Church Street sits on the broad smudge of a boarder that fractions St John’s Wood from Marylebone. It is a thoroughfare from Edgware Road to Lisson Grove, at one end cafés and carpet shops and places that promise everything for a pound, though almost nothing is. Here there is a daily street market, fresh fish sold next to clothes that must smell of them, fruit and veg, piles of plastic shoes. At the other, at the Lisson Grove end, are windows filled with walnut desks, club chairs, lamps shaped like faraway animals. These are the antique shops, where a single purchase might come in at twice what it would cost to buy out all the stalls only a few metres away. It is a tale of two halves, Church Street.
Hidden London: Alfies Antique Market
