Glow-in-the-dark ice cream and a hundreds and thousands fountain at Bompas & Parr's pop-up

SCOOP: The Wonderful World of Ice Cream

Ice cream is getting the Willy Wonka treatment at this exciting new exhibition.

Despite the temperature only meekly pulling itself above the bar of 20 degrees once the planets align and the blood moon waxes, we’ve always had an obsession with ice cream here in Britain. Whether that’s proper ice cream cones at the seaside or Mr Whippy, a food so devoid of substance and yet so beloved that the ingredients have to be air and your own nostalgia neuron, it’s all got a special place in our heart. So much so, it's going to be celebrated with the help of Bompas & Parr and their ice cream exhibition at their own British Museum of Food. 

Celebrating the dessert’s past, present, and future, SCOOP: A Wonderful Ice Cream World isn’t like any other museum exhibition. These culinary madmen are presenting ‘sensory immersions’ to explore all things ice and cream, with vanilla-flavoured fog, caves filled with glow-in-the-dark ice cream, and daffodil ice cream revived from the depths of 18th century cooking. There’s also art and paraphernalia from Caroline and Robin Weir, Warhol prints, and an 18+ section exploring the dark and often bloody past of ice cream. That’s right, the food most closely associated as the thing your grandparents gave you to keep you quiet is responsible for an ice cream van turf war that got six people killed. And topping off this bizarre factory of ice-cold desserts is a fountain of hundreds and thousands, wished into existence by every child in the planet. Have a great summer, guys.

Bompas & Parr's SCOOP: A Wonderful Ice Cream World is open from 3th July to 30th September 2018 and can be found at Gasholders, 1 Lewis Cubitt Walk, Kings Cross, London N1C 4BX. Tickets cost £12.