The Wheatsheaf Coffee House, Fleet Street, London

The Wheatsheaf coffee house would have provided an astute social observer like Rowlandson with much subject matter. Each coffee house hosted a particular clientele, usually defined by occupation, interest or attitude, such as Tories and Whigs, traders and merchants, poets and authors and men of fashion and leisure. Known as ‘penny universities’: the price of a cup of coffee, debates on the pressing matters of the day, art and literature would take place there and many important Institutions such as the London Stock Exchange and Lloyds of London had their origins in the coffee houses of London.