The king and his court entourage settled for most of the year in Whitehall instead of traveling around the country. The king let the public into Hyde Park for recreation. The City of London and Westminster were still separate, but a mass of hovels was springing up in between them. The water carrier was still active and the night transport of sewage necessary. In certain areas there were houses crowded with those wanted for minor offenses, small thefts, and debt. Bailiffs did not dare venture into these areas because the inhabitants hid and defended each other unless the offense was a major one. The penalty for stealing even small sums was still death.
Inigo Jones was the first architect of consequence. He had studied in Italy and designed and built the Banqueting House at Whitehall in London in 1622. It had classical proportions and nice shaping and dressing in stone. He was now an arbiter of taste for the King Charles and his Queen and built many structures for them, including the Queen's Chapel at St. James Palace and her bedroom in the Queen's Hose in Greenwich. All over London and the country he and his pupils built many classical buildings, including houses, churches, stables, lodgings, out-buildings, staircases, galleries, watergates, and archways. They stood in stark contrast to the Tudor buildings around them. In the 1632, Jones started town planning in London with Covent Garden fruit and vegetable market with terraced houses around a central piazza surrounded by open arcades with a Tuscan church at one end. In 1634, a man from the suburb of Hackney introduced a line of coaches rented at 1s. per hour. They soon became very popular.
A large part of England was rebuilt as yeomen expanded their houses and others lower in rank replaced mud and wood hovels with brick and stone cottages. A separate kitchen appeared. The ground floors are boarded over to create bedrooms. Permanent stairs replace ladders. Glass appears in windows. Glass and crockery replace wood and pewter, Chairs replace benches. Knives and forks become common.
About 1640 began travel between towns by covered wagons called stage coaches. They carried passengers and goods and stopped at inns for stabling and repairs.
Work was begun in 1630 to make canals that would make marsh waters run to the sea. Barges on canals were the most efficient mode of transportation. A barge could carry 50 tons on a canal and only 30 tons on a river. A single horse could haul an 8-ton wagon on iron rails or on a soft road, but only 1/8 of a ton on his back.
Real wages, which had been falling, reached their low point and the gap between the poor and others widened. There were depressions from 1629-32 and from 1636 to about 1640, which called for Royal proclamations for the relief and distress, especially among the poor. The Book of Orders, for the relief of distress in earlier reigns, was to be reissued. The assize of beer and bread maintaining quality, prices, weights, and measures, was to be duly kept. Hoarding of foodstuffs was to be punished. Fish days and lent were to be observed to maintain the fishers. Abstaining from suppers on Fridays and on the eves of feasts was ordered in all taverns and commended to private families. City corporations were to give up their usual feasts and half the charge given to the poor. Foreign ships were not to be supplied with food for long voyages. The revised Book of Orders also covered the regulation of beggary, the binding of apprentices, and the general relief of the poor. All magistrates were to enforce the rules and raise special rates from all parishes, the richer of these to help the poorer.
A new trend of spring-sown crops led to better crop balance and reduced the risks of scarcity in a bad year. But the economy was still volatile.
There were riots in London in 1640-1 from a complete breakdown in political consensus, the factions being the Royalist City elite versus the middling and lesser merchants and craftsmen.
In 1631, the clock makers broke away from the control of the Blacksmiths. The gunmakers also broke away from the Blacksmiths. The tinplate workers broke away from the Ironmongers.
"Searching" for bad cloth became more difficult as the industry became more diversified. For instance, a new machine called a gig- mill did the work of many hand finishers. In 1633, Charles issued a commission for the reformation of the cloth industry with minute directions for the manufacture of cloth. But there were many disagreements over the details of manufacture and reform was difficult to enforce.