Join me for a walk around the historic city of Newcastle upon Tyne, home of the Geordies, and one of the country’s most characterful and riveting destinations of all! Famous for its wealth of elegant Georgian architecture, majestic bridges crossing the River Tyne, and an impressive collection of medieval landmarks, there’s so much to see on a walk around Newcastle!
On our walk around Newcastle, we pass countless fascinating landmarks, including the Tyne Bridge, Newcastle Swing Bridge, Newcastle’s old Guildhall, Bessie Surtees House, Castle Stairs, the Castle, The Black Gate, St. Nicholas’ Cathedral, Collingwood Street, George Stephenson Monument, The Royal Station Hotel, Newcastle Central Station, St. Mary’s Cathedral, The Man With Potential Selves, the Church of St. John the Baptist, Grainger Street, Grainger Market, the Royal Arcade, Grey’s Monument, Northumberland Street, Haymarket, Newcastle University, St. Thomas’ Crescent, Leazes Park, St. James’ Park (Newcastle United FC), Chinatown, Newcastle’s old town walls, Blackfriars monastery, Newgate Street, Bigg Market, High Bridge, Grey Street, The Theatre Royal, Dean Street, and the mighty River Tyne.
Thank you so much to the following sites for all their help in my research of Newcastle:
The magnificent 7 bridges over the River Tyne in Newcastle and Gateshead
https://www.newcastle.gov.uk/our-city/history-and-heritage
https://fabulousnorth.com/man-with-potential-selves/
https://www.newcastlecastle.co.uk/castle-blog/stjohn
https://newcastlegateshead.com/business-directory/shopping/central-arcade-newcastle
https://newcastlegateshead.com/business-directory/things-to-do/greys-monument
https://co-curate.ncl.ac.uk/northumberland-street/
https://twsitelines.info/SMR/15543
https://sitelines.newcastle.gov.uk/SMR/6558
https://www.achurchnearyou.com/church/19624/about-us/
https://www.friendsofleazespark.uk/History-of-Leazes-Park/
https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/history/now-famous-strawberry-pub-sat-23778101
https://co-curate.ncl.ac.uk/newcastle-city-walls/
https://blackfriarsrestaurant.co.uk/blackfriars-history/
https://sitelines.newcastle.gov.uk/SMR/6506
https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/history/story-newcastles-historic-newgate-street-18989594
https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/history/now-newcastles-high-bridge-30-29351133
https://co-curate.ncl.ac.uk/grey-street
https://www.theatreroyal.co.uk/about-us/our-story/
https://co-curate.ncl.ac.uk/anderson-place-newcastle/
https://co-curate.ncl.ac.uk/cathedral-buildings-dean-street-newcastle/
https://sitelines.newcastle.gov.uk/SMR/1947
https://1stnorth.co.uk/the-old-tyne-bridge
0:00 River Tyne
0:26 Things to see in Newcastle…
1:06 Tyne Bridge
1:21 Swing Bridge
1:32 Tyne Bridge
2:37 Swing Bridge
2:57 Tyne Bridge
3:26 Sandhill
4:00 Bessie Surtees House
4:29 Old Guildhall
4:47 Sandhill
5:18 Castle Stairs
6:29 Newcastle Castle Keep
7:30 Castle Garth
7:45 The Black Gate
9:25 St. Nicholas’ Cathedral
10:37 Collingwood Street
12:27 George Stephenson Monument
13:07 Royal Station Hotel
13:52 Newcastle Central Station
15:24 St. Mary’s Cathedral
15:58 Basil Hume Statue
16:20 Bewick Street
16:40 Thomas Bewick Square
16:55 Pink Lane
17:35 Neville Street
17:50 County Hotel
18:15 The Man With Potential Selves
19:22 St John the Baptist Church
20:10 Grainger Street
22:42 Grainger Market
24:07 Royal Arcade
25:37 Grainger Street
25:47 Grey’s Monument
27:22 Blackett Street
27:57 Golden Clock (Northern Goldsmiths)
28:22 Northumberland Street
32:12 South African War Memorial (Dirty Angel), Haymarket
33:02 St. Thomas’ Church Haymarket
33:54 Percy Street
34:14 Newcastle University
34:49 Percy Street
35:14 The Hotspur Pub
35:30 St. Thomas’ Street
36:34 St. Thomas’ Crescent
37:54 Leazes Park
39:19 Leazes Crescent
39:49 Leazes Terrace
40:29 St. James’ Park
42:06 The Strawberry Pub
42:32 Jackie Milburn Statue
43:08 St. James’ Park
44:23 Alan Shearer Statue
44:48 Bobby Robson Statue
45:13 St. James’ Park
45:38 Gallowgate
47:17 Chinatown Arch
48:02 Newcastle Town Wall
50:42 Stowell Street
51:42 Blackfriars
54:02 Dispensary Lane
54:42 Low Friar Street
55:12 Newgate Street
57:52 Bigg Market
59:12 Beehive Hotel
59:32 High Bridge
59:52 The Duke of Wellington Pub
1:00:12 High Bridge
1:00:32 Grey Street
1:00:57 Theatre Royal
1:01:42 Grey Street
1:04:32 Dean Street
1:04:57 Cathedral Buildings
1:05:27 Dean Street Viaduct
1:06:17 Side
1:07:32 Sandhill
1:09:07 Quayside
1:09:27 River Tyne
1:10:23 Thank you for watching!
Welcome to Newcastle upon Tyne, one of England’s
great cities – and the home of some of the country’s friendliest people, liveliest streets
and most captivating history of all. And so, on this epic walk around Newcastle today –
we’re going to take a deep dive into all of the essential sights and stories that make up
this bustling city, as we make our way from the banks of the River Tyne, up past the castle which
lends the city its name, into elegant old market halls and along grand shopping streets lined
with majestic Georgian architecture. We’ll also inspect beautifully-preserved medieval relics from
centuries ago, we’ll uncover the intriguing story of one of England’s smallest Chinatowns; we’ll
unlock the mysteries behind some of the city’s more unusual public artworks, and we’ll even
stop by St. James’ Park, the celebrated home of Newcastle United Football Club, one of the
many proud symbols of this magnificent city. All of that, and so much more, is to come over the
next hour and ten minutes, but we begin our epic tour down beside the mighty River Tyne, which
flows through the heart of the city, and which is crossed here by an iconic septet of bridges.
Yes, no less than seven different bridges – of all shapes and sizes – span the Tyne in a stretch
just over a mile in length, and among them, there’s certainly none more iconic than the
Tyne Bridge right here, which has been towering impressively over the river for nearly a century,
ever since it was completed back in 1928. Linking Newcastle, here on the river’s northern
bank, with the town of Gateshead on the south side, the Tyne Bridge is a true icon of this city
– but you might notice that it bears a resemblance to a bridge some 10,000 miles away from here,
the Sydney Harbour Bridge in Australia. That resemblance is no coincidence, the design
of Newcastle’s Tyne Bridge is actually based on the plans for the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
But, despite having started construction later, the Tyne Bridge was actually completed four
years before the one down under, and so this could technically claim to be the original.
Nearly 100 years on, the Tyne Bridge occupies an indelible position as a true icon of the
city of Newcastle, but it’s far from the only captivating river crossing to be found here.
Just a few yards upstream in red and white, we see what’s known as the Swing Bridge,
opened way back in 1876. As the name suggests, it was designed to swing open and closed, and
it was actually the largest swing bridge ever built when it opened just under 150 years ago.
Now the reason for this design was to allow large ships, which could generally squeeze beneath
the much higher Tyne Bridge, to pass further along the river – and this was particularly
important, because for more than 700 years, Newcastle here was the home of one of the
country’s most thriving shipbuilding industries, and as such the river was almost always
thronging with boats big and small. Shipbuilding on the Tyne was a crucial
part of Newcastle’s history for so long, and we’ll talk more about it as we continue
our walk around the city, but it’s now time to make our way away from the river’s edge,
and into the heart of Newcastle – and to help us out as we get going, let’s take a brief
look at a map, to identify where exactly in the country this great city is located.
Famously, Newcastle lies in the northeast of England – just over 60 miles from the
border with Scotland, and the city also sits just under 10 miles from the coast, where
the River Tyne flows out into the North Sea. As a focal point for trade and industry through
history, alongside the river there stand some of Newcastle’s grandest buildings – such as this pair
of huge 17th century merchants’ houses, built of timber over 400 years ago, and which provided
wealthy traders with a strategic headquarters right on the city’s bustling quayside.
Now today, the quayside remains a lively part of Newcastle, showcasing perhaps the
best variety of historic architecture you’ll find in the city – directly across from the old
merchants’ houses there stands the old Guildhall, a 17th-century building now clad in
fetching 18th-century stonework. Indeed, many of Newcastle’s streets today
are lined with eye-catching 18th and 19th century buildings, constructed in an era of
British history known as the Georgian period, when four successive Kings were named George.
As we explore the city over the course of this tour, we’ll be treated to views of some
of Britain’s most magnificent Georgian-era architecture, but that’s not the only string to
Newcastle’s bow – because this city boasts an illustrious history that stretches back nearly
2,000 years – and just around the corner here, we find a staircase which will take us up towards
one of Newcastle’s oldest landmarks of all. Known as the Castle Stairs, this path inevitably
leads towards the Castle, a historic fortress which has stood on a high point overlooking
the River Tyne for nearly 850 years. But as we give our thighs a good bit of exercise
climbing these steep steps, to understand why the castle was built here, we need to go back further
in time to the beginning of Newcastle’s history, which started with none other than the Romans.
To defend a strategically important river crossing, the Romans built a fort on the steep
banks of the Tyne here in the 2nd century AD, and they called it Pons Aelius,
Latin for ‘Hadrian’s Bridge’. This was the same Emperor Hadrian who gave his
name to the famous wall which was built across England, and which originally reached its end
here in Newcastle, making this a place of great military importance for the Romans.
But after a few centuries of settlement, the Romans abandoned Pons Aelius and the rest
of Britain with it, and their old fort slowly fell into ruin – and eventually, when the
Normans, led by William the Conqueror, arrived here in the late 11th century, they
decided to build a new castle upon the Tyne to defend this strategic river crossing.
That is of course where Newcastle gets its name from today, but the first ‘new castle’ built
by the Normans doesn’t actually exist anymore, instead it was replaced about a century later, in
the 1170s, by the structure we see just here. Commissioned by King Henry II, this mighty
stone tower was historically the castle keep, the central and most strongly-defended
part of what was once a motte and bailey fortress that covered a much larger area.
Incredibly, this more than 800 year-old keep has remained in situ ever since it was built,
weathering the storms of countless wars and sieges through the centuries, and standing
strong as the modern city of Newcastle has grown up around it, with the railway bridge
here just skirting around its historic walls. But just on the other side of the viaduct,
there’s another intriguing part of the old castle layout which still remains standing.
This is the Black Gate, a fortified gatehouse which was added to the castle in the 13th
century, under King Henry III, in order to better protect it against attack from the north.
Indeed, it was from the north that many raiding parties from the Scottish borderlands came to
attack Newcastle, and so this great new gatehouse was crucial in securing the city’s main fortress,
cleverly designed with a portcullis and a narrow, curving passageway that made it difficult for
large numbers of attackers to storm the castle. As we can see, though, the historic gatehouse
today no longer stands fully intact, in fact over the centuries the shape of the Black
Gate has been constantly altered as it moved from a military structure to a residential one –
in the year 1619 the gatehouse was leased out as a house, and so much of it was remodeled
to make it more comfortable to live in. One of the gatehouse’s earliest residents
was a merchant from London by the name of Patrick Black, who became so closely
associated with the building that we still know it today as ‘The Black Gate’.
Today preserved as one of Newcastle’s most eye-catching historic landmarks, the Black Gate
almost didn’t survive the growth of this city – as the population ballooned in the early 19th
century on the back of industrial development, the area surrounding the Black Gate here
developed as one of the poorest in town, indeed the gatehouse itself became a slum
tenement, with as many as 60 people living inside in awfully cramped conditions.
Plans were therefore made to demolish the building entirely, but it was thankfully saved
– and today stands as one of a number of notable landmarks on this road – just a few doors along
from the soaring tower of St. Nicholas’ Cathedral, also known simply as Newcastle Cathedral.
The cathedral can trace its history back all the way to the year 1091, when it was founded
just a few years after the new castle, but that original medieval church was much smaller, and
was largely destroyed by fire in the year 1216. Largely rebuilt in the mid-14th century, the
church tower was later topped with its iconic spire, complete with what’s known as a Lantern
Tower, inside which a flaming beacon was lit, visible from ships which used it to navigate
their way up the River Tyne in darkness. Doubling as a lighthouse as well as
a place of worship then, the church, standing high up above the Tyne Gorge,
was fittingly dedicated to St. Nicholas, the patron saint of sailors and merchants –
many of whom plied their trade on the waters of the river that flows through this city.
As we mentioned earlier, Newcastle has long been a major centre of industry, shipbuilding
having begun on the Tyne as long ago as the late 13th century, but as time went
on the city became synonymous with one trade above all else: the trade of coal.
Sitting above large natural coal deposits, Newcastle was exporting coal
from as long as 700 years ago, but the city’s coal trade really began to boom
as the Industrial Revolution gathered steam. The heightened demand for coal turned the product
into a natural moneymaker for this city, and by the turn of the early 19th century, Newcastle
had evolved into one of Britain’s great ports, exporting coal to cities all over the country, and
even further afield – and utilising the profits to modernise the city, constructing grand
new buildings like the ones we’re passing between here on Collingwood Street.
This street was laid out in 1809, at the beginning of arguably the most prosperous
century in Newcastle’s history – the thriving coal trade complemented by shipbuilding on the
Tyne, the world’s largest pottery company moving to this city, and plenty more.
All of this industrial activity created vast wealth that attracted huge numbers of people
to Newcastle, in fact the city’s population grew almost tenfold, from just over 20,000 to
more than 200,000 in the space of 100 years, as Newcastle became renowned as an advanced
centre of pioneering technology and industry. Newcastle was one of the first cities in
England to be lit by electric street lights – indeed the electric light bulb was developed
here – and the city was also the home of one of the era’s most influential engineers, who is
remembered with a prominent statue just here. His name was George Stephenson, born in 1781 in
the village of Wylam just ten miles to the west of here, and he’s often known in Britain
today as ‘The Father of the Railways’. He was the man who pioneered the railways
that dramatically reshaped industrial Britain, selecting the railway gauge today
used on tracks all over the globe, engineering the very first passenger-carrying
steam locomotive in the 1820s, and opening the world’s first intercity railway line,
between Manchester and Liverpool, in 1830. George’s son, Robert, also famously
developed Stephenson’s Rocket, arguably the most influential railway locomotive
of all time, and it was built here in Newcastle – and so there are few other cities
with such an illustrious railway heritage. On that theme, just across the road from us here
we can see the Royal Station Hotel, opened back in 1850 by Queen Victoria, and which was designed on
a grand scale to greet guests who had arrived in Newcastle by train, likely on a lengthy journey
from York, or even London further south. The splendour of the Royal Station Hotel
was second to none, and conveniently, it was positioned right next door to Newcastle’s
Central station, one of Britain’s largest and most impressive railway terminals,
which we can see just up ahead here. Also opened back in 1850, Central Station was
designed to combine train services that were originally stopping at three different stations
all over Newcastle. Trains from Darlington to the south, Carlisle to the west and Berwick to
the north all had separate termini at different parts of the city, but as rail travel became
more frequent, it became necessary for people to be able to catch trains to all these
different places from just one station. Enter the building that we see today,
a spectacular monument to the railways which now serves as one of the largest
and busiest stations in northern England, not only boasting beautiful architecture both
inside and out, but also 12 platforms with services to destinations far and wide – you can
catch the train from here in Newcastle to places as distant as Inverness in northern Scotland,
to Penzance all the way down in Cornwall. Situated right at the heart of the city,
Newcastle’s Central Station keeps the city closely connected with the rest of Britain,
but it’s also the central interchange for people travelling closer to home, on
the Tyne & Wear Metro, one of just four subway systems that you’ll find in Britain.
The metro opened back in 1980 to better connect Newcastle city centre with suburbs and towns all
over Tyneside, as well as with the nearby city of Sunderland on the River Wear, and it’s now
used by more than 30 million people every year, providing a really convenient way to explore the
many more captivating places you’ll find just a stone’s throw from central Newcastle.
We, though, will keep our focus firmly on the many delights of the city centre itself,
because in front of us here we find our second cathedral in just a few minutes.
This is St. Mary’s Cathedral, a Catholic place of worship which opened
its doors back in 1844 – fronted here by a statue of the Newcastle-born Cardinal Basil
Hume, formerly the Archbishop of Westminster – the most senior Catholic bishop in England.
The cathedral behind him, notably taller than the Anglican St. Nicholas’ Cathedral
we passed earlier, was one of many built all over the country in the early 19th century,
as historic suppression of Catholic worship in England was relaxed, and the country saw
a large influx of Catholic Irish immigrants, who desired dedicated places of worship.
Indeed, the construction of St. Mary’s Cathedral here in Newcastle was largely funded by donations
from thousands of poor Irish immigrants that had moved to the city, and today it remains an
important landmark, for more than 100 years Newcastle’s tallest building, and to this day the
northernmost Catholic cathedral in England – more than 1,000 miles from the Vatican in Rome.
Of course, when the Romans reached what they called Pons Aelius nearly 2,000 years
ago – the settlement here sat on the very frontier of their vast empire, and
with the construction of Hadrian’s Wall, the fort at Pons Aelius was a vital outpost
defending the Romans’ British territories. Now that’s not to say that this was as far
north as the Romans went, their armies did advance well into what we now know as Scotland –
in fact just 20 years after Hadrian’s Wall, there they built another defensive wall, known as the
Antonine Wall, in line with the Firth of Forth. However, the Antonine Wall was short-lived,
abandoned just eight years after it was completed, and so the Roman garrisons returned
south to Hadrian’s Wall, reinforcing their forts in places like Newcastle here.
Sadly, nothing remains of the Roman settlement on the streets of Newcastle today, the city having
renewed itself time and time again with grand new edifices like the luxurious County Hotel, opened
directly across the road from the station in 1874 as ever more people began visiting this city.
At the time, it was mostly leading industrialists and merchants who were coming to
Newcastle, a centre of innovation, to do business – but in the modern day the city
attracts plenty of people travelling for pleasure, Newcastle’s rich history, lively atmosphere, and
proximity to some of England’s most beautiful countryside and coastlines – making
it a highly appealing destination. If you are visiting for the first time, though,
you’ll likely be perplexed by sights like this – a sculpture known as the Floating Man, one of the
city’s most unusual pieces of public art. Sculpted by the artist Sean Henry, the Floating
Man is part of a trio of statues on this street, collectively known as ‘The Man With
Potential Selves’, and just up the road you’ll also find the man’s alter egos, known
as The Walking Man, and the Standing Man. These striking sculptures are said to represent
the different aspects of life for an everyday working man from Newcastle, and they’ve stood
here close to the central station since 2003, now well-known among locals as one of the
city’s most distinctive pieces of public art. Modern art blends seamlessly into the mish-mash
of historical eras on display in just this one small street, in fact just across the road
here there stands one of the city’s most beautiful medieval buildings – the elegant
Church of St. John the Baptist, which has a history stretching back nearly 900 years.
A church was first built here all the way back in the year 1130, using stones from nearby Hadrian’s
Wall, but the building as we see it today dates largely from the 14th and 15th centuries, rebuilt
and expanded over time to reflect its position as one of Newcastle’s central places of worship.
Through the centuries, successive generations of locals have worshipped inside this church –
but when we talk about the people of Newcastle, there’s a special name that
citizens here are known by.
Yes, the people of Newcastle, and wider Tyneside,
are famously known as ‘Geordies’, a nickname which is well-known all over the country, and which
has some fascinating, albeit obscure origins. It’s often said that the word ‘Geordie’ derives
from the name ‘George’, but who was George? Well, one of the most common theories is that
George was King George I, a man who came to the British throne in 1714, but was reviled by
many people in Scotland and Northern England, who rebelled against him.
They were known as Jacobites, and were ever-present in this part of the country,
but it appears at the time that the people of Newcastle were actually more sympathetic to King
George, and so it’s possible that they came to be known as ‘Geordies’, or George’s men.
Now through the centuries, Geordies have given the world plenty, we know the story of George
and Robert Stephenson’s work on the railways, we know about the development of electric
lighting here – and you probably also know that Gregg’s the bakers, the UK’s largest fast
food chain, comes from Newcastle – the first Greggs actually opened its doors back
in 1951 in the area of Gosforth, just a couple of miles north of the city centre.
As many as 2,500 Greggs are to be found on the streets of Britain today, and they’re one of
this city’s many famous exports of recent years, alongside the likes of Ant and Dec, musicians
Sting, Jimmy Nail, Cheryl Cole, Brian Johnson of AC/DC – who was originally in a band called
Geordie, and countless legendary footballers, who we’ll talk more about later.
The Geordies are some of the friendliest and proudest people you’ll encounter all over
Britain, and we’ll talk more about how they help to make Newcastle so great as we continue
our walk, but here we’ve made our way onto a street which bears the name of perhaps one
of the most influential Geordies of all. This is Grainger Street, and it’s
named after one Richard Grainger, an architect who designed many of the streets
and buildings that surround us now. Fittingly, then, this part of
Newcastle is named ‘Grainger Town’, defined by its wealth of beautiful stone
buildings of the late Georgian era, mostly laid out in the 1830s as Newcastle’s industrial
prosperity continued to hit new heights. Today, Grainger Town boasts many
of Newcastle’s finest buildings, as well as the iconic Grey Street, which we’ll
stroll down towards the end of our walk, but across the road from us here is another important
landmark – the city’s historic Grainger Market. Now despite the name, this market hall wasn’t
designed by Richard Grainger, it was actually the work of one John Dobson, who also designed Central
Station – and it was opened in 1835 to replace a more rudimentary set of urban markets that spread
out across the streets of central Newcastle. But at the time the concept of covered market
halls were all the rage, providing a dedicated venue where traders could buy and sell
goods out of the rain, wind and snow, and with a number of permanent stalls, many
of which are still in use today – nearly 200 years after they first set up shop.
Now much of the interior of the Grainger Market here is preserved in a similar form to how it
was when its doors first opened – originally one half of the building was a dedicated vegetable
market, and the other half a meat market. In fact, today, you’ll still find
a number of butchers’ stalls which operate inside this storied market hall,
along with a wide range of independent and locally-run stands selling all kinds of goods.
It’s the oldest indoor market in Newcastle today, but it’s far from the only one – in fact Grainger
Town is full of shopping halls from a variety of different historical eras, emblematic of how this
part of the city has stood at the very heart of Newcastle’s commercial sphere for so long.
Directly across the street here is a gorgeous building known as the Central Arcade.
This one was designed by Richard Grainger, built back in 1837, when he intended it
to serve as a corn exchange, a market hall where grains and cereal were sold.
It didn’t last long as a corn exchange, however, later converted into
a newsroom and then a theatre, which was sadly gutted by a fire in 1901.
But just a few years later, the city decided to refurbish the interior of the
building as a brand-new shopping arcade, which opened its doors back in 1906.
One of the most beautiful venues in all of Newcastle, the Central Arcade is filled
with history – the music store known as JG Windows which we see in front of us here has been
operating inside the arcade since 1908, making it one of the country’s oldest music shops of all.
Around it is a collection of ever-changing shops set within a building which is nearly
200 years old, the exterior of the Central Arcade is still the same one as when
Richard Grainger designed it in the 1830s, which wasn’t just to be used as a Corn Exchange,
but also a helpful shortcut for people walking between Grey Street, on the other side of
the building, and Grainger Street itself. Now we’ve walked the length of Grainger
Street from the station up towards its very top, which is punctuated here by one of
Newcastle’s most famous landmarks of all. This mighty column is known as Grey’s Monument,
the jewel in the crown of Grainger Town. It was erected back in 1838 as the centrepiece of this
project of urban renewal, and it pays tribute to the Earl Grey, who was Prime Minister of
the United Kingdom from 1830 to 1834. His achievements as Prime Minister were many, most
notably he was a key player in passing the Great Reform Act of 1832, which greatly expanded voting
rights across Britain, his government enacted the abolition of slavery in the British Empire,
and he even gave his name to Earl Grey tea. This monument was more focused on celebrating
his political achievements than his contribution to British breakfasts, and it stands here in
Newcastle because of the Earl Grey’s association with this part of England, having represented
the county of Northumberland in Parliament early in his political career.
Today, Grey’s Monument occupies a focal position at the very heart of Newcastle, it’s a
popular meeting place for locals, and the square surrounding it is always buzzing with activity.
It’s an easy spot to reach wherever you’re coming from – because directly beneath the monument
is actually one of Newcastle’s busiest metro stations, simply known as Monument.
If you’re coming for a day of shopping in Newcastle, then Monument is probably the best stop
to get off, because not only is Grainger Town full of beautiful shops, cafes, restaurants and more
to enjoy – but just around the corner from here, you’ll also find the city’s most
famous shopping street of all. It’s known as Northumberland Street, and
we’ll take a walk along it in a few moments, but before we do – take note of the building
on the corner across the road – it’s the home of Northern Goldsmiths, opened back in 1892,
which is easily-identified by the huge golden clock that hangs over the street.
Weighing more than one and a half tons, finished with 24-carat golden leaf, and topped
with a gold-gilded sculpture of Venus, the clock here is impossible to miss – and as such it’s also
become known as a popular meeting spot for locals, in fact back in the Second World War, it’s said
that servicemen would arrange to meet their sweethearts here beneath the golden clock.
Originally placed on the building back in 1932, the clock has ever since stood in the heart
of one of Newcastle’s liveliest districts, and at the foot of the mighty Northumberland
Street, Newcastle’s busiest shopping parade. Now as we can see, the street is undergoing
some refurbishment as we walk today – but even among the roadworks there’s plenty of
interesting stories to be found here. Northumberland Street is Newcastle’s answer to
London’s Oxford Street, lined on both sides by many of the country’s biggest High Street chains –
many in huge premises covering multiple floors. Perhaps the most famous shop along the length
of Northumberland Street today is Fenwick’s, today a nationwide chain of department stores
which originally began life on this very street, the very first Fenwick’s opened here
back in 1882, when it sold a variety of fabrics, clothes and other textiles.
Over the years, the shop grew greatly in size, and the business eventually expanded to other
towns and cities around the country – but the one here in Newcastle is the flagship store, and a
fixture of this ever-evolving shopping street. Unlike Grainger Street and Grey Street, whose
stunning Georgian architecture is heavily protected, Northumberland Street features a rather
more varied collection of building styles. Many of the large shops here were
originally developed in the 1930s, and as its popularity grew in the post-war era,
a number of ever-larger, rather more modern buildings began to pop up along its path.
48 Comments
Hello! It's time that we returned to one of my favourite cities of all: Newcastle upon Tyne – for an updated, narrated tour of the fabulous city on Tyneside. Home to everything from majestic Georgian architecture to captivating medieval heritage – and some of the greatest people in the country, there are few places quite like Newcastle – and I hope you enjoy exploring the city with me over the course of an epic tour 🙂 Howay!
Excellent job! I'm feeling a bit homesick as I've been stuck here in Luton for years. Perhaps I'll go back to Newcastle sometime.
The way this tour was planned out is just perfect, the history is just brilliant, you have done us geordies proud, really great tour
Sadly, J.G. Windows closed at the end of November 2024. It was an iconic store for local musicians.
My second home, my favorite city🥰 Really nice video, thanks for this!
Merry Christmas and a happy new year to you. Awesome live video. I enjoyed it. 😊
GREAT WALK ! Nice history of that town….the only thing I did not like was the sign at 31:57.
Canny video.
Brilliant video and wonderful tour! I owe you a ton of thumbs up, been watching your channel and sometimes forget to hit the like button. The content and time you put into these video are great and thanks so much for sharing!
I love the quality of your videos.
Your videos are brilliantly interesting! Even when I think I know a lot about a place, I always learn a ton of fascinating information. Thanks for giving us the best sense of place on YouTube👍
Last major win was Fairs Cup 1969
Great video of a great city.
Nice little tour.
Fun fact – Queen Victoria and her large retinue ordered food and drinks from the Royal Station Hotel, when she stopped on her way up to Scotland. She was so furious about receiving a bill, she never looked upon Newcastle again. She used to draw the curtains of her carriage, when she was passing by.
Daft auld bag!
Excellent video . As someone from the area i learnt more things in details. On a minor note having seen 19th century news articles that it was referred to Newcastle on Tyne and the " upon" added later
Although it's not clear, the term Geordie is probably derived from the mining communities. The popular safety lamp in mining throughout the UK was the Davey lamp, however in the North East George Stephenson invented the Stephenson lamp which was commonly used in North East coal mines. The miners of this region were referred to as George's boys, or Geordie boys, as they used this type of lamp, and well the nickname stuck and now refers to all people from Newcastle.
Enjoyable video, thanks 😊 Also one of my favourite cities in England.
I love these narrated walking tours, I've learnt so much, thankyou. Are there any other channels similar to this?
Hello now are you did you have a good Christmas and happy new year when it comes love your vidio of Newcastle Very interested I have loved all your videos keep up the good work Elaine use to live in Newcastle best wishes take care stay safe from Lynn x ❤😅😅
We’ve been following and enjoying your narrated walks for some time, there’s seemingly not so many of us doing spoken walking tours, so we’re always especially interested and think you do it really well. New year greetings to you and keep them coming won’t you.
Absolutely spectacular tour! The city is just beautiful and I was fascinated by its history!
Its now a third world city full of immigrants
Excellent video. Beautiful views & well researched commentary. I learned so much.
Try visiting the West Road or Elswick areas ,full of Muslims taking over the city ,as per the rest of the country .
The council have killed the night life due to given up the city to Muslims
See the illegal immigrant shown twice delivering crap on an electric bike
Window s is closed now..how sad is that😢
What happened to the Night's Watch?
Feel like an alien there nowadays
Really enjoyed that, took me back to my student days. Quite a lot has changed in 35 years!
Thank you for giving me a visual tour to guide me around Newcastle centre where my paternal ancesters hail from. 👍👏👍
Superb job, I even learned a few thing! One small point, the Joseph Swan invented his light bulb in Low Fell, Gateshead, his house becoming the first in the world illuminated by electric light. It may be pedantic but there's sod all else my home town is known for…
뉴캐슬 팬인데 감사합니다 ㅋㅋ ㅎㅎ 가서 살고싶네영… 귀화,국적 변경,정계 진출이나 입문도 하고싶다… 뉴캐슬어폰타인 사랑해요!
We don't say FEN-WICK, we say FENNICK. Fascinating video, though, even for someone like myself who has lived in Northumberland for decades.
I watch thank you,
follow you , appreciate the information, but this time I was disappointed with the images, I could hardly distinguish the castle you were describing
The image was so dark
May be in a sunny or another time of the day ..
Unbelievable ❤️ ✨️👍👌
Thanks for this tour video. As former student at the university from 1989-1992, this brings me a lot of memories. My last visit to Newcastle was back in 2005, and a lot has changed since then.
1882….
Excellent video and probably the most comprehensive and informative history of Newcastle that I have seen. From a proud Geordie, who’s been living in mainland Europe for the best part of 20 years, although I do try to make it back to the Toon at least once a year.
That is the most beautiful city in the England. Thank you for sharing this muster peace. The Hole city looks like a fairytale.❤
I had a good time there. 🙂
funny if you went to Newie in Australia and do similar walk…
I love this narrated walk!
When I look up the tyne river is that fog I can see lol 😂 (lindisfarne band)
❤ from teesside smoggy land 🇬🇧 🏴
Brilliantly done. Hard to get it all in but you did a fantastic job. As a Geordie who has lived in London for almost 40 years – so many beautiful memories. Thank you
This is excellent… I've lived in Newcastle for 20 years, and learnt a lot!
Show me some more of such beautiful places of London❤
Many thanks for enabling some very warm reminiscence in me.
When I was a sprog I sang in the cathedral choir for 6 years.
Happy days!
Please keep up the good work
😺