Rosie Hewitson

It’s the height of the Great British Summer, we’re in the midst of a third heatwave already this summer, and what with all those late World Cup kick-offs, we wouldn’t be surprised if you’re feeling pretty knackered after a week of extremely late bedtimes and restless, sweaty nights. The thing is, you’re gonna have to suck it up and push through the sleep deprivation, because there’s simply too much unmissable stuff going on over the second weekend of July. For starters, it’s a huge week for summer sport, with Wimbledon wrapping up over the weekend and the quarter-finals of the World Cup beginning. England face Norway on Saturday night, and if you’re still not sure where you’re gonna watch, we’ve rounded up all the best watch parties in the city, if you want to soak up the atmosphere.  It’s also another big weekend for open-air gigs, with Pitbull and Lewis Capaldi playing over the final weekend of BST Hyde Park, Rudimental and Groove Armada playing at Ally Pally’s Kaleidoscope Festival, and free festival Power and Respect on the East Bank.  And with another scorcher on the horizon this weekend, it’s perfect whether to check out some open-air cinema and theatre, or to plan another picnic or pub garden sesh. Start planning: here’s our roundup of the best things to do in July.  In the loop: sign up to our free Time Out London newsletter for the best of the city, straight to your inbox.

It might be tempting to spend August lost in fantasies about escaping on a luxury holiday with no sweaty commutes, overcrowded beer-gardens or un-air-conditioned restaurants to contend with. But London’s hottest, stickiest month can also be pretty damn lovely if you know how to do it right.  August has got a festival feel, and the biggest party on its line-up is Notting Hill Carnival – which takes over the streets of west London for the bank holiday weekend. When you’re not having a riotous time dancing to tinnitus-inducing dance hall with a pocket full of Red Stripe, there are plenty of other ways to get your fill of live music this month. All Points East and Body Movements are among the many festivals pitching their tents and blasting music across various parks in London. It wouldn’t be summer in London without outdoor theatres like Shakespeare’s Globe or Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre, which serve up spellbinding performances that’ll bring magic to the long summer evenings. Or keep your cool with some of this city’s more chill ways to spend an afternoon, like lido swims, lazy days in the park, outdoor-cinema sessions and all the other alfresco pleasures that summer in London has to offer, before September puts an autumnal chill in the air.

Outdoor cinema season is up and running in the capital. There’s a summer of moonlit movies ahead in an array of scenic park, rooftop and riverside spots and the projectors will soon start whirring at Rooftop Cinema Club, Adventure Cinema and many others. On the slate for 2026 are the usual mix of crowdpleasers, cult classics and recent blockbuster hits. But expect some exciting new additions from the past 12 months, too, including F1, Zootropolis 2, to Back to the Future, Jurassic Park, La La Land and all the old favourites. Are there any free outdoor cinemas in London this summer? Yes, Everyman on the Canal, Vauxhall Summer Screens, Devonshire Square’s Cinema Under the Stars, Waterloo’s Lower Marsh Lates and Canary Wharf Summer Screens are all open to all-comers, free of charge. Can I bring my own food and alcohol? As a rule of thumb, if it’s a free screening you’ll be able to bring food and beverages, including the alcoholic kind, but it’s always best to check ahead. The websites listed below will provide the do’s and don’ts for any planned picnics. Recommended: 📽️ The 100 greatest cinemas in the world right now🎞️ The 25 best cinemas in London💰 London’s best cheap cinemas

In this city, you’re never too far away from a picturesque park, a lovely pub or a cracking cinema, and on any given day, you’ve got a wealth of world-class art shows, blockbuster theatre and top museum exhibitions to choose from if you’re twiddling your thumbs. Use your spare time wisely with our roundup of the best things happening in London today, which gets updated every single day and includes a specially selected top pick from our Things to Do Editor seven days a week. Bookmark this page, and you’ll have absolutely no excuse to be bored in London ever again! Find even more inspiration with our curated round-ups of the best things to do in London this week and weekend

Summer is here, and so is another hotly anticipated FIFA World Cup, bringing with it more thrills, spills, soaring highs and beer-soaked disappointments than 15 Wimbledons combined. With its five goals, two penalties, one red card and several thousand headed Dan Burn headed clearances, a lot of people are calling the Three Lions’ victory against Mexico in the early hours of Monday morning England’s greatest game since 1966. And that was far from the end fo the drama this week. Belgium put four past the USA, Egypt went two up against Argentina before the holders launched one of the greatest ever World Cup comebacks, and Switzerland vs Columbia went to penalties. Hopefully you’ve just about managed to catch up on your sleep, because now it’s time for the business end of the tournament. The four quarter finals take place across the latter half of the week, including England’s Saturday night fixture against Norway.  Practically every pub and bar in London will be getting in on the action and vying for your attendance during the World Cup’s biggest games. However, we’ve whittled it down to the places that offer the best atmosphere and the best view of the screen, wherever you station yourself.  RECOMMENDED: The best football pubs in London. When is the next England World Cup match? After triumphing over hosts Mexico in extremely difficult circumstances, England head to Miami to play Norway this Saturday July 11, kicking off at 10pm BST. The Vikings might be participating in thei

When it comes to art and exhibitions, London has it all. From the niche spaces, to the avant garde galleries, and the massive crowd-pleasing museums, our city is packed with shows that will perplex, challenge, inspire, educate and leave you feeling awestruck.  The problem is... there’s absolutely tons to see. Too much, you could say. Lucky for you, Time Out exists. For decades, our experts have been visiting and reviewing all the sculpture, painting, performance, photography, history, fashion and other types of exhibitions on offer. You name it, we’ve (probably, most likely) seen it. If you’re wondering what’s actually worth your time, start here. Check out the best museum exhibitions and art in London right now, and be sure to come back weekly for the latest picks. Stay in the loop: sign up to our free Time Out London newsletter for the best of the city, straight to your inbox. RECOMMENDED: Best photography exhibitions in LondonBest free exhibitions in London

Want a drink? You've come to the right place. This is Time Out’s list of best bars in London, our curated guide to London’s drinking scene, featuring the buzziest bars in the capital right now. These are the 50 places we'd recommend to a friend, because we love drinking in them and have done many, many times over. From classy cocktail counters to delightful dives, sleek hotel bars, rooftop bars, liquor lounges and places to quaff wine, London's got them all. But what makes a truly good bar? Our critieria for inclusion on this list is simple; a menu of genius drinks is important, but so is overall vibe – there’s no point having the perfect paloma if you have to drink it in a bar that smells of bin juice. To make our Top 50, a bar has to be fun, friendly, and inclusive, as well as looking (and tasting) the part.  The best bars in London at a glance: 🍸 Best hotel bar: Scarfes Bar, Holborn 🍷 Best wine bar: Godet, Islington 🍻 Best dive bar: Blondies, Clapton 🎶 Best listening bar: Jumbi, Peckham July 2025: Congrats to the newly-opened bars that have made the immediate jump into our hallowed Top 50, such as Ellie's – a lowkey Dalston cocktail bar recently anointed by Charli XCX, who chose it for the site of her wedding afterparty, House Party, a rowdy Soho bar co-founded by Stormzy, and wine pub Godet. They sit alongside some proper London classics which have returned to this list due to their outstanding excellence and unerring commitment to getting us tipsy in style, like th

It’s the height of the Great British Summer, and we wouldn’t be surprised if you’re feeling a little groggy this week. Not only are we in the midst of the third heatwave of the summer, and yet more sweaty, sleepless nights, but many of us stayed up until 4am to catch England’s Round of 16 clash with Mexico. But you’re going to need to suck it up and push through the sleep deprivation, because there’s simply too much unmissable stuff going on over the second week of July. For starters, it’s a huge week for summer sport, with Wimbledon wrapping up over the weekend and the quarter finals of the Word Cup beginning. England face Norway on Saturday night, and if you’re still not sure where you’re gonna watch, we’ve rounded up all the best watch parties in the city, if you want to soak up the atmosphere.  It’s also another big weekend for open-air gigs, with Pitbull and Lewis Capaldi playing over the final weekend of BST Hyde Park, Kaleidoscope Festival taking place at Ally Pally and K-pop superstars BTS doing a huge two nights in Tottenham.  And with another scorcher on the horizon this weekend, it’s perfect whether to check out some open-air cinema and theatre, or to plan another picnic or pub garden sesh. Start planning: here’s our roundup of the best things to do in July In the loop: sign up to our free Time Out London newsletter for the best of the city, straight to your inbox.

From striking documentary works from a time bygone to glitzy, high fashion editorial shoots and everything in between, London is an excellent city to explore if you’re a photography lover. There are new exhibitions popping up pretty much all of the time, allowing you to lose yourself through the camera lens.  In this list below, we’ve put together all of the best photography exhibitions out there in the city right now. We’ve been there, done that, checked them out in the flesh, and can guarantee that every exhibition on this list is worth going to.  RECOMMENDED: Top 10 art exhibitions in London12 London art exhibitions we can’t wait to see in 20268 great photography exhibitions coming to London in 2026

For Londoners, September is a month where you can get the best of both worlds. You've still got the balmy weather, light evenings and relaxed vibe of summer in the city, even if the calendar warns that cooler weather's on the way. So that makes it a perfect time to get your fill of relaxation in rooftop bars and alfresco restaurants, or lolling about in the city’s best urban beaches, parks and lidos. But if you fancy a little more excitement, you'll also find that the city's cultural life is coming out of its annual hibernation and getting ready for autumn's influx of big openings.  You'll find landmark museum exhibitions, new theatre and art shows and brand new food and drink spots as London kicks back into gear. There’s also a whole host of city-wide fests taking over the capital, including Open House London – giving us a chance to get a sneak peek inside usually private buildings – London Design Festival and Totally Thames – the brilliant celebration of London’s watery main artery. In short, there's absolutely no excuse to stay indoors this September. So don't shed a tear for the end of summer: just get out your diary and get planning. Stay in the loop: sign up to our free Time Out London newsletter for the best of the city, straight to your inbox.

As much as we love clinging to the last traces of summer, October signals a change of pace. Beer gardens empty out, big coats get fished out of wardrobes, and we all start to remember the joys of the great indoors. London's cultural institutions come alive, with line-ups designed to lure us within their walls: there's a host of big theatre productions, major film releases and cultural highlights throughout the month. The BFI London Film Festival returns, as does the London Literature Festival and the Bloomsbury Festival. On the art scene, there’s a wealth of new exhibitions not to be missed, plus Frieze’s annual London art fair, uniting some of the world’s best art galleries in one place. It’s also Black History Month in the UK, and you can expect many of London’s major institutions to throw events to mark the occasion. It’s also the time of year for a hell of a party, with Halloween bringing with it all kinds of spooky celebrations – from family-friendly frights, movie screenings, pumpkin picking and scary nightlife so good it could raise the dead taking over the capital this month. The month also calls for big steins and inventive mixes. Oktoberfest celebrations will take over the capital at the start of the month, while London Cocktail Week is also on the cards.  And there’s plenty more too! Check out our list of the best cultural happenings and things to do throughout October 2026.   RECOMMENDED:📆 The definitive London events calendar

Museums are one of the things that London does best. This city boasts grand institutions housing ancient treasures, modern monoliths packed with intriguing exhibits, and tiny rooms containing deeply niche collections – and lots of them are totally free to anyone who wants to come in and take a gander. And with more than 170 London museums to choose from, there's bound to be one to pique your interest, whatever you're in to.  Want to explore the history of TfL? We’ve got a museum for that. Rather learn about advertising? We’ve got a museum for that too. History? Check. Science? Check. 1940s cinema memorabilia, grotesque eighteenth-century surgical instruments, or perhaps a wall of 4,000 mouse skeletons? Check, check and check! Being the cultured metropolitans that we are, Time Out’s editors love nothing more than a wholesome afternoon spent gawping at Churchill’s baby rattle or some ancient Egyptian percussion instruments. In my case, the opportunity to live on the doorstep of some of the planet’s most iconic cultural institutions was a big reason why I moved here at the first chance I got, and I’ve racked up countless hours traipsing around display cases and deciphering needlessly verbose wall texts in the eleven years since. From iconic collections, brilliant curation and cutting-edge tech right down to nice loos, adequate signage and a decent place to grab a cuppa; my colleagues and I know exactly what we want from a museum, and we’ve put in a whole lot of time deliberating

The New York Times bestselling essayist, BBC Radio broadcaster and all round funny guy David Sedaris stops by the Southbank Centre for two evenings this July to celebrate his latest book, The Land and Its People, a curmudgeonly collection of 28 short essays considering the absurdity of modern life, from family, ageing and travel to the pandemic and politival landscape. Expect to hear some new and unpublished stories, and stick around for a book signing afterwards. 

You need only look at the shelves piled high with unibrowed fridge magnets, tea towels, plant-pots and earrings in the average museum gift shop to know that Frida Kahlo is one of the 20th century’s greatest icons.  Featuring over 130 works alongside documents, photographs and memorabilia taken from Kahlo’s archives, Tate Modern’s blockbuster summer exhibition will explore how the Mexican painter became the kind of cultural phenomenon whose likeness adorns everything from novelty socks to limited-edition eyeshadow pallets. The first major London exhibition on the feminist icon since the V&A’s fashion-focused 2018 show Making Her Self Up, it will include some of her most iconic paintings, as well as the work of more than 80 fellow artists, from her contemporaries to the later generations she inspired.  All in all, it promises to be a fascinating exploration of the transformative role of women artists in the 20th century, as well as notions of fandom and the diverse communities who claim Frida as their own. Read our review here. 

What is it?  One of the capital’s more under-the-radar royal residences, Kew Palace is tucked away inside Kew’s world-famous Royal Botanical Gardens. A pretty, red-brick villa built as a riverside country residence for a Flemish merchant in 1631, the house had a succession of tenants before George II’s wife Caroline decided to purchase it as a home for the couple’s three eldest daughters when the royal family was in residence at the nearby Richmond Lodge.  It was George II’s son, Prince Frederick, and later Frederick’s widow, Augusta, who began cultivating the gardens that would eventually become one of London’s four World Heritage Sites, but Kew Palace truly came into its own during the reign of their son, who grew up at Kew and made it a home for his own family. A keen astronomer, George III had an observatory installed while his wife Queen Charlotte added to the gardens with a rustic-style cottage which the family used as a picnic retreat.  Why go?  With entry to Kew Palace included in admission to the Royal Botanical Gardens, it’s well worth a visit for a rare glimpse into family life among kings, queens, princes and princesses.  Visitors can see the fashionable Georgian decor of the Princesses’ rooms, George III’s library, and the vast Royal Kitchens once staffed by thirty cooks and virtually untouched since they fell out of use in the early 19th century.  Also on display are a series of artefacts telling the fascinating and often tragic story of George III’s life, inclu

Tate Modern’s (more-or-less) monthly Friday Lates series continues this month with an evening curated by this year’s Infinities Commission recipient, Zimbabwean choreographer, film-maker and installation artist Nora Chipaumire.  Centred around ‘gadzi’, Chipaumire’s monumental commission in the East Tank the evening, and will feature the first of three one-hour performances staged by the artist throughout this weekend.Starting in the installation and progressing through the Tanks Lobby and into the Turbine Hall, the performance incorporates the installation’s impressive sound system, plus live musicians and a troupe of thirteen dancers.  Aftet the performance, there’ll be plenty more music throughout the galleries, with sets from Rhythm Section’s Bradley Zero in the Turbine Hall, and Future Nostalgia’s Atiyyah Khan in the Corner Bar.  Visitors can also take part in a communal textile-making workshop, watch a selection of Chipaumire’s previous film work in the Starr Cinema, and join Tate curators for LGBTIA+ tours and ten-minute talks throughout the galleries. 

If you’ve recently found yourself on the Piccadilly Line during evening rush hour, you may have noticed fellow passengers sporting feather boas, bowler hats and other attempts at Belle Époque attire. They’re on the way to the latest immersive dining experience from The Lost Estate, creators of popular festive show The Great Christmas Feast.  The immersive specialists’ new production is set in 1890s Paris, specifically Le Chat Noir, the legendary Montmartre nightclub that birthed cabaret as we understand it. Stepping into a nondescript warehouse round the corner from West Kensington tube station, guests find themselves transported to a sumptuous, low-lit cabaret bar.  A lot of care has been taken over the design, which is replete with Art Nouveau touches, from Théophile-Alexandre Steinlen’s iconic feline prints adorning the walls and swirly Paris Métro-esque patterns decorating the banquette seating. The attention to detail extends all the way to the authentic 1890s adverts in the programme. There’s a lot more to like about Chat Noir! The show is based around the nightclub’s grand reopening following refurbishments that made it one of the first venues in Paris to boast electric lighting. The plot is well-researched, deftly bringing together a diverse range of Belle Époque references and characters. There’s music from the club’s sometime resident pianist, the composer Erik Satie and regular visitor Claude Debussy. Performers include celebrated illusionist Joseph Bautier, 1890s

Another London summer beckons: clouds clearing, days lengthening, an imaginative structure being erected in Kensington Gardens. Mexican architecture firm LANZA atelier has been chosen to design this 2026 Serpentine Pavilion, which features a ‘crinkle-crankle’ wall. Traditional structures seen in English architecture from the 18th century, these wavy partitions temper climate, create shelter, and are ideal for growing fruit. And fittingly, they’re also known as serpentine walls.  The prestigious architectural commission celebrates its 25th anniversary in 2026, with a landmark series of talks programmed in collaboration with the Zaha Hadid Foundation, the charitable organisation founded by the late Iraqi-British architect, who designed the inaugural Pavilion 25 years ago. The programme kicks off with an Architects’ Talk hosted by Hans Ulrich Obrist, with a series of Family Days featuring hands-on workshops, creative activities and performances for all ages scheduled throughout the summer. Check out the Serpentine’s website for further details in due course.   

A longstanding Soho tradition – going back more than half a century – this annual neighbourhood knees-up is organised by volunteers from the Soho Society, and sees the garden of Soho’s St Anne’s Church bursting with live music and entertainment.  The main draw of the day is the Soho Waiters’ Race. A tradition dating back to 1955, it starts at 3.15pm outside the French House, and sees a gaggle of waiters pelt through the streets of Soho, each holding a tray stacked with a bottle of champers, a glass and a napkin, all of which must be intact when they cross the finish line Another crowd favourite is the Soho Dog Show, which awards eight different prizes including ‘Dog who looks most like their owner’.  Alongside this, visitors can expect six hours of entertainment including live music, snail racing, a spaghetti-eating contest, a tug-of-war, a human fruit machine, foodie stalls, and The French House Bar. Best of all? It’s absolutely free to attend, although the gardens have a maximum capacity of 500, so turn up nice and early or be prepared to queue.

Here’s a fun bank holiday activity for fans of fancy homewares and even fancier wine. For the first time in its 13 years, Isaac McHale’s two Michelin-starred restaurant The Clove Club is hosting an archive sale. For one afternoon only, the restaurant in Shoreditch Town Hall will offer visitors a peek behind the scenes as they browse ceramics, glassware and other kitchen and pantry items accumulated by the restaurant over more than a decade of service. As well as bespoke and hand-crafted pieces from covetable local craftspeople like Owen Hall and Rebecca Proctor, oenophiles will be able to take home some very special bottles of wine from the restaurant’s cellar, spanning rare and older vintages, long-held cellar favourites and producers that have shaped the restaurant’s stellar wine programme over the years. Visitors will be able to purchase pots of ice cream, pre-batched cocktails and glasses of Champagne to enjoy while browsing, with other pantry staples including homemade truffle purée, hot sauce, devilled spice powder and elderflower vinegar will also be on offer. Crockery items will start from £10, while wine bottles range from £75 to £500, and visitors are can pop in any time from 11am to 3pm. Happy browsing!

Wimbledon Art Studios is throwing open its doors for this annual fair, which is a golden opportunity to get your hands on affordable works from more than 180 artists and makers while meeting the painters, photographers, sculptors and sensitive types behind them. There’s also a children's art trail, and an in-house cafe for picking up snacks on your arty adventure.

What is it? An official royal residence since 1689, Kensington Palace is one of five regal London properties managed by Historic Royal Palaces. It’s been lived in by everyone from Queen Victoria, to Princess Diana and most recently Wills and Kate.  It began as a reasonably modest, two-story suburban villa built by Sir George Coppin during the reign of King James I, a time when Kensington was a quiet village on the outskirts of London. Initially the home of a wealthy businessman, it was purchased by the first Earl of Nottingham before being acquired by William III and Mary II, who planned to use it as a countryside retreat with easy access to Parliament.  The royal couple engaged Sir Christopher Wren to renovate Nottingham House, adding north and south wings, three-storey pavilions at each corner, and manicured Dutch-style gardens before moving in on Christmas Eve 1689. Kensington Palace has since been home to Queen Anne, George I, George II and Queen Victoria, and countless minor royals. More recently it has become a London base for the younger generation of royals; the Prince and Princess of Wales currently reside in apartments at the Palace, while the Duke and Duchess of Sussex made their first home in a cottage on its grounds.  It might not be as large as Hampton Court or the notorious Tower, but the (comparatively) modest Jacobean architecture and impeccably groomed grounds are absolutely stunning and well worth a poke around—something visitors have been able to do since

Cult British synth-pop band Bronski Beat’s masterful debut album ‘The Age of Consent’ is performed by a roster of briliant contemporary artists in this truly special tribute gig. Originally conceived to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the 1984 album – a seminal piece of queer pop culture that has served as an anthem for LGBTQ+ liberation ever since – this one-off performance has been produced by south London based queer record label The Chateau, and features a powerhouse line-up of cult acts, from post-punk icon Beth Ditto and legendary performance artist David Hoyle to contemporary queer singers including Tom Rasmussen and Planningtorock, performing alongside queer house band The Chateau Collective and Europe’s longest-running LGBTQ+ choir, The Pink Singers. Expect inspiring, emotionally-charged renditions of 'Why?’, 'It Ain’t Necessarily So’ and the iconic hit single ‘Smalltown Boy’ that’ll have you jumping out of your seat. 

With its 31st edition taking place this summer, the Southbank Centre’s Meltdown Festival has long since established itself as a key date in London’s cultural calendar. Each year, the Southbank invites one celebrated artist to curate the festival, with such luminaries as David Bowie, Yoko Ono, Grace Jones, David Byrne, Chaka Khan and Little Simz having previously taken on the exciting task. Taking place in the middle of the iconic London institution’s 75th birthday celebrations, we expect this summer’s edition of Meltdown to elicit one of the most exciteable reactions to date, seeing as it’s being masterminded by none other than former One Direction member, multiple BRIT and Grammy Award-winner and all-round pop superstar Harry Styles. The ‘Watermelon Sugar’ singer has drawn on his eclectic musical influences to curate a line-up traversing pop, soul, rock and electronica. There’s plenty of emerging British talent featured, including London-based singer-songwriter Nilüfer Yanya, jazz drummer Yusuf Dayes, folk artist Stephen Fretwell and post-punk duo Getdown Services.   They appear alongside veteran performers like Dev Hynes (aka Blood Orange), Beverly Glenn-Copeland, LCD Soundsystem frontman James Murphy and African jazz icon Mulatu Astatke.  And as is usually the case for curators of the festival, Styles will also be gracing one of the Southbank Centre’s stages himself for an intimate headline gig. No doubt competition for tickets will be fiercer than ever before, so stay

Hot on the heels of the Chelsea Flower Show, the first week of June sees the arrival of the second biggest event in the calendar for London’s flower fanatics.  London Open Gardens is back this weekend, offering dedicated horticulturists, amateur botanists and other admirers of a colourful wall trellis or an artfully deployed water feature the chance to have a peek at whole bunch of fabulous gardens across the city, the vast majority of which are not usually open to the public.  A £26 weekend ticket grants visitors access to over 120 venues around London, from floating oases and rooftop hideaways to sculpture gardens and historic plots. But there’s only so much time to snoop around, so before you go trekking round the capital in search of blooms, have a look at our roundup of eight brilliant gardens that are definitely worth taking a look at.  The 8 best gardens to visit during London Open Gardens 2026 The Sanctuary Garden at Freedom from Torture, Islington The Sanctuary Garden earned a silver medal at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2024. After that, it was relocated to Freedom from Torture’s London Therapy Centre in Finsbury Park and for most of the year, it functions as a place where survivors of torture can find calm and partake in horticultural therapy. Willow structures curve and sweep around the space, and plants like figs, nigella seeds, chickpeas, pomegranate and a strawberry tree have been installed to evoke happier memories of home. For Open Gardens, experts will be on

The 2025/26 football season has almost come to a close, but while most football fans are turning their thoughts towards this summer’s World Cup, Arsenal fans are gearing up for a huge weekend for their club. After winning their first league title in 22 years last week – which fans will get to celebrate at a huge trophy parade around north London this Sunday – Mikel Arteta’s team will be attempting to clinch a second major piece of silverware as they face Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League Final on Saturday night in Budapest’s Puskás Aréna. Many Gooners will be flying to Hungary for the occasion, with a further 60,000 watching live at the Emirates Stadium. Not got a ticket for either, but still keen to catch the nail-biting action somewhere with a bit more atmosphere than your living room? Local fans will be also be heading to the boozers and beer gardens of north London to watch Ødegaard, Rice and Eze battling it out against Dembélé and co. So if you fancy joining them, look no further than our roundup of London’s best Gooner pubs. Just be sure to book where possible, or show up very early if not, because venues will be packed out for the club’s biggest game in 18 years. RECOMMENDED: London’s best football pubs. The best Arsenal pubs in London The Drayton Park A bar stool at the Drayton is basically as close as you can get to pitchside without a ticket. You can see the stadium from the window, which means you can hear the roar from inside the stadium when Arsenal sco

World-renowned multi-disciplinary festival SXSW launched its London outpost last summer, and it was a pretty major affair, with a whopping 600 talks, 600 gigs and 200 films screenings all taking place around Shoreditch over six days in June. And with the festival’s sophomore edition only a couple of months away (it takes place Tue June 2-Sun June 7) and we’re getting very excited about what’s in store. Some major names have already been announced for the conference and film strands of the multi-disciplinary festival, and now we also have details of the music line-up, with some huge artists set to headline. Taking top billing across the six-day festival are a host of internationally-renowned artists including critically acclaimed US rapper Earl Sweatshirt, Afrobeats star Tiwa Savage, moody electronic producer Sega Bodega, indie-rock outfit Circa Waves, post-punk band Shame, indie-pop singer Rachel Chinouriri, veteran radio DJ Pete Tong and Time Out’s 2024 Londoner of the Year DJ AG.  But it’s not just the big stars to look out for on the line-up. SXSW has long been known as a launchpad for emerging artists and a discovery platform for keen music fans looking for their next favourite band, and the London 2026 festival will be no different. As usual, the festival’s enormous, hugely eclectic musical programme has been co-curated with a variety of esteemed partners, including Clash magazine, Notion, and The Crack, emerging artist platforms like BBC Introducing, Bite Back and Gener

If, like us, your bank account is reeling after a double bank holiday spent tapping your credit card with joyful abandon, then you may be in need of a somewhat more frugal couple of days this weekend. Well, fear not. The second weekend of April is shaping up to be an excellent one for penny-pinching Londoners looking for a good time. From classical concerts on council estates to a major new regular flea market in east London, there are loads of reasons to get out and about this weekend, even if the glorious mid-week sunshine is, in typical fashion, set to be replaced by clouds and showers as the weekend arrives. Ah well. Us Londoners know better than to let a little rain ruin our plans.  RECOMMENDED: 📍 The best things to do in London this weekend.❌ London travel disruption this weekend: full list of tube and train closures for April 11-12. The best free things on in London this weekend, April 10-12 2026 1. Get a free dose of youth culture at Roundhouse Three Sixty Iconic Camden arts venue The Roundhouse will be buzzing this weekend, as the Three Sixty festival fills its walls with music, poetry and performances heralding a new generation of artists and fans. Book a free slot at interactive exhibition From Soundboy to Streaming and you’ll get to experience all the highs of London’s underground music cultures, as curated by local young people, including photographs, gig tickets, zines and more. Or tune in to Transmission, a live podcast recording with special guests from the

More bad news for London’s festival lovers. Just days after it was announced that Wireless festival would no longer go ahead this year after the UK Government revoked headliner Kanye West’s right to enter the UK, the capital’s summer music schedule has been dealt another blow, with the cancellation of the majority of dates for this year’s Lido festival.  Victoria Park’s newest summer event, the 35,000 capacity Lido festival debuted last June, with Charli xcx, Jamie xx and London Grammar headlining. This year’s sophomore edition of the festival was set to take place in mid-June, but the majority of the festival will no longer take place owing to ground conditions in the Tower Hamlets park.  RECOMMENDED: The best music festivals in London. Cancelled and rescheduled dates for Lido Festival Headline shows from Irish country singer CMAT on Friday 12 June and London indie rockers Bombay Bicycle Club on Sunday 14 June have been cancelled, while the festival’s third day, headlined by electronic duo Maribou State, has been rescheduled for the bank holiday on Monday 31 August.  Why has Lido Festival been cancelled and rescheduled? Announcing the cancellation on Instagram, festival organisers wrote, ‘LIDO 2026 is unable to take place in June to protect park ground conditions and will instead move to late August as a one-off date adjustment.’ They were also keen to stress that the changes ‘are in no way the fault of the artists or London Borough of Tower Hamlets (LBTH), all of whom have

The arrival of spring means that there are loads of fabulous new art exhibitions on the horizon in London, with major shows on the likes of Francisco de Zurbarán, Henry Moore and James McNeil Whistler joining excellent recent openings including Hurvin Anderson at Tate Britain, Michaelina Wautier at the Royal Academy and Schiaparelli: Fashion Becomes Art at the V&A. But before all the shiny new openings, we must wave goodbye to the old ones.  Some excellent exhibitions are set to close this weekend, and there’s a good chance you’ve been too busy scoffing Easter eggs, frolicking among the spring flowers and generally making the most of the first rays of sunlight we’ve seen this year to spend your weekends gallivanting around the capital’s art galleries. But you’ve not got long left to see some of the winter season’s best openings. Here’s what to catch this weekend, just in the nick of time.  RECOMMENDED: The top 10 exhibitions in London. Four amazing London art exhibitions closing in April 2026 Turner & Constable: Rivals and Originals at Tate Britain The greatest of rivals – and two of Britain’s greatest painters – JMW Turner and John Constable are placed side by side in this starry exhibition. Although both had different paths to success, they each became recognised as stars of the art world and shared a connection to nature and recreating it in their landscape paintings. Explore the pair’s intertwined lives and legacies and get new insight into their creativity via sketchboo

Major news, music fans. Back in February it was revealed that former One Directioner, three-time Grammy winner and general pop culture icon Harry Styles would be curating the 2026 edition of Meltdown, following in the footsteps of David Bowie, Patti Smith, Grace Jones, Jarvis Cocker and countless other musical legends in selecting the line-up for the Southbank Centre’s renowned summer music festival.   And now, hot on the heels of his chart-topping fourth album Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally, the heartthrob has revealed the first wave of acts set to join him at the central London arts institution this June. On the bill for Meltdown’s 31st edition is an eclectic roster of established and up-and-coming artists, including plenty of artists born or based in the capital.  Harry Styles’s Meltdown opens with Warpaint’s only live date in 2026. The California-based indie rock outfit will play at Royal Festival Hall on Thursday 11 June in what promises to be an atmospheric opening for the eleven-day festival. The festival’s first Friday will feature gigs from folk singer Stephen Fretwell (Purcell Room, Fri 12 June), electronic producer Ninajirachi (Queen Elizabeth Foyer, Fri 12 June) and British jazz composer and multi-instrumentalist Shabaka Hutchings, who will be inviting a host of special guests to join him on stage at the Queen Elizabeth Hall for a one-off collaborative performance (Fri 12 June).  Also appearing over the opening weekend are experimental pop singer Erika de

Spring has finally sprung, and as the capital’s parks and gardens start to burst into life, its art scene is also a hive of activity. Some brilliant shows have opened in the last few weeks – there’s Beatriz González at the Barbican, Catherine Opie at the Portrait Gallery and Hurvin Anderson at Tate Britain, to name a few – but it’s about to get even busier for the city’s major galleries and museums.  Alongside the arrival of three massive new venues – V&A East (opening on April 18), the Museum of Youth Culture (opening on May 15) and the Quentin Blake Centre for Illustration (also due to open in May) – Londoners can expect loads of brilliant exhibitions on everything from Gilded Age portraitists and monumental sculpture to Baroque masters and avant garde couture. Grab your diary and get planning with our guide to the truly unmissable shows coming up over the next few months.  10 London art exhibitions we’re most excited about in spring 2026 1. Michaelina Wautier at the Royal Academy Until relatively recently, few art historians believed that paintings bearing 17th century artist Michaelina Wautier’s signature could possibly have been made by a woman, instead attributing them to her brother or other male artists. And yet she did it all; flowers and still lifes, portraits and large-scale history paintings, mastering subjects typically reserved for her male peers. Twenty-five pieces feature in this landmark exhibition, the first in the UK to be devoted to this rediscovered mas

You’ve really gotta hand it to Tate. The UK’s largest gallery conglomerate is in a league of its own when it comes to programming season after season of blockbuster exhibitions. Hot on the heels of the institution’s widely lauded Tracey Emin retrospective, in the brief lull before its next major opening – Tate Britain’s Hurvin Anderson exhibition arrives at the end of the month – the institution has announced its full programme for 2027, and there are plenty of bangers to get excited about. From 18th century landscapes and 20th century ink painting to giants of impressionism and post-impressionism, here’s everything to look forward to next year at two of London’s biggest and best art galleries.  Tate Modern  Tate kicks off 2027 with a huge exhibition examining Claude Monet’s relationship with time at Tate Modern. The gallery’s first ever exhibition to focus exclusively on the works of Impressionism’s founding father, Monet: Painting Time (Feb 25-Jun 27) promises to bring together loans from across the globe to examine how he evoked the rapid pace of modern life through fleeting, transient moments in time.  Image: Yuan Jai, ‘Jadeite Cabbage’, (1999). Courtesy of the Artist and Vitamin Creative Space. Spring will see the arrival of the gallery’s inaugural exhibition focusing on the practice of ink painting. Focusing on 20th century artists in Hong Kong, Taiwan and mainland China, Ink (Apr 22-Aug 20) will examine this ‘enduring and profoundly philosophical’ discipline through

Do you occasionally have a flutter on the National Lottery? Your chances of winning millions might be pretty slim, but whether you win big or not this weekend, your ticket means guaranteed prizes in the form of free or discounted entry to dozens of top attractions across the UK. Returning from Saturday March 7 to Sunday March 15, the National Lottery’s Open Week is a way for National Lottery-funded venues across the country to say thank you to participants for their part in raising £32 million each week to support charitable causes. The annual celebration offers free or heavily discounted access to visitors who present a lottery ticket upon entry at hundreds of celebrated venues, from historical sites, art galleries and museums to wildlife hotspots, sporting venues and even some lovely independent cinemas. In the mood for a bargain day out in the city? Here are loads of great London venues participating in National Lottery Open Week 2026. London venues with free or discounted entry for National Lottery Open Week 2026 The Tower of London What? 50 percent off for two adults and four children When? March 7-14  Kensington Palace What? 50 percent off for two adults and four children When? March 7-8 and March 11-14 Hampton Court Palace What? 50 percent off for two adults and four children When?  March 7-8 and March 13-14 Photograph: Shutterstock Tate Modern What? Two for one entry to the Theatre Picasso exhibition When? March 7-15  Eltham Palace and Gardens What? Free entry fo

Somerset House is a truly year-round venue. Through the winter months, the palatial arts complex on the Strand is home to one of the city’s most atmospheric winter skating pop-ups. In spring and autumn it hosts all manner of interesting art installations in its magnificent neo-classical courtyard. And at the height of summer, the same space plays host to some of the season’s most memorable outdoor concerts, as part of the Somerset House Summer Series. With festival line-up announcements coming thick and fast, and another glorious London summer beginning to take shape, the riverside arts venue has revealed the headliners for this year’s Summer Series, with eleven eclectic gigs scheduled from 16-26 July.  As usual, it’s an eclectic line-up, encompassing everything from indie and rock to neo-psychedelica, contemporary jazz and soul. RECOMMENDED: The best music festivals in London to book for 2026. The biggest names in this year’s series include breakthrough pop sensation Naïka (Thursday 16 July), veteran indie band The Cribs (Monday 20 July), ascendent art-rock outfit Black Country, New Road (Wednesday 22 July) and psychedelic rockers The Flaming Lips (Saturday 25 July). Also headlining are Palace (Friday 17 July), Thee Sacred Souls (Saturday 18 July), Lightning Seeds (Sunday 18 July), Agnes Obel (Tuesday 21 July), Venna (Thursday 23 July), Raf-Saperra (Friday 24 July) and Benjamin Clementine (Sunday 26 July).  Tickets for all gigs will be priced between £30 and £60, with the g

One of the longest-standing and largest queer film festivals, BFI Flare celebrates its 40th anniversary in 2026. The springtime film bonanza at the BFI’s South Bank home is a major calendar fixture for London’s queer communities and cinephiles alike, and with exactly one month to go until the 2026 edition of the festival kicks off, the line-up has just been revealed. Film buffs attending this year’s edition of Flare will be able to catch 31 world premieres among the 65 feature films and 62 shorts on the programme, alongside a stellar curation of classic queer cinema, and the usual programme of talks, workshops, exhibitions and DJ nights that make the BFI Southbank such a buzzy place to be during the festival.  The BFI Flare 2026 Line-Up Opening Night Film  As previously announced, the 40th edition of Flare will open with the world premiere of American documentary maker Jennifer Kroot’s riotous new film Hunky Jesus, which follows social justice movement the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence as they prepare to host their legendary annual Easter Sunday drag contest in San Francisco. Alongside the premiere, long-serving member Sister Roma will be present for a talk exploring the ‘sistory’ and impact of the movement alongside UK chapter members. Image: Hunky Jesus Special Presentation Taking place halfway through the festival, the Special Presentation for Flare 2026 is Kiwi director Paloma Schneideman’s ‘tender, unflinching’ coming of age drama Big Girls Don’t Cry, following 14-ye