Lady Henry Somerset Memorial

Two Temple Place, known for many years as Astor House, is a building situated near Victoria Embankment in central London, England. It is known for its architecture, and contains notable works by the likes of William Silver Frith, Sir George Frampton RA, Nathaniel Hitch and Thomas Nicholls.On 28 October 2011, Two Temple Place opened as a public gallery. It hosts exhibitions showcasing publicly owned art from regional collections in the United Kingdom, and is also used as a venue for private hire.

HMS Wellington (launched Devonport, 1934) is a Grimsby-class sloop, formerly of the Royal Navy. During the Second World War, she served as a convoy escort ship in the North Atlantic. She is now moored alongside the Victoria Embankment, at Temple Pier, on the River Thames in London, England, as the headquarters ship of the Honourable Company of Master Mariners, where she is known as HQS Wellington. It was always the ambition of the founding members of the company to have a livery hall. Up to the outbreak of war in 1939, various proposals were examined, including the purchase of a sailing ship, Archibald Russell.After the Second World War, it became apparent that the possibility of building a hall in the City of London had been rendered very remote. In 1947, the Grimsby-class sloop Wellington was made available by the Admiralty. The company decided to buy her with money subscribed by the members and convert her to a floating livery hall, an appropriate home for a company of seafarers. Since 2014, Wellington has also served as the London postal address of the Flag Institute.

The Honourable Company of Master Mariners is one of the Livery Companies of the City of London. The Company was formed in 1926; it was made a Livery Company by the City of London in 1932, making it the first new Livery Company to be formed since 1746. While the other Livery Companies are entitled to the style Worshipful, the Master Mariners are styled Honourable, King George V having granted them that honour in 1928. The Company aids nautical schools and promotes nautical research. It ranks seventy-eighth in the order of precedence for Livery Companies. Its motto is Loyalty and Service. Instead of the usual livery hall, the Honourable Company of Master Mariners has a headquarters ship, HQS Wellington, moored on the Thames at Victoria Embankment.

The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) is a British research institute (or think tank) in the area of international affairs. Since 1997 its headquarters have been Arundel House in London, England. The 2017 Global Go To Think Tank Index ranked IISS as the tenth-best think tank worldwide and the second-best Defence and National Security think tank globally, while Transparify ranked it third-largest UK think tank by expenditure, but gave it its lowest rating, "deceptive", on funding transparency.

Essex Street is a street in the City of Westminster that runs from Milford Lane in the south to Strand in the north. It is joined by Little Essex Street on its western side and Devereux Court on the eastern side. It was laid out by Nicholas Barbon in around 1675 or 1680 and contains a number of listed buildings.

Temple Place is a street in the City of Westminster that runs parallel with Victoria Embankment along the River Thames. The name of the street refers to the Knights Templar who once lived in the Temple area of London.

The Cheshire Cheese is a public house at 5 Little Essex Street, London WC2, on the corner with Milford Lane. It is a grade II listed building, rebuilt in 1928 by Nowell Parr on the site of an earlier pub, for the Style & Winch Brewery. There has been a tavern on this site since the 16th century.

Milford Lane is a narrow street in the City of Westminster that runs from Strand in the north to a brief walkway section leading to Temple Place in the south. It is joined by Little Essex Street and Essex Street on its eastern side. Maltravers Street once joined the lane to Arundel Street, but ceased to exist when building work at 190 Strand was completed.

The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known simply as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers, the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn and Lincoln's Inn. It is located in the wider Temple area of London, near the Royal Courts of Justice, and within the City of London.

The Edgar Wallace is a public house at 40–41 Essex Street, London WC2, at the corner with Devereux Court. The pub dates back to 1777, and was originally The Essex Head. The landlord then was Samuel Greaves, a former servant of the Thrale family where Samuel Johnson had lodged and Johnson and his friend Richard Brocklesby established the Essex Head Club in the tavern in 1783.It was renamed in 1975 to commemorate the crime writer Edgar Wallace's birth centenary.

The Garden Bridge project was an unsuccessful private proposal for a pedestrian bridge over the River Thames in London, England. Originally an idea of Joanna Lumley, and strongly supported by then-Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, the designer Thomas Heatherwick worked with Arup Group on a proposal by Transport for London (TfL) for a new bridge across the Thames between Waterloo Bridge and Blackfriars Bridge. The proposed concrete, steel, cupronickel clad structure was intended to carry pedestrians, with no cycles or other vehicles. It was to have been located some 200 metres (660 ft) from Waterloo Bridge and 300 m (980 ft) from Blackfriars Bridge, and have included some areas of planting. The project was to include a commercial building, built on former green space at the southern end of the bridge. The bridge was intended to be funded by raising over £140 million of private money (including taxpayer funding through charitable gift aid) and £60 million of promised public money, of which £30m was from Transport for London (£20m of this to be repaid over 55 years) and £30m from the Department for Transport, adding up to projected funding of over £200m. In January 2017, the trustees of the prospective owner of the bridge, the Garden Bridge Trust, stated that costs would "substantially exceed" an earlier revised total of £185m and, in April 2017, a report by Margaret Hodge MP concluded, on the basis of the Garden Bridge Trust's own evidence, that the cost would be over £200m.If built, it was proposed that the bridge would have been open from 6am to midnight, with closures for the preparation for and holding of up to 12 private commercial events per year to raise funds for its maintenance. A planning condition required annual maintenance costs to be guaranteed by a third party and it was expected that this would be the Greater London Authority. The annual maintenance costs were variously estimated at between £2m and £3.5m, before allowing for the repayment of loan capital and interest.In July 2016 preparatory work for the bridge was halted and the Garden Bridge Trust put contractors on standby to allow for a financial review and because they had not cleared outstanding issues such as securing legal rights to the land on either side of the river, despite signing a contract for construction of the bridge in January 2016. In September 2016, Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London, announced a formal review by Margaret Hodge of the procurement processes in relation to the bridge project and its value for money. In October 2016, the National Audit Office reported on procurement issues and perceived value for money for that part of the cost of the project which was being met by funds (£30m) from the Department for Transport. In January 2017, the trustees of the Garden Bridge Trust (the limited company behind the project) said they were unable to conclude that the trust was a going concern. In February 2017, the Charity Commission for England and Wales found the financial management of the trust to be satisfactory, albeit with criticisms as to the trustees' approach. The subsequent report by Margaret Hodge MP was highly critical of the plan, its procurement, its cost, the risk to public funds, and lack of value for money.The Garden Bridge Trust formally announced on 14 August 2017 that it would be ending the project and that the Garden Bridge Trust itself would be wound up in accordance with the Companies Acts. The failed project cost £53m, including £43m of public money.

The National Submariners' War Memorial is a war memorial on the Victoria Embankment in London, England, between Waterloo Bridge and Blackfriars Bridge. The memorial is also referred to as the National Submarine War Memorial, the National Submarine Memorial, the Submarine War Memorial and the Submariner Memorial. It commemorates the Royal Navy submariners who died in the First and Second World Wars. The Royal Navy Submarine Service had 57 operational vessels at the start of the First World War in 1914, but expanded to 137 vessels by the time the war ended in 1918, with another 78 under construction. During the war, 54 of its submarines were sunk, and over 1,300 Royal Navy submariners were killed. The memorial is a Grade II* listed building, and it is the focal point of a special memorial walk and laying of wreaths held each year by submariners on the Sunday preceding Remembrance Sunday. The memorial was funded by public subscription. It was designed by the architect Arthur Heron Ryan Tenison, and bears a bronze sculpture by Frederick Brook Hitch which was cast by the Parlanti Foundry. Tenison and Hitch also collaborated on the memorial to the 8th and 9th Submarine Flotillas at St Mary's Church, Shotley. The memorial was built into a granite pier that former part of the entrance to Temple Pier, a boat landing stage on the Victoria Embankment. The memorial stands on granite steps, supporting a large bronze bas relief within an architectural frame. The bas relief shows the interior of a submarine and another with nereids swimming on either side. To the right and left are allegorical figures representing Truth and Justice. On either side of the central bronze plaques are 40 bronze wreath hooks in the form of anchors. At the top of the memorial is the inscription "Erected to the memory of the officers and men of the British Navy /who lost their lives serving in submarines 1914–1918 and 1939–1945". On the left hand side is a list of 50 submarines lost during the First World War, and on the right a list of 82 submarines lost during the Second World War. It was unveiled on 15 December 1922 by the Chief of the Submarine Service, Rear Admiral Sir Hugh Sinclair, and dedicated by the Chaplain of the Fleet, Archdeacon Charles Ingles.Further panels commemorating the Second World War were unveiled on 15 November 1959 by Rear-Admiral Bertram Taylor. An additional plaque was added in 1992 to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the unveiling of the original memorial. The 70th anniversary plaque reads: "National Submarine War Memorial (1922) This plaque commemorates the memorial’s seventieth anniversary and the contribution by the members of the submariners old comrades, London, in their devotion to the upkeep of this memorial, unveiled by Peter P. Rigby C.B.E.J.P.".It became a Grade II listed building in 1972, and was upgraded to Grade II* in January 2017.