Charing Cross Road, London

Renowned for its second-hand bookshops and spell-binding antique shops which give this street its intriguing charm, it seems only natural that Charing Cross Road inspired J.K. Rowling to set the entrance to London’s magical world nowhere else but here. In the Harry Potter books, the Leaky Cauldron pub and boarding house for wizards – in which Harry lives for a brief period at the beginning of “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban” – is a gateway between the non-wizarding world and Diagon Alley, the wizarding shopping district where young Harry goes in “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” to buy all his school supplies for the upcoming year at Hogwarts.

To the non-wizard or muggle eyes it appears like a closed storefront located on Charing Cross Road in London’s West End. Harry also walked down Charing Cross Road with Hagrid, and later rode down it on the Knight Bus and in Ministry cars. There’s also a clothing shop on Charing Cross Road called “A Child of the Jago” with the uniquely dressed window displaying what looks like wizarding clothes and costumes.