Mrs. M lived in the old-fashioned neighbourhood between the King's Road and the Thames called Historic Old Chelsea. In London's past the river was the main thoroughfare for traveling through the city and to the countryside of Chelsea. Henry the VIII's mansion once dominated Cheyne Walk (named for the Cheyne family whose tombs are in the Chelsea Old Church) and aristocratic ‘old families' lived here beside Tudor palaces . Historic Old Chelsea is valued today for its rich Tudor past and more recently for it's mystique as the favourite haunt of many 19c and 20c artists and writers and the bohemian set.

Mrs. M's London was an idealized, innocent and safe place of well-brought up, soft-spoken people who were generally polite and said "hello" on the street. They dined together and had cucumber sandwiches for tea. Houses were not decorated with today's identical, white, soulless ‘blank canvases,' that look like hotel rooms. Personal taste was highly appreciated and the ‘vogue.' Londoners were not flash or ostentatious, but warm, human, and altogether admirable compared to today's city dwellers. Chelsea was a vibrant place full of artists' clubs and cheap restaurants, where you rubbed shoulders with artists, writers and intellectuals.

Cheyne Walk runs for eight blocks along the River Thames between the Chelsea and Battersea bridges. Since its heyday in the 15 and 16c Cheyne Walk has been synonymous with elegant salons and the grandest and most expensive houses in London. It has always been a highly prized, "prestige" address. It is said that behind every door of these tall houses there is a story. Houses do not often change hands here. The fact that there is no nearby tube stop has protected the area somewhat from modernization by city billionaires and bonus buyers. This means it has preserved its private, backwater atmosphere, and houses have not had the expensive renovations which change their architectural character.

At the time that the river was the main highway through London in the 1500's, the grandest houses and palaces were along or near the riverside. Sir Thomas More's farm occupied 114 acres. (In 1724 Daniel Defoe described Chelsea as a "village of palaces.")
Cheyne Walk was dotted with royal palaces, mansions and gardens, riverside inns, porcelain factories, physic gardens, ateliers of artists and writers, and the homes of aristocrats and historical figures.

Mrs. M's London focuses on this neighbourhood" which is largely owned by Lord Chelsea, and extends between the King's Road and the river, and the Royal Hospital (where the Chelsea Flower Show takes place) and Lots Road, which was once the Old Chelsea Wharf.

Old Church Street is one of the oldest streets in London. At the bottom of Old Church Street on the river is the ancient Old Church, circa 1157, where Henry VIII secretly married Jane Seymour in 1543, only a few hours after Anne Boelyn was beheaded. Catherine Parr, who later became Henry VIII's sixth wife, brought Princess Elizabeth (Elizabeth I) and Lady Jane Grey to worship here. Henry VIII's barge frequently moored at the church for him to visit his Lord Chancellor, Cardinal Wolsey, in his palace and to clandestinely visit his mistress, Anne Boelyn. He also dined here regularly with Sir Thomas More at Beaufort House. Both were Henry's best friends. More's tomb is in the More Chapel in the Old Church. It was at Beaufort House that Henry met Holbein, who painted his famous portrait now in the National Portrait Gallery.

In 1543 Henry build his own castellated mansion facing the river (now nos. 27-45 Cheyne Walk), which dominated the riverside. Anne Boelyn walked these streets, disguised in her cape, hiding from the disgruntled mobs. Elizabeth I frequented these streets with her ladies-in-waiting.

In the 19^th and 20^th centuries many famous artists and writers lived here including: Whistler, Turner, Sergeant, the Greaves brothers, George Elliot, William de Morgan, Rossetti and the Pre-Raphaelites, Jacob Epstein, Alfred Munnings, Augustus John, Holman Hunt, Wilson Steer, Christopher Wood, Bram Stoker, and Sir Phillip Steere.

It was the post-war world of Evelyn Waugh, Cecil Beaton, The Mitford girls, Daphne du Marnier, Oswald Mosley, Virginia Wolf, Somerset Maugham, John Betjeman.

Writers who lived on Cheyne Walk include: Sir Thoman More, Thomas Carlyle, Jonathan Swift, Katherine Mansfield, Henry James, Elizabeth Gaskell, Oscar Wilde, Mark Twain, Bertrand Russell, the Sitwells, Sybille Bedford, Halloc Bellow. Because of its' celebrated history, this area has a romance and allure unequal to any other part of London.