Little Newport Street

Little Newport Street runs along the northern edge of Chinatown, towards Charing Cross Road. Its name goes back to Newport House, built in the 1620s, which was demolished in 1681 and replaced by a meat market. The market later fell into disrepair, and the buildings that followed gave the street much of its present form. The connected open space to the south was renamed Newport Place in 1939, having earlier been known as part of Little Newport Street.

A terrace at numbers 8 to 10 dates from about 1772 and was altered through the nineteenth century. Where Newport Court meets Newport Place there is a triangular brick building described as the sole survivor of Nicholas Barbon's early development of the area.

After the Second World War the Chinese community settled in this part of Soho, and Little Newport Street, with Gerrard Street and Lisle Street, took on the mix of import companies, food shops and restaurants that defines Chinatown. The street remains busy with that trade and connects Chinatown to the bookshops of Charing Cross Road and the theatres along Shaftesbury Avenue.