The Old Marylebone Town Hall

That towering colonnade rising above you isn't just decorative... it's deliberately designed in Christopher Wren's baroque style, crowned by an ornate urn finial that watches over Marylebone Road like a sentinel from another century. You're standing before the Old Marylebone Town Hall, where Princess Royal herself laid the foundation stone on July 8th, 1914, just weeks before the world plunged into chaos. Sir Edwin Cooper's grand design in Portland stone was meant to replace a cramped 18th-century courthouse, but the Great War had other plans. For six long years, this half-finished shell stood silent while Europe burned. When Prince Albert finally opened these doors on March 27th, 1920, he was inaugurating more than just a building... he was christening a symbol of resilience. That same Prince Albert would later become King George VI, making this one of the few buildings in London he opened before ascending the throne. Look closely at those thirteen bay windows stretching across the facade... the central five bays hide a two-storey portico supported by full-height Corinthian columns that have witnessed nearly everything. During the Blitz, German bombs shattered the council chamber behind these walls, but the building refused to fall. Today, as you step inside, you'll find seven ceremony rooms named after Westminster's neighborhoods, where couples still exchange vows beneath restored ceilings that once echoed with the sounds of war.