Francis Crick Institute

Richard Everitt (6 December 1978 - 13 August 1994) was a 15-year-old boy who was stabbed to death in London, England, in a racially-motivated attack. Everitt's neighbourhood, Somers Town, had been the site of ethnic tensions. He was murdered by a gang of British Bangladeshis who were seeking revenge against another White British boy. He was not a gang member. The murderer was not apprehended and members of the gang fled to Bangladesh. Abdul Hai, Badrul Miah and Showat Akbar were tried in 1995. Miah was given a life sentence, with minimum terms of 12 years. Akbar was sentenced to three years in custody for violent disorder. Abdul Hai was acquitted by the jury on the direction of Mrs Justice Steel, the trial judge, at the close of the prosecution case. She ruled that there was no case for him to answer. He left court an innocent man. Abdul Hai was represented by Helena Kennedy QC.

The Lawrence Durrell Collection is a special collection of books and periodicals by, about or associated with the novelist and poet Lawrence Durrell, donated to the British Library by Alan G. Thomas.

The Lady Eccles Oscar Wilde Collection is a special collection of materials by, about and associated with the novelist and playwright Oscar Wilde, donated to the British Library by Lady Eccles.

The Dexter Collection of Dickensiana is a special collection of materials by, about and associated with the novelist Charles Dickens, donated to the British Library by John Furber Dexter.

The Harleian Library, Harley Collection, Harleian Collection and other variants (Latin: Bibliotheca Harleiana) is one of the main "closed" collections (namely, historic collections to which new material is no longer added) of the British Library in London, formerly the library of the British Museum. The collection comprises 7,660 manuscripts, including 2,200 illuminated manuscripts, more than 14,000 original legal documents; and more than 500 rolls. It was assembled by Robert Harley (1661–1724) and his son Edward (1689–1741). In 1753, it was purchased for £10,000 by the British government. Together with the collections of Sir Robert Cotton (the Cotton library) and Hans Sloane (the Sloane library) it formed the basis of the British Museum's collection of manuscripts, which were transferred to the new British Library in 1973.The collection contains illuminated manuscripts spanning the early Middle Ages to the Renaissance. There are important early British manuscripts, many from Western Europe, and several Byzantine manuscripts in Greek and other languages.

The Asia, Pacific and Africa Collections previously called the Oriental and India Office Collections (OIOC) form a significant part of the holdings of the British Library in London, England.

The Harold Pinter Archive in the British Library is the literary archive of Harold Pinter, which Pinter had first placed "on permanent loan" in the British Library in September 1993 and which became a permanent acquisition in December 2007.

The Ossulston Estate is a multi-storey council estate built by the London County Council on Chalton Street in Somers Town between 1927 and 1931. It was unusual at the time both in its inner-city location and in its modernist design, and all the original parts of the estate are now Grade II listed buildings. The estate was built to rehouse those poor who were not being served by the LCC's new suburban estates, and was significantly denser to suit the urban site. It was located on the site of the Somers Town slum, between Euston and St Pancras stations. The original proposal made in 1925 was for 9-storey blocks on the American model, which would have required lifts, and with more expensive flats for private tenants on the highest floors. This was rejected and the height reduced to a maximum of 7 storeys, with fewer lifts and no private flats. The provision of central heating was also eliminated, but the buildings were unusual in providing electricity from the start, and Levita House had the first central heating system installed by the LCC. The design, by G. Topham Forrest, chief architect of the LCC, and his assistants R. Minton Taylor and E.H. Parkes, was influenced by Viennese modernist public housing such as Karl Marx-Hof, which Forrest had visited. The estate consists of blocks grouped around three courtyards, and small greens, reached by archways from Ossulston and Chalton Streets; some of the original plantings survive. The buildings have some neo-Georgian features in the treatment of roofs and windows, but are modernist in being of steel-frame construction with unornamented roughcast walls, the facades instead enlivened by spatial features such as the archways in front of the balconies which lead to the individual flats. Chamberlain House, three blocks of flats, was built in 1927–29; Levita House, south of it and named for Cecil Levita, who was chairman of the LCC's Housing Committee in the 1920s, was built in 1930–31 and consists of the 7-storey section and wings enclosing a grand courtyard which was originally intended to lead to the premium flats. Walker House was begun in 1929–30, but the other side of the courtyard was completed in 1936–37 with more traditional brick 6-storey buildings. The total number of flats was 310. Chamberlain House, Levita House, the southern part of Walker House and the associated shops and The Cock Tavern public house are all Grade II listed buildings.In 2004–07, Levita House was extensively refurbished by Sprunt Architects, which included creating larger flats, external refurbishment of the fabric and transformation of the courtyard areas.

The British Library Sound Archive, formerly the British Institute of Recorded Sound; also known as the National Sound Archive (NSA), in London, England is among the largest collections of recorded sound in the world, including music, spoken word and ambient recordings. It holds more than six million recordings, including over a million discs and 200,000 tapes. These include commercial record releases (chiefly from the UK), radio broadcasts (many from the BBC Sound Archive), and privately made recordings.

In 1757, the actor David Garrick commissioned the sculptor Louis-François Roubiliac to make a full-size marble statue of William Shakespeare for Garrick's octagonal Temple to Shakespeare, erected near his villa beside the River Thames at Hampton, to the west of London. The sculpture cost 300 guineas and was installed at Garrick's temple in 1758; it remained there until it was bequeathed to the British Museum along with Garrick's books in 1779. The sculpture was transferred to the new British Library in 2005, where it is displayed on a new travertine plinth beside the main staircase in the main entrance hall. The sculpture depicts Shakespeare standing, leaning with his right arm on a lectern covered with a fringed cloth. His right foot is forward and body leaning to the right, with his hips thrust out awkwardly to the left. His right hand is holding a quill pen while the left hand is raised to his chin with the index finger extended along the jawline, as if in thought. The subject is balding but bearded, with ringlets of hair at his temples. Rather than Tudor costume, he is wearing anachronous 17th century "Van Dyke" dress, including a shirt with an elaborate lace collar and cuffs; a long jacket with many buttons, but unbuttoned over the lower body; short trousers with fringed legs; stockings and heeled shoes; all draped in a billowing cloak. The art historian Margaret Whinney describes Roubiliac's bust as having "Van-Dyckian elegance" and notes that "he has greatly ennobled the head".

Euston St Pancras railway station is a proposed station on the future Crossrail 2 line in the United Kingdom linking Hertfordshire and north-east London to south-west London and Surrey.

Somers Town is an inner-city district in North West London. It has been strongly influenced by the three mainline north London railway termini: Euston (1838), St Pancras (1868) and King's Cross (1852), together with the Midland Railway Somers Town Goods Depot (1887) next to St Pancras, where the British Library now stands. Historically, the name "Somers Town" was used for the larger triangular area between the Pancras, Hampstead, and Euston Roads, but it is now taken to mean the rough rectangle centred on Chalton Street and bounded by Pancras Road, Euston Road, Eversholt Street, Crowndale Road, and the railway approaches to St Pancras station. Somers Town was originally within the medieval Parish of St Pancras, Middlesex, which in 1900 became the Metropolitan Borough of St Pancras. In 1965 the Borough of St Pancras was abolished and its area became part of the London Borough of Camden.