Georgian and Victorian terraces line Upper Street's shopfronts, with garden squares and a narrow antiques passage one block behind.
What Islington looks like
runs as a single shopping spine for the length of a long block, three and four storey terraces in London stock brick with shopfronts painted in period colours at street level. Awnings and hanging signs crowd the pavement, and pubs sit among the shops rather than set apart from them.
One block back, garden squares hold the same brick behind railings. has paired stucco terraces facing each other across a central garden, with a pedimented pavilion block at each end. keeps mature trees and a magnolia in front of its own four storey terraces.
continues south toward Angel in the same fabric, four storey London stock brick houses with ground floor shopfronts built into what were once plain townhouses. Off Canonbury Road, holds its corner in yellow brick and pale green paintwork, sash windows stacked above a curved ground floor bar front.
is a narrow pedestrian lane of antiques shops and small restaurants running off Upper Street near Islington Green. On Essex Road, the old Carlton Cinema keeps its cream and ochre Egyptian revival tiling above a row of newer shopfronts.
Shot in Islington
on Upper Street has stood in for its own real function twice on screen. Love and Other Disasters used it for a wedding, and The Ones Below filmed a couple registering their child there. Fever Pitch put Colin Firth's character outside 12 Camden Passage, looking in a shop window near the corner at Charlton Place.
Love and Other Disasters, 2006
Islington Town Hall
The wedding scene was filmed at the real Town Hall on Upper Street. Its stone porch and forecourt are the same ones a couple would use for an actual registry wedding today.
The Ones Below, 2015
The couple in this psychological thriller register their child at the same Town Hall, and a separate scene plays out at a restaurant in Camden Passage. Both are real, working parts of the borough's own register office and its nearby shops.
What Islington can double for
Merrion Square in Dublin, Ireland
Merrion Square stands at the same scale as a London garden square, its brick and stucco Georgian terraces facing a shared garden with matching fanlights, iron railings and pedimented doorcases. Dublin's front doors are painted in brighter colours and the fanlights carry more ornament, so a tight frame on brickwork and railings alone holds the illusion best. Try searching Georgian terraces square now.
Beacon Hill in Boston, Massachusetts
Beacon Hill's brick bowfront rowhouses and black iron railings share the scale of a London terrace, and Louisburg Square is itself a private garden ringed by matching facades. The bowed fronts, brownstone steps and shuttered windows are the tell in a wide shot, so keep the frame tight on brick and railings. Try searching brick bowfront rowhouses now.
Montpellier's cream stucco Regency terraces and iron balconies read at a similar scale to a Georgian garden square, with matching pilasters and pediments over the ground floor windows. Cheltenham's terraces run in longer straight crescents rather than facing across a square, so tight framing on one block holds the illusion best. Try searching Regency stucco terraces now.
