Gateway to the Mall—no, not an indoor shopping center but one of the very grand avenues of London—this is one of the city's stateliest set pieces. On the southwest corner of Trafalgar Square, the arch, which was named after the adjacent Royal Navy headquarters, was designed in 1908-11 by Sir Aston Webb as a two-part memorial to Queen Victoria, along the ceremonial route to Buckingham Palace; the second part is the Victoria Memorial just outside the palace. Passing under one of its five arches—two for pedestrians, two for traffic, and a central arch, opened only for state occasions—the environment changes along with the color of the road, as you leave frenetic Trafalgar Square and go into the Mall (rhymes with the American pronunciation of shall)—the tree-lined boulevard that leads directly to the palace.
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