What we’ve always known: London named best city for culture

Time Out magazine has rated London the best city in the world for culture, outranking both Paris and New York.

It was judged on the availability of museums, theatre, art galleries, live music, literary festivals and comedy clubs.

London was particularly praised for its free access to a large number of these cultural venues.

Of course, this is not news to SOAS students, who are ideally situated in the heart of the capital to take advantage of all these cultural entertainments, many of which are located right on SOAS’s doorstep in Bloomsbury.

The British Museum

It is impossible to contemplate culture and not think of the British Museum. 

Its collection of eight million artefacts is the largest in the world. Indeed, it is so immense that a good strategy for tackling it is to just pick out one or two particular exhibits to visit, rather than become overwhelmed by such a vast cultural overload.

Platform 9¾ 

It is not possible to actually catch a train from King’s Cross Station to Hogwarts, but it is possible to visit Platform 9¾ and, for Potterheads, to have your photograph taken wearing a Hogwarts scarf and waving a Harry Potter wand.

The Horse Hospital

Five minutes’ walk from SOAS, the Horse Hospital is an independent alternative arts venue, focussing on contemporary counter- and sub-culture; outsider art; film screenings; and with a particular emphasis on promoting emerging artists.

Bloomsbury Club Bar

If your particular idea of culture is cocktails and live jazz music, the Bloomsbury Club Bar offers both in sumptuous bohemian surroundings with a speakeasy vibe. Nice.

Charles Dickens Museum

The author’s house on Doughty Street is where the novel Oliver Twist was originally written. Nowadays, the Georgian terrace building is a museum dedicated to Dickens’s writing and his advocacy for London’s working classes. After an immersion of Victoriana, enjoy a cuppa in the Artful Tea Room. You’d be a Scrooge not to pay the £14 entrance fee to visit.

And, not forgetting, SOAS’s own gallery:

SOAS Gallery

The SOAS Gallery hosts a changing programme of contemporary and historical exhibitions from Asia, Africa and the Middle East. It is the perfect place to spend a lunchtime to soak up all the rich diversity of cultural life that London has to offer.

Header image by Natanael Vieira, Unsplash