London Museum gets November opening date - and some surprising night-time plans

A photo inside the London Museum. — (Image credit: London Museum)

Soon the Barbican centre won’t be the only real reason to alight at the Barbican tube station, with the London Museum set to open soon.

The London Museum’s new Smithfield Market location will open on 28th November, joining the current London Docklands museum.

It inhabits a space that used to be part of Smithfield Market, which has spent the last few years going through a major renovation and all-round rethink.

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The museum will of course focus on London and its history, reaching right back to Roman times. You’ll be able to check out a floor mosaic and fresco, which have been uncovered after 2000 years.

In what the London Museum is calling a “world first” you can also watch tube trains pass by through a massive 6m-long window.

It’s planned to be much more than just a staid museum too, with a “day to night” programme of events in the Our Time section of the museum. The Fabric nightclub, Punchdrunk Enrichment theatre company and Morley’s chicken are all on the list of planned partnerships.

There are places to eat and drink too, while a monthly “dinner club” will begin from January 2027.

If this is all starting to sound nothing like a museum, the London Museum in Smithfield Market will have 13 “anchor displays” that feature “snapshots" representing iconic aspects and areas of London.

A big part of the initial focus on the London Museum will be on food, though. Its first wave of “guest editors” include food writers Ruby Tandoh and Jonathan Nunn, who are helping to steer the London Tastes section of the museum. It’s all about the “intersections of food and social change” in the global food city that is London, and will run from the museum’s opening to August 2027.

If you can’t wait for the new London Museum to open, you can visit the Docklands museum at West India Quay. It’s free to enter, and features all sorts of historic exhibits with a focus on the docks, trade during the time of empire and World War 2.

Two London museums have been announced as finalists for the Museum of the Year prize

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Andrew Williams has written about all sorts of stuff for more than a decade — from tech and fitness to entertainment and fashion. He has written for a stack of magazines and websites including Wired, TrustedReviews, TechRadar and Stuff, enjoys going to gigs and painting in his spare time. He's also suspiciously good at poker.