The four benefactors
Statues of Simon de Montfort, Wyggeston, White and Newton guard the four corners: the earl granted the town its privileges, the other three left it schools and charities.
Tell anyone from Leicester «meet you at the Clock Tower» and no further directions are needed. This 24-metre Gothic spire has been the city's agreed rendezvous since 1868, when it went up on the site of the old hay market after a design competition that drew 105 entries; local architect Joseph Goddard won it. The result is a rather fine thing: a Mountsorrel granite base, a Ketton stone shaft, polished Peterhead granite colonnettes, and at the four corners Portland stone statues of four men who did the city good: Simon de Montfort, the thirteenth-century Earl of Leicester, and three later benefactors, William Wyggeston, Thomas White and Gabriel Newton, whose schools and charities partly survive to this day. The spot matters more than the tower. Five streets converge here at the top of the pedestrianised shopping streets: Gallowtree Gate running south towards the railway station, plus Church Gate, Humberstone Gate, Haymarket and Eastgates. Highcross shopping centre is two minutes west, Leicester's covered market is round the corner to the south, and Haymarket bus station is a two-minute walk to the north-east. In 1926 the tower became the hub of one of Britain's first traffic roundabouts, with buses grinding past; the square was repaved for pedestrians in 2008, leaving traffic only on its northern side, and in 2010 the clock mechanism was overhauled for the first time in roughly seventy years. Be honest with yourself about what this is: not a destination but a landmark. You cannot climb it, there is no museum around it and no lengthy interpretation, and five minutes is enough to circle it, read the four names and take a photo. Its real value is as the compass of central Leicester: stand here and you know where the market, the malls, the cathedral and the King Richard III Visitor Centre (a seven-minute walk) all lie. From the railway station it is about ten minutes on foot along Granby Street. For families it could not be easier: level paving, no steps, pushchairs roll straight through, cafes and restaurants in every direction, and in Leicester you will not search long for halal food. It looks best at dusk when the shopfronts light up around it, and in December when the surrounding streets fill with Christmas market crowds. On a wet winter evening it is less enchanting, but you will pass it anyway on the way to anything else in the centre.
Statues of Simon de Montfort, Wyggeston, White and Newton guard the four corners: the earl granted the town its privileges, the other three left it schools and charities.
Five streets fan out from here towards the malls, the market, the cathedral and the railway station, so start your walk at it.
Joseph Goddard's design won against 104 rivals, in Mountsorrel granite, Ketton stone and polished Peterhead colonnettes.
Junction of Gallowtree Gate and Humberstone Gate, Leicester city centre
Just pass by; nobody comes to Leicester for it. Use it as the starting point of a loop that takes in the King Richard III Visitor Centre and the cathedral seven minutes away, then Leicester Market and Highcross for shopping and food.
No; it is a solid memorial with no staircase or viewing platform, and what you see from the street is all there is.