Seven Dials Covent Garden is a unique quarter of London whose star-shaped layout remains as constructed in the early 1690s. It was brought back to life largely through the dedication of the Seven Dials Trust, working in partnership with the local authorities and landowners for nearly forty years.

Born in the Black Horse Inn on Long Acre, Thomas Stothard RA was one of the foremost history painters of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. He is also remembered as the most prolific book illustrator of the time. 

Seven Dials' most famous and successful chapbook and broadsheet seller, James 'Jemmy' Catnach founded his business in the now disappeared Monmouth Court in 1813. He paid writers, usually anonymous, a shilling for words, which were then normally set to a well-known tune and vividly illustrated. The cheap, lively publications were sold on the streets by 'patterers'.

A central figure of the Arts and Crafts Movement, Robert Anning Bell was born in a house on this site in 1863. The son of a cheesemonger, he became Master of the Artworkers' Guild and a Royal Academician.

Founder of the enduring inprint of Mills and Boon, Charles Boon was born near this site, above Combes Brewery and lived in the family home in this street. A champion of women authors, Boon shaped a popular genre and a marketing style which still flourishes.

The long-lasting lodging house called Tom Farmer's was better known as 'The Kip'. Here, until the end of the 19th century, residents slept 'on the rope' (sitting down leaning on a rope which was untied at dawn). 

Aldridge's Horse Bazaar or Repository for Horses and Carriages, as the premises were also called, was a famous horse mart. During the mid C19 there were accusations of insider dealing. The proprietor advertised auctions with the caveat that “under no circumstances is the practice of misrepresenting the ownership of horses ever resorted to”. Several cases of horse stealing in Old Bailey records. Described in 1895 as “specially famous for the sale of middleclass and tradesmen's horses”. The last horse sale was in 1926, by when there were many greyhound sales, and motor cars had been sold from 1907. The firm left in 1940 and the extensive buildings were demolished in the late 1950s. The site is now occupied by Orion HOuse and Meridian House. 

John Logie Baird carried out the first experimental transmissions of true Television on this site in autumn 1926 – three years before his work with the BBC. Here he also demonstrated noctovision and phonovision,…

The 19th century artist Nathaniel Westlake specialised in stained glass and was a leading designer of the Gothic Revival movement. 

Dudley Court on Endell Street and Short's Gardens covers the site of the St Giles parish workhouse 'baleful institution', into which were crammed over 900 paupers.

Brian Epstein (1934–1967), the legendary pop impresario and manager, dubbed the 'fifth Beatle' by John Lennon, worked with the defining acts of a movement that came to be known as The Mersey Sound. Among the artists managed by Brian Epstein were Gerry and the Pacemakers, Cilla Black and, of course, The Beatles.

Melodisc Records was established by Emil Edward Shalit (24 December 1909 – 23 April 1983) in London from the USA in 1949 as one of the first, and at the time, the largest independent record label. The label, and then its subsidiaries ‘Blue Beat’ and ‘Fab Records’ introduced Afro-Caribbean music to the UK and thus played a key role in the development of popular music.