About Kings Road Kings Road, London Middlesex England

King's Road or Kings Road, known popularly as The King's Road or The KR, is a major, well-known street in Chelsea, west London, England. It is traditionally associated with 1960s style, and fashion figures such as Mary Quant and Vivienne Westwood.

King's Road runs for just under 2 miles (3.2 km) through Chelsea, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, from Sloane Square in the east (on the border with Belgravia and Knightsbridge) and through the Moore Park estate on the border of Chelsea and Fulham opposite Stamford Bridge. Shortly after crossing Stanley bridge the road passes a slight kink at the junction with Waterford Road in Fulham, where it then becomes New King's Road, continuing to Putney Bridge; its western end is in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham.

King's Road derives its name from its function as a private road used by Charles II to travel to Kew. It remained a private royal road until 1830, but people with connections were able to use it. Some houses date from the early 18th century. Thomas Arne lived at No. 215 and is believed to have composed "Rule Britannia" there. Ellen Terry lived in the same house from 1904–1920, and is commemorated by a blue plaque. Photographer Christina Broom was born in 1862 at No 8.

In 1876, the world's first artificial ice rink, the Glaciarium, opened just off King's Road, and later that year it relocated to a building on the street.

King's Road was home in the 1960s to the Chelsea Drugstore (originally a chemist, a pharmacy, with a stylised chrome-and-neon soda fountain upstairs, later a public house; more recently the site became a McDonalds) and in the 1970s to Malcolm McLaren's boutique, Let It Rock, which was renamed SEX in 1974 and then Seditionaries in 1977. During the hippie and punk eras, it was a centre for counterculture, but is now gentrified. It is Chelsea's high street and one of the most fashionable shopping streets in London. It has been criticised for losing its character and just having high street chains. Celebrated boutiques were Granny Takes a Trip and Malcolm McLaren's shop SEX (later Seditionaries).Another facinating facet of the road is the period 68 to mid seventies when the place really hummed re the fashion stores that dominated that period .The squire Shop ,The Village Gate Thackerays and Cassidy all had a huge influence in that period .Jeffrey Kwintner owned a number of these stores and dominated the road for years along with Lord John and Take 6.Another store that should not be forgotten was "Just men" they really started the mass fashion market before they closed.The Kings rd really got its reputation from Mary Quant who had a shop there before it was sold to the Markham Pharmacy.Also the eating places like the Chelsea kitchen and The piccaso cafe were great places to be in in those days.Although almost all the books that are out there about the street only mention Malcom Mc Claren Vivian Westwood etc they turned up very late in the era.It was a very exciting place to be in the early seventies.

484 King's Road was headquarters of Swan Song Records, owned by Led Zeppelin. They left following closure of the company in 1983. King's Road was site of the first UK branch of Starbucks which opened in 1999. It inspired the formation of King's Road Cricket and Social Club - or KRCSC - in 2007.

"King's Road" is the title of a song by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers from the 1981 album Hard Promises and Ian Fleming's James Bond lived in a trendy unnamed square just off King's Road.