AboutLondon Laura – February 2025

Did you try any of my recommendations from last month? I’ve booked for the Leigh Bowery! exhibition at Tate Modern and am really looking forward to it.

Best things to do in London in the Winter

As February is rather well known for its challenging weather, I thought some ideas on things to do in London at this time of year might help. I actually have an alert in my electronic diary that appears around mid-January to remind me not to travel near my birthday (early February) as the weather will get in the way. Think storms such as ‘Beast from the East’, flash flooding, unexpected snowfall, etc.

So, if you’re in London during the winter, what can still ‘spark joy’ as Marie Kondo once said?

Theatre Deals

I’m sending this newsletter a day early so you can get bargain London theatre tickets in the ‘See It Live’ offer as it ends on 31 January 2025. Tickets are reduced to £10, £20, £30, £40, £50 & £60 for select performances throughout 2025. The discounted tickets include a mixture of matinée, evening, and weekend performances.

Winter Light Trails

To bring light into your life while the evenings are still dark, a winter light trail is an excellent idea. You’ll have to be spontaneous today to see Canary Wharf Winter Lights as it ends on 1 February, but The Light Festival at Battersea Power Station is on until 23 February 2025. It’s free to visit and is on daily from 8 am to 11 pm.

If you’d prefer your light to be indoors, Helios is in the Painted Hall in Greenwich until 25 March 2025. Enjoy this seven-metre winter sun by Luke Jerram.

Decent Pubs

Pub culture may have declined in recent years but there’s still something glorious about relaxing on a pub sofa with friends watching a roaring open fire.

My faves are The Mayflower in Rotherhithe on the south side of The Thames and The Prospect of Whitby in Wapping on the north side. The Grapes in Limehouse is great and The Spaniards Inn in Hampstead is too.

Image by Klaus Heller from Pixabay

Galleries

I love losing hours wandering aimlessly in the National Gallery or the National Portrait Gallery. Both are big enough to enjoy many hours of cultural exploring.

I also recommend Two Temple Place as it’s a glorious building. The current exhibition is Lives Less Ordinary: Working-Class Britain Re-seen. It looks at the overlooked richness and diversity of working-class life and creative expression from the 1950s to now. And it’s free to visit with no booking required.

What’s Happening This Month?

As well as all the good stuff above, The Courtauld Gallery has Goya to Impressionism. Masterpieces from the Oskar Reinhart Collection opening on 14 February 2025. The exhibition has a selection of major paintings by artists who preceded the Impressionists plus some of the greatest paintings of Impressionism and Post-Impressionism.

Edouard Manet, Au café, 1878. Image: The Swiss Confederation, Federal Office of Culture, Oskar Reinhart Collection “Am Römerholz”, Winterthur

You could time your visit to also see The Somerset House Spring Courtyard Commission: Salt Cosmologies by Hylozoic/Desire. This 80-metre-long and 2-metre-high open-air installation can be seen from 20 February 2025.

The National Portrait Gallery has The Face Magazine: Culture Shift on from 20 February celebrating iconic fashion images and portraits from the youth style magazine. From 1980 to 2004, musicians featured on its covers achieved global success and the models it championed – including a young Kate Moss – became the most recognisable faces of their time.

Dickens in Doughty Street: 100 Years of the Charles Dickens Museum opens on 5 February 2025. It is a celebration of both the life of Dickens and of a Museum which now holds the world’s most comprehensive collection of material related to the great author.

If you’re looking for all the thrills without leaving the city, Zip World is opening its first permanent city-based site on 14 February 2025. Zip World London is based at the iconic ArcelorMittal Orbit sculpture located in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. You can get tickets for the views or whizz down the world’s longest and tallest tunnel slide – now called Helix. I tried the slide years ago and it is fun!