Exhibition halls, works of art, audio-visual presentations and dioramas bring to life the countries, the natural resources and the lives of the inhabitants of the 50 members of the Commonwealth.

This commercial street used to be called West Cheap, derived from the Anglo-Saxon word ceap meaning «to trade». It plays host to London's main market. In the Middle Ages it also played host to many tournaments. Cheapside has three churches St-Mary-le-Bow was reconstructed after the Great Fire.

The college was founded in 1542 by Lord Audley of Audley End on the site of a Benedictine college. The First Court is essentially 15C; except for the 16C gatehouse and the hall. Behind the Second Court is the Pepys Building, which contains Samuel Pepys' own library, bequeathed by him to the college in 1703 and containing the cipher manuscript of his Diary.

Waterloo Place is a broad street very familiar to Londoners. In the northern half stands the Crimea Monument, honouring the dead of the 1854-56 campaign. The Athenaeum (no 107 Pall Mall), a club founded in 1824 as a meeting place for artists and men of letters, occupies a building dating from 1830. The façade giving onto Waterloo Place sports a statue of Athena (Minerva).