The New Blue Plaques of Mayfair: Herstory Reclaims the Streets

Something thrilling is happening on the polished streets of Mayfair — and no, it’s not another luxury boutique or discreet private members’ club. It’s something far rarer: recognition.

Two new blue badge plaques have appeared, and this time they’re not commemorating yet another duke, admiral, or obscure Victorian gentleman with an overgrown moustache.

No — Audrey Hepburn has arrived. So has Winifred Atwell.

Audrey, the swan-necked icon beloved across generations, who started life not as a gilded movie star but as a refugee, a wartime volunteer, a girl who simply kept going.

And Winifred Atwell? Ah, she’s the one everyone should know but too few do. A Trinidadian piano virtuoso who stormed the British charts in the 1950s when Black women were barely allowed through the door, let alone invited onto the stage. She sold more records than anyone could keep count of, played like lightning, laughed like thunder — and changed music forever.

Don’t believe me? Ask Sir Elton John, who credits Winifred Atwell as one of his earliest inspirations.

Yes. Elton. The megastar in diamanté spectacles. His first piano teacher? A Black woman from Trinidad who blew the doors off the British music scene.

Mayfair likes to present itself as an enclave of silk and subtlety — a little too refined to sweat, sing, or shout — but that’s only half the story. Peel back the polished veneer and you’ll find something far more exciting: Black jazz artists riffing in basement clubs, lesbians carving spaces where they could love and breathe, immigrant dancers, radical artists, and women who refused to stay in the shadows.

These new plaques don’t just honour individuals. They expose a lie.

London — even Mayfair — has never belonged exclusively to the rich, the male, or the pale. It has always been a mosaic of voices, accents, and fierce persistence. The problem has never been participation. It’s recognition.

Because let’s be brutally honest: only 13% of blue plaques in London commemorate women. Thirteen. Percent.

So forgive me if I don’t clap politely and say “good progress.” I’ll cheer for Hepburn and Atwell — absolutely — but I’ll also say what needs saying:

About time.

I Was Here Before the Hashtags

Long before it became trendy to “celebrate women in history,” before the marketing slogans and International Women’s Day brunches, I was out here — literally — pounding the cobbles of this city, telling stories no one asked for but everyone needed to hear.

I’ve spent the last three years

guiding people through the alleys and boulevards of London, lifting the names of women out of erasure — scientists, spies, poets, rebels, lovers, strikers, saints, sinners, and everything in between.

And do you know what still shocks me?

Not the men.

The women.

Because so often, when I say, “I’m a women’s herstory guide,” I’m met not with delight — but with a sigh. An eye roll. A subtle “Oh. One of those.”

As though speaking of women — our triumphs, our art, our influence — is an indulgence. A niche interest. A flavour of tour, rather than the backbone of human history.

But here’s the truth: women aren’t a subplot.

We built this city.

So when I see these plaques go up in Mayfair — Audrey, Winifred — I don’t just smile. I nod. I whisper to myself:

They’re catching up.

Blue plaques are not just markers of history. They’re permission slips for belonging. They signal who “counts” in the narrative.

And finally — finally — Mayfair is beginning to tell the truth.

Shall we make them put up a few more?