Andrew Whitehead

Arnold Circus, perhaps the loveliest bandstand in London, is 100 years old. An event to be celebrated! It was built a century ago by the London County Council amid the still fairly new Boundary Street Estate in Shoreditch. The bandstand itself is nice enough - what makes the spot particularly enchanting in a locality not known for enchantment is the landscaping of the small hill which once stood in the middle of the circus. Now Arnold Circus has been spruced up to celebrate its centenary - and very nicel too,

Next month the circus will be the venue for the annual 'sharing picnic'. And the Friends of Arnold Circus have organised a busy summer programme of events.

The Boundary Street Estate was built on the site of the Old Nichol - the area that the novelist Arthur Morrison described, and damned to perdition, as the criminal slum of "the Jago". One of the most evocative remnants of Morrison's "Jago" - the little snicket of Boundary Passage - is a short stroll away.

This photograph of Arnold Circus was posted by LoopZilla under a Creative Commons license.