Culture vultures of the capital gather around, as London's art scene is alive and well with a kaleidoscope of exhibitions, each offering a glimpse into the city's creative spirit. From centuries-old masterpieces in museums to immersive works, these showcases feature something for everyone.
Whether you're a sucker for the avant-garde or a traditionalist at heart, there's a feast of gorgeous art waiting to entice your senses and you can dive into a realm of inspiration with our guide to the best exhibitions London has to offer for 2026.
EDITOR'S PICK: Winter is a brilliant time to stay inside in the warm and mosey around one of these fabulous exhibitions. Here are three of our favourites taking place this month in London:
- Wes Anderson: The Archives at The Design Museum
- Nigerian Modernism at The Tate Modern
- Ramses: The Exhibition at Battersea Power Station
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The Best London Exhibitions For February 2026
1. Frameless
- Location: 6 Marble Arch, W1H 7EJ
- When: ongoing
- Tickets: from £20 per person
- Website: DesignMyNight.com
Frameless is the UK’s largest permanent immersive art experience, located in the heart of Marble Arch. With 42 masterpieces spanning across four distinct galleries, this multi-sensory journey redefines how we experience art.
Featuring iconic works from legends like Van Gogh, Monet, Dalí, and Rembrandt, each piece is digitally remastered and set to a captivating surround sound soundscape, blending classical and contemporary music. You can explore the galleries at your own pace, immersing yourself in art from different genres. After soaking in the masterpieces, unwind at the café bar or visit the shop for a unique memento.
Take around two hours to explore all four galleries at Frameless.
2. David Bowie Centre
- Location: The V&A East Storehouse, Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, East Storehouse, V&A, Parkes Street, E20 3AX
- When: ongoing
- How
much: free (optional £5
donation)
- Website: V&AEast.uk
The new V&A East Storehouse museum in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park is playing host to an exhibition of epic proportions in 2025: the David Bowie Centre. For the first time ever, this archive of 90,000+ items will be accessible to all and totally free to enter.
Highlights of the event include iconic stage costumes for the likes of Ziggy Stardust, lyrics for songs including Fame and Heroes, and even audio-visual installations to create an all-encompassing and immersive feel.
Experience the music icon through these archives.
3. Spencer House
- Location: 27 St James’s Place, SW1A 1NR
- When: ongoing
- Tickets: from free
- Website: DesignMyNight.com
Discover Spencer House, a hidden gem of Georgian elegance, where centuries of history and stunning art come to life. Originally built for Lord and Lady Spencer, this exquisite palace once served as both a family residence and a private gallery.
Today, its remarkable collection of paintings, furniture, and decorative objects gives a fascinating glimpse into 18th-century aristocratic life. Marvel at pieces original to the house, alongside those generously loaned from renowned institutions like the V&A and Tate. Book your tour now to experience this unique piece of London’s heritage.
Check out the likes of paintings, furniture and bronze lanterns.
4. Wes Anderson: The Archives
- Location: Design Museum, 224-238 Kensington High Street, W8 6AG
- When: 21st November 2025 - 26th July 2026
- Tickets: from £19.69 per person
- Website: designmuseum.org
Visit the whimsical world of Wes Anderson: The Archives as The Design Museum unveils a spectacular retrospective celebrating the filmmaker’s signature style and storytelling magic. You'll be able to explore over 600 rare and never-before-seen objects from Anderson’s personal archive, on display in Britain for the very first time.
Curated in collaboration with La Cinémathèque française, this landmark exhibition traces the journey from his early 1990s experiments to his most iconic creations like The Grand Budapest Hotel, Moonrise Kingdom, Fantastic Mr Fox, and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. Expect to be immersed in Anderson’s cinematic universe through original sketches, puppets, storyboards, costumes (yes, Margot Tenenbaum’s fur coat is here), and even a candy-pink model of the Grand Budapest Hotel.
Fan of Wes Anderson? You'll love this exhibition, running until the 26th of July 2026.
5. Prehistoric Planet: Discovering Dinosaurs
- Location: Lightroom, 12 Lewis Cubitt Square, King's Cross, N1C 4DY
- When: until March 2026
- Tickets: from £27.50 per person
- Website: lightroom.uk
Head on a Jurassic journey with Prehistoric Planet: Discovering Dinosaurs at Lightroom, a fully immersive experience that brings Earth’s most legendary creatures to life like never before. Developed in partnership with Apple TV+, this extraordinary show combines cinematic storytelling, state-of-the-art CGI, and breathtaking 360° visuals to transport you back to the age of dinosaurs.
From swirling desert storms to mysterious ocean depths, you’ll find yourself side by side with iconic creatures like the mighty Tyrannosaurus Rex, swirling ammonites, and the quirky Adalatherium during their most thrilling moments. Featuring exclusive new scenes, original artwork, and a powerful soundtrack by Hans Zimmer and the Bleeding Fingers Music team, this is prehistoric storytelling at its most epic.
On the hunt for exhibitions in London now? Strut over to this immersive spectacular.
6. Costume Couture: Sixty Years Of Cosprop
- Location:
Fashion and Textile
Museum, 83 Bermondsey Street, SE1
3XF
- When: 26th September 2025 - 8th March
2026
- Tickets: £12.65 per
adult
- Website: fashiontextilemuseum.org
From Downton Abbey to Peaky Blinders, few names have shaped screen style quite like Cosprop. Founded in 1965 by Oscar and BAFTA-winning designer John Bright, the legendary London costume house has dressed everyone from Helena Bonham Carter in A Room with a View to Colin Firth’s Mr Darcy. Now, the Museum is celebrating 60 years of this couture powerhouse with Costume Couture, a once-in-a-lifetime exhibition showcasing never-before-seen costumes, sketches and accessories.
More than just a red-carpet moment, this exhibition takes you behind the seams - charting Cosprop’s artistry from script to screen through iconic outfits, insider stories, and a dazzling line-up of period finery. Expect lush fabrics, impeccable tailoring, and the kind of detail that’s made Cosprop synonymous with cinematic magic for six decades. And yes, there’s even a glossy accompanying book (with a foreword by Dame Judi Dench, naturally).
Expect everything from A Room with a View to Downton Abbey.
7. The Moonwalkers: A Journey With Tom Hanks
- Location:
Lightroom, 12 Lewis Cubitt Square, King's
Cross, N1C 4DY
- When: until 8th March
2026
- Tickets: £25 per person
- Website: lightroom.uk
Few stories fire the imagination quite like humanity’s journey to the Moon, and The Moonwalkers: A Journey with Tom Hanks turns that giant leap into an immersive experience. Narrated by Hanks himself, the show blends intimate storytelling with epic scale, revisiting the Apollo missions not as distant history but as lived, human endeavour. From tense countdowns to the quiet awe of lunar footsteps, the experience foregrounds the emotion, risk and ambition behind one of humankind’s most extraordinary achievements.
Using Lightroom’s vast projection and audio technology, the space is transformed into a vessel that carries audiences beyond the past and into the future. Alongside archival material, the experience goes behind the scenes of NASA’s Artemis programme, with Hanks in conversation with the astronauts preparing to return to the Moon’s surface.
Let Tom Hanks (pictured) fly you to the moon.
8. Inside Aardman: Wallace & Gromit and Friends
- Location: Young V&A, Cambridge Heath Road, Bethnal Green E2 9PA
- When: 12th February - 15th November 2026
- Tickets: £11 per person (some concessions available)
- Website: vam.ac.uk
To celebrate their 50th anniversary, Aardman are bringing Inside Aardman: Wallace & Gromit and Friends to Young V&A. Expect a behind-the-scenes look at some of your favourite stories, including Wallace & Gromit, Shaun the Sheep and Morph, to see how the team use clay to bring these modern classics to life on film.
From the initial sketch through to set building and the final effects, this exhibition follows all aspects of Aardman's production. To round it all off, it's interactive too, so you can have a go at all the elements of stop-motion animation on your visit.
9. Samurai
- Location: British Museum, Great
Russell Street, WC1B 3DG
- When: 3rd February - 4th May 2026
- Tickets: from £23 per
person
- Website: britishmuseum.org
Samurai at the British Museum takes one of history’s most mythologised figures and carefully peels back the legend. Tracing a thousand years of samurai history, it explores how Japan’s warrior class, known as bushi, evolved from medieval fighters into political leaders, artists and cultural tastemakers, before being transformed into the near-mythic figures we recognise today.
Far from a story of endless battle, the exhibition reveals how, during long periods of peace, samurai life shifted towards governance, scholarship and creativity, with women also occupying places within this elite social class. Highlights range from an ornate suit of armour sent by Tokugawa Hidetada to James VI and I, to refined luxury items such as an incense connoisseurship game.
Discover Samuair at the British Museum.
10. Lucian Freud: Drawing Into Painting
- Location: National Portrait Gallery, St Martin's Place, WC2H 0HE
- When: 12th February - 4th May 2026
- Tickets: from £23 per person
- Website: npg.org.uk
For a fresh way into one of Britain’s most uncompromising artists, Lucian Freud: Drawing into Painting puts the spotlight on the work that underpinned everything else. This is the first UK museum exhibition dedicated to Freud’s works on paper, tracing his obsessive engagement with the human face and body from the 1930s right through to the 21st century. You can expect pencil, ink, charcoal, etching and crayon studies that reveal the intensity of his looking, alongside a carefully chosen group of paintings that show how drawing fed directly into his canvases.
The exhibition also marks a significant moment for the gallery, following the acquisition of 12 works from Freud’s estate, including eight etchings never before represented in the collection. Among them is a striking etching of his daughter, fashion designer Bella Freud, shown alongside archive material and previously unseen research.
11. Tracey Emin
- Location: Tate Modern,
Bankside, SE1
9TG
- When: 27th February - 31st August
2026
- Tickets: £20 per person
- Website: tate.org.uk
Discover the raw, intimate universe of Tracey Emin, charting four decades of fearless, confessional art from one of Britain’s most influential contemporary voices. Spanning painting, video, textiles, neon, writing, sculpture and installation, the show brings together career-defining works alongside pieces never exhibited before. Across every medium, Emin uses the female body as both subject and language, exploring desire, vulnerability, pain and healing with a candour that remains as arresting now as it was in the 1990s.
Rising to prominence with incendiary works such as My Bed - which famously challenged public ideas of what art could be - Emin has never separated the personal from the public. This exhibition broadens her story, foregrounding her lifelong dedication to painting and positioning her recent works as the culmination of decades spent transforming lived experience into art
Tracey Emin, My Bed (pictured).
12. Orchids At Kew
- Location: Princess of Wales
Conservatory, Kew Gardens, TW9 3AE
- When: 7th February to 8th March
2026, daily from 11am
- Tickets: included with entry into the gardens
- Website: kew.org
Kew’s much-loved orchid festival returns in 2026 with a spectacular new edition inspired by China’s extraordinary biodiversity, heritage and design traditions. Marking 30 years of the festival, the Princess of Wales Conservatory is transformed into a vivid winter escape, filled with thousands of orchids and dramatic large-scale installations that celebrate colour, craftsmanship and nature.
Expect to wander through scenes animated by dragons, lanterns and intricate plant sculptures, all set against the warmth and humidity of the glasshouse, a welcome burst of life in the colder months. Beyond the visual drama, the festival also highlights the global reach of Kew’s scientific work, using orchids to spotlight plant conservation and international collaboration. You can also experience the magic after dark during Orchids After Hours.
The Orchid Festival comes to Kew.
13. Robbie Williams: Radical Honesty
- Location: Moco Museum, 1-4 Marble Arch, W2 2UH
- When: until 12th April 2026
- Tickets: £22.90 per person
- Website: london.mocomuseum.com
Robbie Williams, a pop icon with 15 number one albums and a career spanning from Take That to his solo success, is now making waves in the art world with his Radical Honesty exhibition at London’s Moco Museum. After nearly two decades of creating art, Williams brings a bold, unfiltered perspective on human nature, inviting viewers to confront anxiety, self-love, introversion, and the messy truths of life without the usual filters.
His latest collection features never-before-seen sculptures and visual works, including a marble representation of anxiety and a playful piece featuring an elderly lady named Blanche, symbolising his approach to facing fears with humour. Radical Honesty challenges society’s obsession with curated images, offering a refreshing, raw exploration of self-acceptance and vulnerability, all infused with Williams’ signature wit and irreverence.
After the success of exhibitions in Amsterdam and Barcelona, Radical Honesty comes to London.
14. The Last Days Of Pompeii, London
- Location: Immerse LDN at Excel Waterfront, E16 1XL
- When: 14th November 2025 - 6th Februay 2026
- Tickets: £24 per adult, £18 per child
- Website: pompeii-experience.com/london
This November, you'll be transported back over 2,000 years as The Last Days of Pompeii lands at Immerse LDN, ExCeL Waterfront, for a limited 16-week run. Experience an eight-metre-high projection room and wander Pompeii’s bustling streets, exploring villas, bathhouses and marketplaces as if you were truly there.
Become a gladiator spectator in the amphitheatre with thrilling VR sequences, or walk freely through the Villa of Mysteries in the metaverse, frescoes glowing in dazzling detail. Alongside rare Roman artefacts, marble statues and poignant casts of Vesuvius’ victims, you’ll uncover the human stories behind one of history’s most infamous disasters.
Watch Pompeii's streets come to life.
15. Our Story With David Attenborough
- Location: The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, South Kensington, SW7 5BD
- When: until August
2026
- Tickets: from £20 per person (£12.50 for members)
- Website: nhm.ac.uk
If you've ever wanted to step inside a David Attenborough documentary, now's your chance. Our Story with David Attenborough is a bold, immersive 360° cinematic journey that surrounds you with the sights, sounds, and staggering beauty of our planet and its story.
Set in the Jerwood Gallery, this 50-minute adventure invites you to walk through the history of life on Earth - from bubbling primordial seas to forest-dwelling gorilla families and the deep-ocean ballet of humpback whales. But it’s not just about what we see - it’s about who we are. This is the story of us, told through the lens of evolution, impact, and ultimately, hope. Crafted with Sir David Attenborough’s unmistakable voice and insight, the experience draws on a lifetime of exploration and storytelling. His narration guides you through awe and wonder to a quiet, powerful call to action: we all have a role in shaping the next chapter.
Expect jaw-dropping visuals from the award-winning minds behind many of Attenborough’s iconic documentaries.
16. Marie Antoinette Style
- Location: Olympic Way, Wembley Park, HA9 0NP
- When: 20th September 2025 - 22nd March 2026
- Tickets: from £23 per person
- Website: vam.ac.uk
Head to the V&A for an Marie Antoinette Style - an exploration of how this complex fashion icon has shaped design over the last 250 years. The timeless appeal of this look is rooted in youth and fame, and the ill-fated queen has a long-lasting legacy.
The exhibition features preserved clothing and furnishings, as well as a deep-dive into her lasting influence. Prices start from £23, though members can enter for free.
Marie Antoinette - the last Queen of France.
17. Van Gogh Exhibit: The Immersive Experience
- Location: 106 Commercial Street, Spitalfields, E1 6LZ
- When: ongoing
- Tickets: from £21 for adults; from £14 for children; aged 3 and under go free
- Website: vangoghexpo.com/london
Art no longer hangs quietly on a wall at Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience - here, it surrounds you. This multi-sensory exhibition transforms Van Gogh’s most iconic works into a living, breathing world through 360° projections, interactive spaces, evocative music, and even VR experiences.
Venture into Starry Night and feel the swirling skies come alive, wander through the golden glow of Sunflowers, or drift among the serene petals of Almond Blossoms. Each space invites you to experience the artist’s vision, emotion, and humanity in a way that’s visceral, immersive, and unforgettable.
'Starry Night' at the Van Gogh Immersive Experience.
18. Practically Magic: William Morris At Home in Hammersmith
- Location: William Morris Society & Museum, Kelmscott House, W6 9TA
- When: ongoing
- Tickets: £7.50 entry, free for local residents
- Website: williammorrissociety.org
Head to Kelmscott House, the riverside Hammersmith home where William Morris, designer, poet, craftsman, socialist, and environmentalist extraordinaire, lived and created for eighteen years. To mark the William Morris Society’s 70th anniversary, a new exhibition celebrates his genius, from hand-drawn wallpapers and textiles to rare books crafted in pursuit of ‘the ideal book.’ You can explore the house as the Morris family knew it, wander through the flourishing garden, and peek into the library where ideas flowed as freely as the Thames outside.
But Morris’s magic wasn’t a solo affair. The exhibition also shines a light on the friends, family, and colleagues whose creativity and collaboration shaped his world, including fellow members of the Socialist League. Together, they turned Kelmscott House into a buzzing hub of artistry, activism, and inspiration - a space where beauty, politics, and imagination collided.
Sunflower wallpaper printing block, William Morris, manufactured for Jeffrey & Co. 1879 ©
19. Theatre Picasso
- Location: Tate Modern, Bankside, SE1 9TG
- When: 17th September 2025 - 12th April
2026
- Tickets: £14 per person, free for members
- Website: tate.org.uk
Marking the centenary of his iconic painting The Three Dancers, Theatre Picasso reimagines the artist through the lens of contemporary performance, staged by acclaimed artist Wu Tsang and curator Enrique Fuenteblanca. Fascinated by performers, such as dancers, entertainers, and bullfighters, Picasso drew inspiration from their transformative power to shape his own public persona: Picasso, the Artist.
This exhibition explores that cultivated identity, showing how Picasso balanced the tension between popular culture and the avant-garde while questioning what it means to be both celebrated and an outsider. The immersive space presents over 45 works from Tate’s collection, alongside key European loans, including paintings, sculpture, textiles, and works on paper - some never before seen in the UK.
Discover a theatrical, thought-provoking exploration of Picasso, where identity, transformation, and performance collide.
20. Blitz: The Club That Shaped The 80s
- Location: Design Museum, 224-238 Kensington High Street, W8 6AG
- When: 20th September 2025 - 29th March 2026
- Tickets: from £14.38 per adult, £10.77 per student, and £7.19 per child
- Website: designmuseum.org
Head behind the door of a Covent Garden side street and enter the world of Blitz, the legendary 1980s club night that sparked a style revolution. From David Bowie’s glam to punk, soul, continental cinema, and cabaret, this was the playground where the brightest young creatives of the decade came together to turn fashion, music, and design upside down – and launch careers that would go global.
Blitz: The Club That Shaped The 80s features the music that had everyone dancing, the flamboyant fashions that made heads turn, and the art, film, and graphics that defined a generation. See iconic outfits, design sketches, vinyl, photography, furniture, and rare film footage - over 250 items in total - all celebrating the energy, creativity, and audacious style of the original Blitz Kids.
Spandau Ballet’s debut photo shoot at the Warren Street squat, 1980. Photo by Graham Smith.
21. Dark Secrets: The Esoteric Exhibition
- Location: The Vaults, Leake Street, SE1 7NN
- When: 10th October 2025 - 31st May 2026
- Tickets: £21 per person
- Website: thevaults.london/dark-secrets
Head to immersive Leake Street venue The Vaults for an eerie exhibit: Dark Secrets: The Esoteric Exhibition. This explores the relationship between occult sciences, supernatural phenomena, ancient beliefs and esoteric doctrines, shown through a lens of rationality that considers fraudulent practices and scientific experiments.
Their displays feature artefacts from ritualistic crimes committed by criminal religious groups, as well as information on how esotericism and the supernatural have influenced fiction and art. This closes with the eternally asked question of whether there is something after death, designed to get you thinking.
Expect to be spooked at this creepy exploration of the supernatural.
22. Ramses: The Exhibition
- Location: Battersea Power Station
- When: from February 2026
- Tickets: TBC
- Website: ramsestheexhibition.co.uk
Discover iconic pharaoh King Ramses II (also known as Ramses the Great), who ruled Egypt for nearly 67 years, at this exhibition named after the man himself. From his monuments to his military strategy, diplomacy, and 100 children, experience Ramses' life in person.
Not only is there a once-in-a-generation opportunity to see the pharaoh’s original sarcophagus, but also towering sculptures, mummies, silver coffins, jewellery and more.
Limestone Colossus at Ramses: The Exhibition.
23. Banksy Limitless
- Location: 79 - 85 Old Brompton Road, SW7 3LD, SW7 3LD
- When: 29th September 2025 - 22nd February 2026
- Tickets: £19 per adult, £15 per student, £14 per child
- Website: banksylimitless.com/london
Banksy Limitless is an immersive exhibition that drops you headfirst into the world of the elusive street artist. For a limited run only, expect to find over 250 artworks, spanning originals, large-scale installations, sculptures, murals (including seven created in war-torn Ukraine), and even an Infinity Room where his sharp social commentary reflects at you from every angle.
You’ll also step into recreations of some of his most iconic works, from Cinderella’s Carriage to the Louise Michel room, inspired by the refugee rescue ship he decorated.
Immerse yourself in Banksy's artworks.
24. Quantum Untangled
- Location: Science Gallery, King’s College London, Guy’s Campus, Great Maze Pond, SE1 9GU
- When: 8th October 2025 - 28th Febraury 2026
- Tickets: free entry
- Website: london.sciencegallery.com
Quantum Untangled is the Science Gallery London’s immersive new exhibition where art and science collide. From the tiniest subatomic particles to cosmic ripples across space and time, the show explores how quantum phenomena shape our reality, and how understanding them could transform the future.
Through interactive artworks, sculptural installations, immersive environments, poetry, photography, and film, you're invited to explore the big questions of quantum physics in a way that’s both playful and profound. Highlights include immersive works by Conrad Shawcross RA, sculptural explorations by Alistair McClymont, Monica C. LoCascio & Daniela Brill Estrada, Matthew Woodham, and the interactive Quantum Jungle by Robin Baumgarten.
Ringdown by Conrad Shawcross.
25. Nigerian Modernism
- Location: Tate Modern, Bankside, SE1 9TG
- When: 8th October 2025 - 10th May 2026
- Tickets: from £18 per person
- Website: tate.org.uk
Discover the artists who shook up modern art in Nigerian Modernism, the exhibition that celebrates mid-20th-century trailblazers who fused African, European, and Nigerian traditions into bold, multidimensional works.
Explore paintings, sculpture, textiles, and poetry from over 50 creatives, including El Anatsui, Uzo Egonu, Ladi Kwali, and Ben Enwonwu, and trace the vibrant networks that connected Lagos, Zaria, Enugu and even Paris and London.
Benedict Enwonwu Black Culture 1986 (pictured right).
26. The National Gallery: Art On Your Doorstep
- Location: Croydon
- When: 3rd February - 5th July
- Tickets: free entry
- Website: culturecroydon.com
Get ready to explore the city like never before with The National Gallery: Art On Your Doorstep in Croydon. Launching on the 3rd of February and running until the 5th of July, this free outdoor exhibition brings 30 of the Gallery’s most iconic masterpieces into public spaces, from parks and gardens to bustling town squares.
Expect to encounter life-sized, painstakingly realised recreations of works by Van Gogh, Renoir, Seurat and more, allowing visitors to get up close to every brushstroke. A collaboration between The National Gallery and Culture Croydon, the initiative transforms everyday spaces into cultural hotspots, encouraging exploration, photography, and conversation.
Photo Credit: Stoke On Trent City Council.
27. Wayne McGregor: Infinite Bodies
- Location: Somerset House, Embankment Galleries, WC2R 1LA
- When: 30th October 2025 - 22nd February 2026
- Tickets: from £19.50 per person
- Website: somersethouse.org.uk
This autumn, Somerset House transforms into a playground of movement, art, and technology with Infinite Bodies, a bold exploration of choreographer Sir Wayne McGregor’s groundbreaking career. Discover how McGregor and his collaborators - from Oscar-winning sound designers to visionary visual artists - push the boundaries of dance, digital media, and creative experimentation.
Visitors can wander through interactive installations, witness unannounced live performances by Company Wayne McGregor, and experience talks, workshops, and music that expand the exhibition beyond the gallery. Perfect for anyone curious about the intersection of art, science, and the human body, Infinite Bodies is as spectacular as it is inspiring.
Wayne McGregor: ON THE OTHER EARTH.
28. Peter Doig: House Of Music
- Location: Serpentine South Gallery, W2 3XA
- When: 10th October 2025 - 8th February 2026
- Tickets: free (advance booking strongly recommended)
- Website: serpentine.org
Serpentine presents House of Music, a new project by Peter Doig that explores the intersections of music, film, and communal gathering within his practice. Transforming the gallery into a listening space, the exhibition brings together recent paintings and, for the first time, integrates sound, creating a multi-sensory environment for reflection and conversation.
Doig’s works depict spaces where music is played, musicians performing, and people dancing, blending personal memory, found photographs, and imagined scenes, many of which are inspired by his years in Trinidad. Central to the exhibition are rare, restored analogue speakers, through which music selected from Doig’s decades-long archive of vinyl and cassette tapes plays, offering a unique acoustic experience.
Sundays feature Sound Service, live listening sessions where musicians, artists, and collectors - including Ed Ruscha, Linton Kwesi Johnson, and Duval Timothy - share tracks on the analogue systems, fostering dialogue through shared sound.
Peter Doig: House of Music with Sound system by Laurence Passera.
29. Hawai'i: A Kingdom Crossing Oceans
- Location: Great Russell Street, Bloomsbury, WC1B 3DG
- When: 15th January - 25th May 2026
- Tickets: from £14 per person
- Website: britishmuseum.org
A story of power, artistry and ocean-crossing ambition unfolds in Hawaiʻi: A Kingdom Crossing Oceans, a major exhibition opening at the British Museum. Bringing together extraordinary historic treasures and striking contemporary works, the show traces Hawaiʻi’s rich cultural legacy through objects made to command attention - feathered cloaks worn by chiefs, finely carved deities, and formidable shark-toothed weapons sit alongside new works by Kānaka ʻŌiwi (Native Hawaiian) artists.
At its heart is a pivotal moment: the 1824 journey of King Liholiho and Queen Kamāmalu across vast oceans to Britain, an ill-fated visit that marked a turning point for the Hawaiian Kingdom. Two centuries on, the exhibition reflects on that moment as part of a wider narrative of exchange, alliance and colonial entanglement between Hawaiʻi and Britain - and its lasting impact today.
Hawaii: A Kingdom Crossing Oceans.
London Exhibitions Coming Soon In 2026
1. Agatha Christie At The British Library
- Location: British Library, 96 Euston Road, NW1 2DB
- When: 30th October 2026 - 20th June 2027
- Tickets: TBC
- Website: events.bl.uk
Celebrate the Queen of Crime with a landmark exhibition celebrating the life and legacy of Agatha Christie, the bestselling novelist of all time. From grand English country houses to sun-drenched archaeological digs and glamorous journeys aboard the Orient Express, discover the places and experiences that fuelled her imagination and inspired some of the most unforgettable stories ever told.
Through evocative photographs, personal letters, family memorabilia, notebooks, manuscripts and never-before-seen drafts, the exhibition reveals the real Christie behind iconic characters like Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. Highlights include her 1937 Remington typewriter (used to compose And Then There Were None), handwritten notes for Witness for the Prosecution, a teenage typescript of her very first short story, and study notes from her 1917 pharmaceutical exam.
Credit: The Christie Archive Trust.
2. The Bayeux Tapestry
- Location: British Museum, Great Russell Street, Bloomsbury, WC1B 3DG
- When: September 2026 - July 2027
- Tickets: TBC
- Website: britishmuseum.org
For the first time in nearly a thousand years, the Bayeux Tapestry is making its way back to the UK. The 70-metre embroidered masterpiece - which famously chronicles the Norman Conquest and the Battle of Hastings - will go on display at the British Museum’s Sainsbury Exhibition Gallery from September 2026 to July 2027. Long housed at the Bayeux Museum in Normandy, this marks the first-ever loan of the UNESCO-recognised artefact, which is widely regarded as one of the most important works of medieval art in existence.
Featuring 58 detailed scenes with more than 600 figures, 200 horses and 40 ships stitched into its linen, the tapestry is both a work of extraordinary craft and a vivid visual history of 1066. It comes as part of a cultural exchange that will also see treasures from the British Museum head to France.
The Bayeux Tapestry.
3. The 90s At Tate Britain
- Location: Millbank, SW1P 4RG
- When: 8th October 2026 - 14th February 2027
- Tickets: TBC (free for members)
- Website: tate.org.uk
Revisit a decade defined by rule-breaking creativity with The 90s, a major exhibition exploring the cultural forces that reshaped Britain. Curated by fashion trailblazer Edward Enninful OBE, the show charts a moment of rebellion and optimism as art, fashion, music and design collided to create a bold new visual language.
Bringing together iconic photography by Juergen Teller, Nick Knight, David Sims and Corinne Day alongside works by artists including Damien Hirst, Gillian Wearing and Yinka Shonibare, the exhibition also spotlights era-defining fashion from Vivienne Westwood, Alexander McQueen and Hussein Chalayan.
2026 is all about the 90s.
