘yep, I could happily live here’. And as great as that is, it sure does make pinpointing London’s best place to live pretty darn difficult for us. And so I guess it comes in handy that The Times does that job for us.
Each and every year, The Times have us all on the edge of our seats in anticipation, waiting for their ‘Best Places to Live’ guide to be published. And guess what, folks? The time is finally here. They’ve just revealed the best places to live in London. And the whole of the UK, for that matter – but we’ll stay in our own lane (for now). So, grab a cuppa and make yourselves comfy; here are this year’s best places to live in London.
The best place to live in London, according The Times
Drum roll, please… topping the charts as the best place to live in London this year is… Walthamstow. With a name that’s believed to be derived from the Anglo-Saxon for ‘the welcome place’; the East London locale was praised for being ‘diverse, vibrant and cool without being frosty’ (which happens to be exactly how I imagine my friends describe me when I’m not around).
Walthamstow was also commended for its ‘hip hangouts, independent shops and restaurants, handsome Victorian housing stock, calming green space, excellent public transport and, imminently, West End-quality culture, courtesy of the new Soho Theatre‘. Walthamstow also boasts a beloved local cinema, the Instagrammable paradise that is God’s Own Junkyard, and Europe’s longest street market. Not bad, hey?
Where else in London topped the charts?
Six other London locations were included in The Times’ annual guide. Bloomsbury, East Dulwich, Stoke Newington, Telegraph Hill, Twickenham, and Wembley Park all earned themselves a comfy seat at the table of the best places to live.
Where is the best place to live in the UK?
Okay, we are going to veer out of our lane for just a moment – to let you where The Times named the best place to live in the whole of the UK. And we feel like we can, really, because the spot that nabbed the crown isn’t actually too far from London at all. Having scoured the length and breadth of the country, assessing places based on factors including schools, transport, culture, and even broadband speed; The Times decided that Saffron Walden in Essex is the cream of the crop. And considering the picture-perfect town looks like it could have been plucked straight from the front of a postcard; it’s not too difficult to see why.
You can read The Times’ full findings here.
