Place Name
A tenuous link to the eponymous Italian island, it is said to be paved with Sicilian marble. Its biggest claim to fame however is as the first purpose-built pedestrian cut-through in London. It was built by architects Robert Worley and Charles Worley, of the Worley & Saunders practice between 1906 – 1910 using Italian marble, colonnades and turrets throughout. Not a lot is known about them, and there seems to be some dispute over whether they were brothers. The avenue’s purpose was to connect the newly-widened Southampton Row to Bloomsbury Way.
