Bloomsbury is an area of central London in the south of the London Borough of Camden, developed by the Russell family in the 17th and 18th centuries into a fashionable residential area. It is notable for its array of garden squares, literary connections (exemplified by the Bloomsbury Group), and numerous hospitals and academic institutions.
While Bloomsbury was not the first area of London to have acquired a formal square, Southampton Square (now named Bloomsbury Square), which was laid out by Thomas Wriothesley, 4th Earl of Southampton in 1660, was the first square to actually be named thus.
