Hidden places

Thor 2, Fast & Furious 6 and Guardians of the Galaxy are just a few of this year's big screen blockbusters shot in London. 

How is the capital increasingly attracting Hollywood's big bucks?

I found out for BBC News.

Dizzy heights

The "Walkie Talkie" and "Cheesegrater" are nicknames for two of the latest bizarrely-shaped tower blocks to appear on London's skyline, to mixed reaction and sometimes unexpected consequences. 

The "Boomerang" and "Scalpel" are next in the pipeline. But are these modern-day monoliths good for the capital?

Liquid sunshine

In a converted warehouse in south-west London, gentle bubbling and trickling sounds can be heard and there is a heady aroma in the air.

The smell is a spirit, currently 70% alcohol, which has just been boiled in a shimmering copper and stainless steel still. The vapour pipes through a condenser and the alcohol is dripping through a tap into a steel rolling vat.

London's first whisky distillery in more than a century has begun its debut run of production.

Unseen London

Anonymous London blogger The Gentle Author has published his London Album, a compilation of more than 600 previously unpublished photos showing a century of East End life.

Stefan Dickers discovered the slides at the Bishopsgate Institute and highlighted them to the Gentle Author.

They include images of Tower Bridge under construction in the 1890s and a funeral effigy of Charles II on display at Westminster Abbey in the 1910s. I interviewed him and produced this audio slideshow.

Venue transforms

In the 1890s it was a church, but by the 1980s it was the hedonistic Limelight nightclub, hosting the likes of Boy George and Duran Duran.

Now the former Welsh chapel, on Shaftsbury Avenue, is set to become one of the West End's most unusual performance art venues.

Find out more in my BBC News feature on the venue's transformation.

Twitter Ripper

It has been 125 years since Jack the Ripper stalked the streets of London, yet the shadow of his gory legacy still looms large.

The identity of the man who brutally murdered five - possibly more - women in the Whitechapel area of London's East End remains a mystery but the case continues to frighten and fascinate.

Now those intrigued by what life in Victorian London was like during the Autumn of Terror have a chance to experience it in a relatively modern way - through real time tweets.

Here's my BBC News exclusive on the project called @WChapelRealTime.
 

Pansy power

He has been called an installation artist, a guerrilla gardener, a photographer and even a therapist.

But Paul Harfleet prefers to describe himself as an "accidental activist".

Mr Harfleet, 37, is the green-fingered man behind the Pansy Project, where a solitary flower is planted in the nearest soil to the spot where homophobic abuse has reportedly happened.

Rising from flames

East London's Spitalfields was once dominated by the cloth trade. When Charles Dickens wrote of visiting a silk warehouse in 1851, fabric warehouses had been pervasive there for hundreds of years.

Yet by last year, only one such warehouse remained in the area - Crescent Trading.

Then on the morning of 26 September 2012, the firm - which boasted celebrity clients in Vivienne Westwood and Dame Helen Mirren - was devastated by a large fire.

Going Underground

From Gerry Rafferty's Baker Street to Suggs' Camden Town, via Duffy's Warwick Avenue, London's Tube stations have inspired many musicians.

But now one north London songwriter has used an entire Tube line as his muse.

A 16-year journey to justice

In the early hours of a January morning in 1997, Hazel Backwell was asleep in her home.

An intruder broke in, struck her over the head, tied her hands behind her back and raped her.

She then spent 15 hours incarcerated in a cupboard below the stairs before she was found by a friend who raised the alarm.

After more than 16 years, her attacker Wendell Baker has been convicted of raping her.

Welcome to plane spotting paradise

As tens of thousands of Olympics spectators arrived in the UK via Heathrow Airport, few of them would have thought they had spectators of their own.

But they did.

From a small residential road in west London, the arrivals were being watched closely, and in some cases photographed.

For this BBC News feature, I went to meet the of aviation enthusiasts of Myrtle Avenue.

Clowning around

Rubber noses, frizzy wigs and multi-coloured suits may not sound like your usual Sunday best.

But this look was very much en vogue in an east London church.

Armed with hand puppets, balloon animals and whoopie cushions, dozens of clowns descended on Holy Trinity Church in Dalston.

I went along to find out why the jokers and jesters were congregating. 

We can't work it out

When international Beatles fans plan musical pilgrimages to the UK, day tripping to an industrial part of east London is probably not what they have in mind.

But that is where some of the Fab Four's followers have been buying a ticket to ride. 

I went to find out why so many are going on a - not so magical - mystery tour.

Shoreditched?

With news that the White Cube gallery is to close its doors in Hoxton Square, is this the beginning of the end for east London's art scene?

I found out for BBC News.

Subterranean show

A former abattoir in central London, a long forgotten department store in Brighton and a disused paper factory in Moscow might not seem the most likely of theatre venues.

Yet they are just some of the locations where artistic director of dreamthinkspeak Tristan Sharps has been setting up shop over the past decade.

Sharps' venue of choice for his latest production, In The Beginning Was The End,  is central London's Somerset House.

I delved into its hidden chambers and underground vaults to find out more about the show.

Religious TV ‘putting lives at risk'

TV shows made in London that encourage viewers to believe they are cured of life-threatening illnesses by prayer have been condemned by charities.

Charities criticised episodes of the Miracle Hour show, on Faith World TV, during callers with  life-threatening illnesses are encouraged to believe they are cured.

Read my article from my exclusive BBC News investigation here.

Camden Town to Tinseltown

Blur, The Who and Elvis Presley are front-runners on a list of musicians to be honoured with Walk of Fame discs along a route in north London.

Camden Town is to be officially twinned with Tinseltown to create its very own Music Walk of Fame.

The first 30 discs will be laid down this summer, organisers said.

Here's my exclusive story.