Greenwich Park, London

Greenwich Park is a former hunting park and a Royal Park, spread across 74 hectares in south-east London. Its elevated ground gives you broad views towards the River Thames, the Isle of Dogs and the City of London. The hilltop Royal Observatory sits within the park, and the Greenwich Prime Meridian passes through its grounds.

A stainless steel strip in the Observatory courtyard marks that historic line, giving an abstract global boundary a physical form you can see. The park was enclosed in 1433, and its landscape now combines flower gardens, open grass, wooded areas, a boating lake, a pond and a wildlife habitat called The Wilderness. Its history reaches further back: Roman and Anglo-Saxon remains lie within the grounds.

The park also hosted Olympic and Paralympic equestrian events during the London 2012 Summer Olympics. Look towards the Observatory and the open slopes around it: this is a Grade I listed historic park and garden, as well as part of the Greenwich World Heritage Site. Its scale, surviving archaeology and connection to world time make Greenwich Park far more than a pleasant expanse of greenery.