LJ-021 · Places · London
Diagon Alley
A hidden London shopping street for wands, books, cauldrons, and school supplies, reached through a pub courtyard.
Diagon Alley is the high street of the British wizarding stories. Readers meet it as a list of errands: money changed at a bank, a wand that has opinions, robes, and a bookshop. The comedy is in the shopping list. The world-building is in the fact that a whole retail economy sits behind a brick wall.
A side passage, Knockturn Alley, sells the shadier inventory. The contrast is deliberate. One street outfits a child for term. The other implies that the same society has a black market within walking distance.
Nothing here quotes a scene. The point of the entry is the geography of a hidden commercial life.