London Guide
Spitalfields
Spitalfields, within sight of the sleek tower blocks of the financial sector, represents the old heart of the East End, where the French Huguenots settled in the seventeenth century, where the Jewish community was at its strongest in the late nineteenth century, and where today's Bangladeshi community eats, sleeps, works and prays. If you visit just one area in the East End, it should be this zone, which preserves mementoes from each wave of immigration.
The further east you venture, the more the damage inflicted on the area during World War II becomes apparent, and the more dispersed the sights, such as they are, become. The best time to visit the area is on a Sunday, when the markets at Petticoat Lane, Spitalfields, Brick Lane and Columbia Road are all up and running.
The Women's Library
In the 1840s, the Victorians decided it was time to do something about "the great unwashed" and a grandly-named Committee for Promoting the Establishment of Baths and Wash-Houses for the Labouring Classes was set up. One of the plushest public baths was the Goulston Square Wash Houses, opened by Prince Albert himself; "a penny for a cold bath, two for a hot bath for up to four children under eight" were typical charges of the period. The grey-brick facade of the old washhouses survives on Old Castle Street, south of Wentworth Street, but the interior has been transformed into a new home for the Women's Library, which puts on excellent exhibitions covering a wide range of social issues on the ground floor. Opening time: Mon– Fri 9.30am–5.30pm, Thurs until 8pm, Sat 10am–4pmPrice: Free 
020/7320 2222 
www.thewomenslibrary.ac.uk The actual library (Tues– Fri only) was set up by the suffragette Millicent Fawcett in 1926 and has a vast collection of books, pamphlets and periodicals on women's history; it also puts on regular talks and events, and has a café on the first floor.