Creating a walking tour: Legends of London

• Project title: Legends of London Walking Tour
• Faculty: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
• School: School of the Arts
• Formats: Walking tour
• Key themes: festivals; public engagement; medieval literature; history; London; Being Human Festival

Please could you give us an overview of your activity?

‘Legends of London’ was a two-hour walking tour from the Tower of London to Guildhall. It offered a history of the city, told entirely through medieval legends. These legends shaped understandings of London for centuries, but they are widely unknown today. My aim was to bring the stories to a non-academic audience, and to demonstrate how they can inform our thinking about London’s past and present. I organised the tour for Being Human Festival (in November 2025), the UK’s national festival of the humanities. The festival gave me an opportunity to experiment with something new. I’d never done a walking tour before, but I’d been wanting to give it a try!

The activity was inspired by my research (on medieval legendary histories of Britain) and by my teaching at Queen Mary. We have a module in the Department of English that explores different aspects of London’s literature, history, and culture through weekly walking seminars, which take place (outside) in different areas of London. Medieval literature—my specialism—isn’t part of the module, but I had so many ideas when teaching about how my research contributes to our understanding of London’s literature through time. I attended Being Human Festival’s online training session on ‘Introduction to Creative Public Engagement’ in March 2025 for tips and inspiration. By the end of the session (which I’d highly recommend), I was committed to developing a walking tour on medieval legends of London for the festival. I booked an advice surgery with Queen Mary’s Centre for Public Engagement team to talk through my ideas (which I’d also highly recommend). I submitted my proposal to Being Human in June 2025. The rest is history!

Please could you tell us more about how you made the activity accessible?

I wanted to make the tour as engaging and accessible as possible. My main goal was for my participants to have fun—to enjoy the medieval legends I told them about. After all, they were giving up their free time on a Saturday to spend two hours with me! From the beginning, then, I thought about how I could captivate and surprise my participants at each stop.

I did not know who my participants would be, so I assumed no prior knowledge of the Middle Ages, medieval literature, or London’s history. I had more legends to tell than I could fit into my time, so I chose stories that were the most fun and bizarre—the most likely to stand out—and the ones that tie directly to London’s sites and streets. I found it helpful to write a ‘script’ of my tour in advance, not to read from on the day, but instead to work out what my key points were and how I wanted to frame my narrative at each stop. Essentially, I approached the tour as one big story: the tour had its own narrative, which each legend developed; but each stop (1-2 legends each) also had its own unique themes and aims.

Having themed stops, with built-in questions and activities (optional, of course), kept the tour interesting for my participants and ensured opportunities for two-way engagement. Two hours is a long time to keep someone’s attention (even with short walks to break up the content), so I knew I needed to mix things up by varying my themes and format as I went along. Having opportunities to hear my participants’ questions, comments, and ideas throughout the tour helped me to gauge the success of the activity in real time so I could make adjustments if/when needed, and clarify any confusions. Finally, having to condense my legends (in writing) into short ‘summary stories’ that would pique and keep interest was an invaluable exercise. On the day, I had a very clear sense of what to say and how to say it. I was confident. I didn’t ramble or veer off topic, which was my fear going in.

Could you tell us more about how you prepared for the activity?

This was really fun. There were two sides to my initial preparation: (1) identifying which medieval stories I wanted to tell; and (2) the practicalities of mapping my sites/stops, determining my route, and timing that route. Once I’d narrowed down my list of legends, I used Google Maps to pin them to specific locations and to put those locations into a logical order. Some of my ‘legendary locations’ were too far to walk to, no longer exist, or never existed, so there was some creativity involved with the route planning. I ended up moving a few legends around to fit them all in. I aimed for 20 minutes of walking time according to Google Maps, which was longer in real time. (One thing I learned from teaching was that groups always move slower than you expect. Generally, I’d recommend giving yourself a 20-30-minute buffer when planning a walking tour, to account for more time spent both walking and talking with your participants.)

Then it was time to put my route to the test. I spent a lovely morning walking my route and adapting it to make it better suited my tour. Mainly I was looking to ensure that the route was step-free and quiet, so that I could be heard by a group of 20 people (traffic noise can be a killer). I chose pedestrian-only streets whenever possible, and I looked out for areas off the road (e.g. boardwalks, gardens, tucked-away spaces) where I could stand with a large group for some storytelling and conversation. I also kept a lookout for sheltered areas (in case it rained) and outdoor seating options. This enabled me to flag when seating would (and would not) be available on the day of the tour. If a stop offered seating, then I invited my tour group to sit (if they wanted to) and noted when seating would be available next. This seemed to be appreciated. Two hours on your feet can be challenging.

The best thing I did to prepare was a dry-run. Fortunately, I had three wonderful colleagues who were happy to spend an afternoon with me the week before the tour. Although they were academics, they were not medievalists, so the tour’s content was new to them. Their feedback was invaluable. I ended up framing a couple of my stops differently—in more attention-grabbing ways. I also modified a couple of the hook-like questions I posed for optional discussion while walking between stops (a trick I borrowed from teaching) to make them even more enticing. Ultimately, the dry-run gave me more confidence in my activity: it helped me to feel prepared and excited (real people enjoyed this!), to fine-tune my points and plans, and to test the more experimental aspects of the tour.

Please could you tell us more about the people you engaged with and how they responded to the activity?

It was such a pleasure to get to discuss medieval legends with non-specialists. I greatly enjoyed hearing their perspectives on these stories, and their own London stories, as we walked. Several people asked me if the rulers I told them about were real (or based on a historical king). For example, did Brutus (London’s legendary founder) and King Arthur really exist? I was expecting those questions, and I was delighted that participants wanted to learn more about the legends. But I was surprised—in the best way possible—by participants’ praise for the premise of the tour, i.e. that all its stories were legends (fictions to our twenty-first-century eyes). As one participant put it, ‘we often get history, but rarely the ancient legends’. I knew (at least I hoped!) that I was being creative with my tour by basing the whole thing on legends/fictions. But because this approach is so familiar to me—my research essentially explores how legends reimagine history—I hadn’t appreciated fully how exciting the prospect of a ‘tour through legends’ would be to non-specialists. This was my biggest reward from the tour—to know that my participants not only enjoyed the activity itself (and the legends), but that they also responded so positively to its underlying idea. This has taught me that we should embrace what we love the most about our research when designing public engagement activities. If you’re not sure where to start, then use what inspires you to frame and drive your activity.

Anything else you’d like to share?

You never know where an activity will take you! The walking tour has inspired me to write a book about medieval legends of London, which takes everything I did on the tour and runs with it. I also plan to reprise the walking tour later this year. I’m excited to run it again!

If you’re on the fence about trying a walking tour or another public engagement activity, then I’d say go for it! You’ll learn so much, you’ll have a blast, you’ll meet some amazing people, and you may well end up somewhere exciting that you’d never expected.

Do you have any top tips for those that might be planning similar activities in the future?

• Take advantage of public engagement training sessions offered by the CPE and beyond Queen Mary (e.g. by the Being Human Festival team). I did this at an early stage in my thinking and it was hugely beneficial.
• Allow ample preparation time. It took me three times longer to prepare the tour than I was expecting, even with a very clear sense of what I wanted to do (and how).
• Walk your route on the day of your tour to make sure you don’t encounter any unexpected obstacles. When I did this, I came across a film crew on one of my pedestrian-only streets. I discussed and agreed with them how to proceed with a tour group at around X time. In the end, they had finished filming by the time we got there so there weren’t any disruptions, but better safe than sorry.
• Plan a few indoor stops, as back-ups in case of bad weather. Check to see if you need to book timed entry tickets for these sites. (I did this with the London Mithraeum and Guildhall Art Gallery, which I used even though it didn’t rain.) If you plan to enter a small or less touristy site (e.g. a church), then consider budgeting to make a small donation as thanks for bringing your tour group in. I’d also recommend talking with the site manager beforehand about your plans so that they know to expect you.

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• SDG 4: Quality education

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