Cut a diagonal line through the middle of Hyde Park and you’ll find the Serpentine — a curving 40-acre lake that has been London’s favourite piece of borrowed countryside since 1730, when Queen Caroline had it dammed from the small Westbourne river to create a more fashionable, naturalistic shape than the rigid formal ponds of the era. Nearly three centuries later, it remains one of the most unexpectedly peaceful places in central London, a five-minute walk from some of the busiest streets in Europe.
The lake technically changes its name partway across — the western half, within Kensington Gardens, is the Long Water, while the Serpentine proper lies to the east within Hyde Park itself — but Londoners have always treated it as one continuous stretch of water, and so does everyone who comes to walk, row, or simply sit beside it.
Rowing Boats, Swimmers, and a Very British Institution
Hire a rowing boat from the boathouse on a sunny weekend and you’ll be in good company — Londoners have been messing about on the Serpentine since Victorian times, and it remains one of the few places in the city where you can properly get out on the water without leaving the centre of town. At the lake’s eastern tip, the Serpentine Lido has drawn open-water swimmers for over a century, including the famously hardy members of the Serpentine Swimming Club, who take to the water on Christmas Day regardless of the temperature.
Along the water’s edge, the lake also does quiet cultural duty: the Serpentine Galleries, on opposite sides of the park, host some of London’s most adventurous contemporary art exhibitions, and each summer a specially commissioned Pavilion rises beside the water, designed by a different leading architect every year. It is, in its way, as much a creative landmark as a scenic one.
Painting Stillness in the Middle of the City
There’s a particular kind of light on the Serpentine — soft, reflected, broken gently by rowing boats and the odd passing swan — that makes it a natural subject for watercolour. We’ve tried to capture that quiet in our own Hyde Park Serpentine Watercolor Print, painted first by hand and printed to order on archival paper — a small piece of London’s green heart for a wall at home.
Whether you’ve rowed across it yourself, braved a winter swim, or simply sat on its banks with a coffee watching the world go by, the Serpentine has a way of making the whole city feel a little further away — even though it never really is.