Bloomsbury is a fascinating part of London to work in, for all sorts of reasons.

One is because of the history of the area. Among other things, there are still quite a few Georgian properties, including whole terraces as well as individual dwellings. One feature common to many of these houses is the unusually wide front doors, relative to what you find on a more modern house. Not that you can really tell that from this photo, but take my word for it.

A modern front door in the UK would be 2’9” wide (838mm), but I reckon these must be between 3’6” and 4’ (up to 1200mm). [UPDATE: I measured one on my way into work this morning and it was 3’ 5”]

It makes me wonder - were Georgian gentleman all fat?

Or perhaps it was a status symbol. The wider the door, the more important the owner?

Or maybe someone just decided what seemed right and everyone else followed suit? In those days they didn’t care about standardised measurements and efficient mass production. Everything would have been hand-made.

And well-made.

Which is a good thing, as I dread to think what it would cost to replace one of these wide boys today!