Backstage Behaviour in the Global City: Tourists and the Search for the ‘Real London’

Abstract

Tourism is increasingly important to city economies and the built environment is crucial to the tourist experience of cities. Accounts in the literature tend to focus on cities responding with planned development of iconic buildings and tourism precincts. Evidence from London and other world tourism cities shows that in many cases tourists want to explore the city beyond tourism precincts, and strive to get off the beaten track to discover the 'real city'. The architecture and built environment that is important to them is not iconic, monumental and planned, but the ordinary and everyday fabric of the city.