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Landmarks in London

58 places from the A Reason to Stop library. Pick one to see what makes it worth a stop, then take the whole list with you in the free app.

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All landmarks

  • Abbey RoadThe zebra crossing outside Abbey Road Studios made famous by the cover of the Beatles' 1969 album of the same name.
  • Australia HouseThe Australian High Commission's grand marble banking hall, doubling as Gringotts Wizarding Bank in the first Harry Potter film.
  • BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir (Neasden Temple)A large Hindu temple in Neasden built from hand-carved limestone and marble shipped from Bulgaria and Italy to India for carving, then assembled in London, often cited as Britain's first traditionally built Hindu mandir.
  • Brompton CemeteryA Victorian cemetery managed by The Royal Parks, with a colonnaded Great Circle and central chapel, open free to walkers daily and known for its wildlife and graves including Emmeline Pankhurst and Dr John Snow.
  • Buckingham Palace and Royal MewsThe monarch's official London residence, with the working stables of the Royal Mews next door housing the royal carriages and horses.
  • The CharterhouseA Grade I listed former Carthusian monastery, Tudor mansion and still-working almshouse, with a free museum display and chapel open to visitors.
  • Chiswick House and GardensLord Burlington's compact Palladian villa, built 1726-29 and set in free-to-enter gardens with a cascade, classical statues and an 1813 conservatory used for camellias.
  • Christ Church SpitalfieldsNicholas Hawksmoor's towering English Baroque church on Commercial Street, restored in 2004 and free to step inside when open.
  • Crystal Palace DinosaursThe world's first dinosaur sculptures, unveiled in 1854 and now Grade I listed, standing on islands by the lake in Crystal Palace Park.
  • Cutty SarkA preserved 19th-century tea clipper in dry dock at Greenwich, one of the fastest sailing ships of its era.
  • Dr Johnson's HouseThe narrow 1700s townhouse off Fleet Street where Samuel Johnson lived and worked, kept as a small museum in one of the City's hidden squares.
  • Forty Hall and EstateA Grade I Jacobean manor house in Enfield, free to enter, set in parkland with a lake, gardens and the buried remains of a Tudor royal palace.
  • Fulham PalaceThe former residence of the Bishops of London for over 1,300 years, from AD 704 until 1973, set in its own historic walled gardens by the Thames in Fulham.
  • Guildhall YardThe City of London's ceremonial seat of government since medieval times, its yard tracing the outline of a buried Roman amphitheatre.
  • Hall Place & GardensA Tudor stone-and-flint mansion of 1537 with a later red-brick wing in Bexley, surrounded by free gardens best known for the Queen's Beasts topiary.
  • Ham HouseA rare, largely unaltered 17th-century mansion on the Thames at Richmond, built in 1610 and transformed into an opulent Stuart-era home by Elizabeth Murray, Countess of Dysart, and her husband the Duke of Lauderdale.
  • Hampton Court PalaceHenry VIII's sprawling Tudor palace with a baroque wing for William and Mary, the Tudor kitchens and 60 acres of gardens on the Thames.
  • Handel & Hendrix in LondonA single Mayfair museum spanning two adjoining Brook Street addresses: composer George Frideric Handel's home from 1723 until his death in 1759, and Jimi Hendrix's flat two centuries later from 1968–1969.
  • Highgate CemeteryA Victorian cemetery split into East and West sections on a wooded Highgate hillside, the burial place of Karl Marx and numerous other notable Victorians, known for its overgrown monuments and catacombs.
  • Kensington PalaceA royal palace in Kensington Gardens where Queen Victoria was born in 1819, with her childhood rooms, the King's Grand Staircase and the Cupola Room open to visitors.
  • Lesnes Abbey Ruins and WoodsThe flint-and-rubble ruins of a 12th-century Augustinian abbey on the hill above Abbey Wood, set in woods and parkland.
  • Marble Hill HouseA Palladian villa in Twickenham built in the 1720s for Henrietta Howard, mistress of the future King George II, as her own retreat away from court life.
  • Millennium BridgeA pedestrian steel suspension bridge linking St Paul's Cathedral to Tate Modern across the Thames, with a low-slung profile designed to preserve the cathedral's sightline.
  • The MonumentA 202-foot Doric column marking where the Great Fire of London started in 1666, with a viewing platform at the top after 311 steps.
  • Old Royal Naval CollegeA Baroque riverside complex in Greenwich designed by Christopher Wren, its grounds free to explore and its Painted Hall open for a separate ticket.
  • Osterley Park and HouseA country house remodelled by Robert Adam into a neoclassical showpiece in its own parkland.
  • Palace of WestminsterThe seat of the UK Parliament on the Thames, rebuilt in Gothic Revival style after an 1834 fire and topped by the Elizabeth Tower housing Big Ben.
  • Pitzhanger Manor & GallerySir John Soane's country house in Ealing, restored to his original design and reopened in 2019, now also a contemporary art gallery beside Walpole Park.
  • Platform 9¾, King's Cross StationThe half-trolley fixed to the wall near King's Cross's concourse, marking the fictional platform Harry Potter departs from for Hogwarts.
  • Postman's ParkA quiet City garden holding the Watts Memorial, a wall of tiles honouring ordinary people who died saving others.
  • Red HouseWilliam Morris's home, designed by Philip Webb and completed in 1860, a red-brick Arts and Crafts landmark decorated by Morris and his Pre-Raphaelite friends.
  • Royal Albert HallThe great red-brick elliptical concert hall in Kensington, open to visitors on daytime tours as well as for Proms and gigs.
  • Royal Hospital ChelseaThe Wren-designed retirement home of the Chelsea Pensioners, with a Soane stable yard, a Wren chapel and tours led by the scarlet-coated veterans themselves.
  • Royal Observatory GreenwichA hilltop observatory in Greenwich Park marking the Prime Meridian, home to historic telescopes and the origin point of world time zones.
  • Sadler's WellsOne of London's leading dance venues, on a site in Islington that's hosted a theatre in some form since 1683, when it began as a music house built around a discovered medicinal spring.
  • Somerset HouseA grand neoclassical building on the Strand with a courtyard and fountain court open to all, plus the Courtauld Gallery, exhibitions and a river terrace.
  • Southbank CentreEurope's largest centre for the arts, a Brutalist riverside complex housing the Royal Festival Hall, the Hayward Gallery, and a run of second-hand book stalls under Waterloo Bridge.
  • Southwark CathedralA Gothic cathedral dating from between 1220 and 1420, described as London's first Gothic church, free to enter beside Borough Market with Shakespeare and John Harvard connections.
  • St Alfege ChurchNicholas Hawksmoor's Baroque church in the centre of Greenwich, rebuilt in 1712-14 and said to mark where Archbishop Alfege was martyred in 1012.
  • St Bartholomew's Hospital, Henry VIII Gate & MuseumThe gatehouse and small museum of London's oldest hospital: the real place Holmes and Watson first meet in Conan Doyle's 1887 story, and more than a century later a real filming backdrop for BBC's Sherlock.
  • St Bride's Church, Fleet StreetWren's tiered steeple church on Fleet Street, long the spiritual home of journalists, with a crypt museum built around older foundations.
  • St Dunstan in the EastA church gutted in the Blitz and left as a ruin, now a public garden with ivy climbing through the Gothic window frames.
  • St Magnus the MartyrA Wren church at the head of old London Bridge, holding a four-metre scale model of the medieval bridge and an interior T. S. Eliot praised as Ionian white and gold.
  • St Paul's CathedralChristopher Wren's Baroque masterpiece and the City of London's defining silhouette, rebuilt after the Great Fire and still an active place of worship.
  • St Paul's Church, DeptfordA Grade I-listed English Baroque parish church on Deptford High Street, designed by Thomas Archer and consecrated in 1730 under Queen Anne's Act for building fifty new London churches, of which only twelve were ever completed.
  • Strawberry Hill HouseHorace Walpole's own "little Gothic castle" in Twickenham, built and expanded from 1749 onward and now recognised as the founding building of the entire Gothic Revival architectural style.
  • Syon HouseThe Duke of Northumberland's west London home, with Robert Adam interiors, a Capability Brown landscape and the huge Great Conservatory built in the 1820s.
  • Temple ChurchA round 12th-century church built by the Knights Templar, tucked away in the quiet Inns of Court off Fleet Street.
  • Thames BarrierThe 520m line of ten steel gates across the Thames at Woolwich, London's flood defence since the early 1980s and a striking piece of engineering to see from the Thames Path.
  • Tower BridgeThe blue-and-white Victorian bascule bridge you can walk inside, with glass-floored high-level walkways about 42 metres above the Thames and the original steam engines in its Victorian engine rooms.
  • Tower of LondonThe Norman fortress that grew into a royal palace and prison, still patrolled by Yeoman Warders and holding the Crown Jewels behind the White Tower.
  • Trafalgar SquareA public square commemorating the Battle of Trafalgar, dominated by Nelson's Column and flanked by the National Gallery.
  • Trinity Buoy Wharf LighthouseLondon's only surviving lighthouse, standing where Bow Creek meets the Thames, and home to Longplayer, a piece of music designed to play for 1,000 years.
  • Wembley Stadium TourA guided tour of England's national football stadium that takes in the press conference room, player dressing rooms, the players' tunnel and pitch-side.
  • Wesley's Chapel & Museum of MethodismThe Grade I listed Georgian chapel of John Wesley, opened in 1778, with a free Museum of Methodism in its crypt and Wesley's neighbouring house on City Road near Old Street.
  • Westminster AbbeyA Gothic royal church in Westminster that has hosted every English and British coronation since 1066 and holds the graves of numerous monarchs, scientists, and poets.
  • Westminster CathedralThe red-and-white striped Neo-Byzantine Catholic cathedral just off Victoria Street, with a mosaic-lined interior and a tower with a lift up to a viewing gallery over London.
  • Wilton's Music HallThe world's oldest surviving grand music hall, built in 1858 behind a row of Wapping terraced houses and still used today as a working theatre and performance venue.

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