The Avenues — Westbourne, Park, Victoria, and Marlborough — were laid out in the 1870s by the developer David Garbutt as a planned middle-class suburb. The streets are broad, lined with mature trees and decorated cast-iron fountains, and the villas behind them are among the most ornate in northern England. Today the area is something of Hull's creative and academic quarter, with the University of Hull a short walk to the north.
Princes Avenue, the eastern boundary of the Avenues, is the main strip for independent cafes, bars, and restaurants — Hull's nearest equivalent to a neighbourhood high street. Walk one of the Avenues from end to end for a sense of late-Victorian aspiration, then loop back along Princes Avenue for lunch or a drink.