All stories

London Places
London Places

The animals of London Zoo in the 1950s

Photographer Henry Grant takes us on a tour of these Regent’s Park residents

Love, Sex & Relationships
Love, Sex & Relationships

The toilet photos that saved gay men on trial

Fighting the prosecution of gay encounters in the 1980s and 1990s

Music & Subculture
Music & Subculture

The comic operas of Gilbert & Sullivan

The writer-composer pair behind the hottest shows in Victorian London

Fashion & Style
Fashion & Style

Katharine Hamnett shaped the style of the 1980s

Oversized silhouettes, worn-in denim, political slogans – Hamnett’s designs drove a new London look

Fashion & Style
Fashion & Style

Norman Hartnell: Couturier to queens & stars

The south Londoner who brought a theatrical flair to high-end fashion design

London stories
London stories

London’s stars of the stage & screen

The actors, singers, dancers and entertainers who’ve taken the city by storm

Fashion & Style
Fashion & Style

The Forty Elephants: South London’s supreme shoplifters

How an all-women clan of career criminals hounded West End department stores

Art & Design
Art & Design

Alvin Langdon Coburn’s ethereal photographs of London

A foggy, shadowy view of the capital in 1909

Rights & Activism
Rights & Activism

Occupy London: Looking back at the 2011 protests

In the wake of the global financial crisis, anti-capitalist protesters set up a camp outside St Paul’s Cathedral

Lifestyle & Leisure
Lifestyle & Leisure

Portraits of London’s close-knit queer club scenes

Liz Johnson Artur captured community, individuality and joy on and around the dance floor

Immigration & Identity
Immigration & Identity

The Huguenots in London

These French refugees worked silk in Spitalfields and silver in Soho, weaving a lasting legacy

Food & Diet
Food & Diet

Fast food & feasts: Where did Tudor Londoners eat out?

Meat pies, alehouse snacks and boiled sheep’s feet sold on the streets

Architecture & Home
Architecture & Home

Inside St Paul’s Cathedral

Tiptoe through these tranquil photographs from the early 1900s

Lifestyle & Leisure
Lifestyle & Leisure

Soho in the 1950s: The wild West End

A place where outsiders felt at home

Art & Design
Art & Design

Photographing London after dark

When the sun set, Alan Delaney took out his camera, capturing a ghostly city marked by shadow

Death & Disasters
Death & Disasters

Who was publicly executed in London?

Thirteen tales of the cooks, rebels, bankers and king who died in front of a watching crowd

Publishing & Media
Publishing & Media

Malorie Blackman’s books shaped Britain’s youth

The south-east Londoner writes diverse fictional worlds for young people of all ages

Publishing & Media
Publishing & Media

Zadie Smith: Writing north-west London

The author of White Teeth and The Fraud uses Brent as her canvas