The Best Exhibitions To See This Weekend
Got no plans this weekend and need something to do? You can’t go wrong with a trip to one of London’s best galleries or museums. Here are all the best exhibitions on this weekend.
London is filled with great galleries and museums, with iconic institutions like the Science Museum, the V&A, Tate Modern, and the Royal Academy all calling the city home. That means on any given weekend, you’re spoiled for choice with interactive exhibitions, art installations, photography exhibitions and more all happening in the city.
If you like immersive exhibitions, there are some massive ones on this weekend – one is an Infinity Room from Yayoi Kusama at the Tate Modern, there’s one that’s all about inflatable art, and then there’s a bunch of famous artworks to get lost in at Frameless, the city’s first digital art gallery, and all of them are perfect selfie opportunities too. There are also a load of free exhibitions on in London that are perfect for the weekend. With no need to book tickets, you can decide to drop in last minute – very handy for when your plans get cancelled or the forecast is showing wall-to-wall rain.
Whether you’re looking for exhibitions today, exhibitions this weekend or you want to stay on top of all upcoming art exhibitions, we’ve got you covered.
Look Back Over Wes Anderson's Work at the Design Museum
21st November 2025 – 4th May 2026
224, 238 Kensington High Street, Kensington, London W8 6AG
Calling all Wes Anderson fans! The Design Museum is hosting a landmark exhibition on the director, featuring objects from his personal archives that will be displayed in Britain for the first time. Wes Anderson: The Archives will look back over his career, from his early experiments in the 90s to his most recent films, with over 600 objects, including storyboards, sketches, polaroids, puppets, models, costumes, notebooks, props and more, on show. They include a pink model of the Grand Budapest Hotel, the fur coat worn by Gwyneth Paltrow in the The Royal Tenenbaums, the vending machines from Asteroid City, and stop-motion sea creature puppets used in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. The exhibition will also include a screening of Anderson’s first short film Bottle Rocket, as well as work-in-progress material and maquettes.
Go Behind-the-Scenes of Hamnet at This Exhibition
8th - 22nd December 2025
6 Fitzroy Square, London, W1T 5HJ
Oscar winner Chloé Zhao is releasing her adaption of Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet, starring Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal, in January but you can get a peek behind-the-scenes of the film before it comes out at this exhibition. Even as a Shadow, Even as a Dream will showcase a collection of original props, set pieces, on-set photography by Agata Grzybowska, and artwork and writings from Zhao and Buckley, giving you an insight into the creative process.
Step Inside a Botanical Garden With The Butterfly Trail at Outernet
Until 1st January 2026
Outernet London, Charing Cross Rd, London
Hold a butterfly on the tip of your finger at this immersive botanical garden at Outernet London. Created in collaboration with Pixel Artworks, mixed-reality experience The Butterfly Trail is back for another run on Outernet’s four-storey high, 16k wraparound screen. Using cutting-edge exhibition tech, The Butterfly Trail will take you through explorer Professor Peter Pelgrin’s Botanical workshop and inside his Glass House where you can interact with the space, release AR butterflies and trigger real-time animations using your smartphone.
This Exhibition Is a Showcase of Japanese Craft
3rd December 2025 - 10th May 2026
Japan House London, 101-111 Kensington High Street, London W8 5SA
With the Hyakkō: 100+ Makers from Japan exhibition, Japan House London is exploring the country’s rich culture of craft, with more than 2000 works across glass, metal, leather and wood, from 120 makers on display. The exhibition will explore how makers reference tradition in their works whilst also adding their own individual expressions, and how the craft of the everyday has come to be appreciated.
Spitalfields Crypt Trust Is Showcasing Work by Artists With Experience of Homelessness and Addiction
21st November - 4th December 2025
2nd floor, 100 Liverpool Street, London EC2M 2AT
Spitalfields Crypt Trust, which is celebrating its 60th anniversary, is hosting an exhibition at Cob Gallery featuring work by artists with lived experience of homelessness and addiction. The pieces in the Existential Exhibition have been made by students taking part in SCT’s art programme and reflect their journey of recovery and creativity. Artworks will be available to buy with 50% of the proceeds going to the artist and 50% reinvested in SCT’s art programme.
Tate Britain Is Hosting a Major Exhibition on Turner and Constable
27th November 2025 – 12th April 2026
Millbank, London SW1P 4PN
In the 250th year of their births, Tate Britain is hosting a major exhibition on J.M.W. Turner and John Constable, two of Britain’s greatest artists who were born within a year of each other and who used different visions of landscape art to reflect the changing world around them. Turner and Constable: Rivals and Originals explores the intertwined lives and legacies of these artistic rivals – critics compared their paintings to a clash of ‘fire and water’ – with over 170 paintings and paper works display, alongside intimate insights from sketchbooks and personal items.
Travel Back in Time to Pompeii at This Immersive Exhibition
14th November 2025 - 15th March 2026
ImmerseLDN, Excel Waterfront, London
The Last Days of Pompeii: The Immersive Exhibition is promising to take visitors on a journey through the ancient city through the use of cutting-edge tech, interactive experiences and original artefacts. The exhibition will showcase daily life in the city with recreations of Roman architecture and displays of artefacts and replicas, including bronze utensils and marble sculptures, before moving onto the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD that destroyed the city. There’ll be casts of Pompeii’s citizens shown in the way they were found after being preserved by calcified ash; eight-metre high projections featuring the sights and sounds of Pompeii; a 360-degree virtual reality sequence inside a Roman amphitheatre, including gladiatorial combat and a naval battle; and a free-roaming Metaverse experience where you can move through a recreation of the Villa of the Mysteries.
Journey to the Moon with Tom Hanks
24th November 2025 - 25th January 2026
12 Lewis Cubitt Walk, London N1C 4DY
The Moonwalkers: A Journey With Tom Hanks, which tells the story of humankind’s exploration of the moon, is back at Lightroom in King’s Cross. The immersive experience is narrated by the Oscar-winning actor, with an original score by Anne Nikitin. Hanks, who is a big space fan (pretty fitting that he starred in Apollo 13 then) has co-written the script with BAFTA-nominated writer-director Christopher Riley. As well as footage from the previous Apollo missions, the experience features interviews with Hanks and astronauts on the Artemis programme, which is preparing for the return of crewed surface missions to the moon. And all of that is projected using Lightroom’s cutting-edge tech.
The Gingerbread City Is Back for 2025
29th November 2025 - 4th January 2026
Unit 5, Coal Drops Yard, King’s Cross, N1C 4DQ
Forget gingerbread houses, there’s an actual gingerbread city coming to King’s Cross this Christmas. Created by the Museum of Architecture, this is the ninth year of the project and this time, the theme for the exhibition is ‘The Playful City’. The aim is to explore how we can design cities that spark fun and public spaces that encourage joy and connection, only doing it through the mediums of biscuits, sweets, cakes, and icing. Not only is this a sweet way to help get the public excited about architecture and innovative, sustainable design, a little holiday cheer never hurt anybody.
Tate Britain Is Hosting the Biggest Lee Miller Retrospective in the UK
2nd October 2025 - 15th February 2026
Millbank, London SW1P 4PN
The Lee Miller exhibition at Tate Britain is the most extensive retrospective of her photography ever staged in the UK, covering her work in French surrealism to her fashion photography to her war reportage. Around 250 vintage and modern prints, including some that have never been on display before, feature in the exhibition. It begins with Miller’s time working in front of the camera as a model before moving on to her work in Paris, including with surrealist artist and lover Man Ray. Photographs from Cairo and wartime London are presented alongside her famous images from Buchenwald and Dachau, with lesser-known elements of her practice, like images of the Egyptian landscape in the 1930s, also on show.
Step Inside Cecil Beaton's Fashionable World
9th October 2025 - 11th January 2026
National Portrait Gallery, Saint Martin's Place, London
Cecil Beaton was a true multi-hyphenate, working as a fashion illustrator, Oscar-winning costume designer and writer as well as a fashion and portrait photographer. The National Portrait Gallery is hosting the Cecil Beaton’s Fashionable World exhibition (the first of its kind) dedicated solely to his contributions to fields of fashion and portrait photography. Over 200 items, including images, letters, portrait sketches, illustrations and costumes, will be on display, capturing the glamour of the Jazz Age, the Bright young Things and the golden age of Hollywood. Portraits of the some of the most famous figures in the twentieth century, like Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor, Marlon Brandon, Queen Elizabeth II, Princess Margaret, Lucian Freud, Francis Bacon and Salvador Dalí, show just why Beaton was given the title ‘The King of Vogue’.
Look Back Over 25 Years of Gilbert & George
7th October 2025 - 4th January 2026
Hayward Gallery, Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, London SE1 8XX
Gilbert & George are some of the most iconic artists working today. Having spent the last five decades being ‘living sculptures’, their work acts as a record of our changing society – by incorporating text and images from everyday life in their pieces, their art opens a dialogue about social norms and taboos, things that the pair aren’t afraid to challenge. Gilbert & George: 21ST CENTURY PICTURES at the Hayward Gallery will look back over the past 25 years of their careers and explore the impact that technology and digital distortion has had on their reflections of today’s society. The exhibition will feature over 60 floor-to-ceiling installations; works from key series like NEW HORNY PICTURES, THE LONDON PICTURES, THE BEARD PICTURES, and CORPSING PICTURES; and two works from their new 2025 series THE SCREW PICTURES, featuring everyday objects sourced from around their home.
Marvel at the Diversity of the Natural World at the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Exhibition
17th October 2025 - 12th July 2026
Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London
The 61st Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition is being hosted at the Natural History Museum. The display features awarded images selected around from over 60,000 entries and it showcases the beauty and diversity of the natural world. See everything from penguins journeying across an ice shelf to a lion facing down a snake in the Serengeti depicted in the photographs.
Celebrate 100 Years of the Photobooth at The Photographers' Gallery
10th October 2025 - 22nd February 2026
16-18 Ramillies St, London W1F 7LW
2025 is the 100th anniversary of the invention of the analogue photobooth by Anatol Josepho and The Photographers’ Gallery is hosting an exhibition to celebrate. Strike a Pose! 100 Years of the Photobooth looks back on the history of the photobooth, from its initial invention to its everyday adoption around the world. A combined studio and lab in one, the photobooth made photography accessible and affordable to all, requiring no technical knowledge to operate. The exhibition charts the photobooth’s initial popularity (the first one in NYC was used by 7500 people in its first five days) to its ubiquitousness in the 1950s and 1960s (when they were used by regular people, celebs and artists like Andy Warhol) to the resurgence of analogue booths around the world following their disappearance after the rise of digital photography. Archive prints, vintage strips and materials will all be on display and there’ll be a booth for you to take your own pics in, with live feed running so you can see the mechanics of the booth in action.
Discover the Artists Who Pioneered Nigerian Modernism
8th October 2025 – 10th May 2026
Bankside, London SE1 9TG
Tate Modern is exploring the artists who revolutionised modern art in Nigeria in the mid-20th century with the Nigerian Modernism exhibition. Artists working both before and after the decade of national independence from British rule in 1960, across Zaria, Ibadan, Lagos and Enugu, as well as London, Munich and Paris, are showcased in the exhibition. The work of groups like the Zaria Art Society and Mbari Artists’ and Writers’ Club; the fusion of Nigerian, African and European traditions; and the backdrop of cultural and artistic rebellion will feature in the show, where you’ll be able to see works spanning paintings, sculpture, textiles and poetry from more than 50 artists, including Uzo Egonu, Ladi Kwali, El Anatsui, and Ben Enwonwu MBE.
Over 250 Banksy Pieces Are on Show at This Exhibition
24th September 2025 - 31st January 2026
79 Old Brompton Road, London
If you didn’t catch Banksy’s mural on the Royal Courts of Justice before it was scrubbed away, don’t fret as Banksy Limitless London in South Kensington has over 250 Banksy works on display – one of the most expansive retrospectives of the artist to date. Curated by Sorina Burlacu, the display brings together his certified originals, rare pieces, digital works and sculptures under one roof. Highlights of the exhibition include an exclusive holographic experience create exclusively for the London edition, installations from the 2015 Dismaland “bemusement park, certified prints of iconic works like ‘Flower Thrower’ and ‘Kissing Coppers’, the large-scale Phone Booth sculpture, more recent pieces exploring themes of immigration, and original art from the Walled Off Hotel in Bethlehem. The exhibition also promises to delve into Banksy’s process, featuring recreated stencil works and a mural installation capturing the essence of his street art.
Tate Modern is hosting an exhibition on Picasso that showcases his works in a way you haven’t seen before. Theatre Picasso, curated by artist Wu Tsang and author and curator Enrique Fuenteblanca, centres around Picasso’s fascination with performers, the way he borrowed from them to create his persona of Picasso the artist, and his painting ‘The Three Dancers’, which is celebrating its 100th birthday. The pair have turned the exhibition space into a theatre, displaying more than 45 of Picasso’s works across painting, sculpture, textiles and paper pieces, some of which have never been seen in the UK before. There’ll also be an accompanying programme of events alongside the exhibition, including dance and flamenco.
Dive Into the Fashion of Marie Antoinette
20th September 2025 - 22nd March 2026
Cromwell Road, London SW7 2RL
The V&A is hosting Marie Antoinette Style, the first ever UK exhibition on the fashionable and ill-fated French queen. As well as showing how she was a fashion icon in her own time, the display will examine Marie Antoinette’s influence on design, fashion, film and decorative arts more than 200 years after she was put to the guillotine. Over 250 objects will be on show, including pieces loaned from the Chateau De Versailles as well as contemporary fashion from the likes of Moschino, Dior, Chanel and Vivienne Westwood, and costumes from Sofia Coppola’s Oscar-winning Marie Antoinette.
Go Inside the Club That Shaped the 80s With This Blitz Exhibition
20th September 2025 – 29th March 2026
224, 238 Kensington High Street, Kensington, London W8 6AG
With the Blitz: the club that shaped the 80s exhibition, the Design Museum is revisiting the iconic Blitz club, which was a launchpad for the careers of its ‘Blitz Kids’, who included Boy George, Spandau Ballet, Sade and Princess Julia, among others. The club has become famous for its impact on 80s music, fashion and design, and the exhibition will explore that influence through garments, drawings, photographs, flyers, magazines, records, instruments and film (curated in collaboration with some of the leading Blitz Kids) – much of which has never been on public display before.
The Barbican is Looking at How Fashion Has Embraced Dirt and Decay
25th September 2025 – 25th January 2026
Barbican Centre, Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS
After hosting shows on Viktor & Rolf, Japanese fashion and Jean Paul Gaultier in the late 2000s and 2010s, the Barbican is returning to fashion programming in 2025 with the Dirty Looks exhibition. The show will look beyond conventional beauty to see how the contemporary fashion world has embraced wear, tear, dirt and distress, and what this means for the future of fashion. Traditionally viewed as beautiful and glamorous, over the last fifty years luxury fashion has been exploring how dirt and decay can provoke and empower, through pieces like pre-scuffed shoes, stained jeans and ruined romantic gowns. Dirty Looks will track the varied ways this dirty aesthetic has been presented, with works from over 60 designers on show. Alongside pieces from the likes of Alexander McQueen, Vivienne Westwood, ACNE Studios, John Galliano, and Maison Margiela, the exhibition will feature bespoke commissions from Hussein Chalayan, Ma Ke, Yuima Nakazato and Bubu Ogisi of IAMISIG, as well as works from emerging designers such as Paolo Carzana, Alice Potts, Michaela Stark, Solitude Studios and Yaz XL.
Rare Blondie Photographs Are Going on Show at the Barbican
14th August 2025 - 5th January 2026
Barbican Centre, Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS
The Barbican Music Library is on a roll with its exhibitions; following popular displays on emo music and Black British music, a show featuring rare backstage photographs of Blondie will be taking over the space. Blondie in Camera 1978 features 50 images taken by photographer Martyn Goddard, capturing the band in concert, backstage, in the studio and during photo sessions, in the year they released the Parallel Lines album. Though the Debbie Harry-fronted band formed in 1974, they achieved real breakthrough success in 1978 with Parallel Lines, going on to hit number one with ‘Heart of Glass’ in 1979. You can look back at the band’s early days at this exhibition, which will also feature poster prints, album covers, concert memorabilia, and items from the private collection of Alan Edwards, who’s done Blondie’s PR since 1978.
A Major Gianni Versace Retrospective Has Come to London
16th July 2025 - 1st March 2026
Arches London Bridge, 8 Bermondsey St, London SE1 2ER
This dazzling new exhibition celebrating the life and legacy of iconic fashion designer Gianni Versace is the first and largest retrospective of its kind in the UK. It features over 450 original pieces, many of which are here for the first time; from opulent baroque prints to edgy runway statements, the show spans 21 collections from 1988 to 1997. Expect iconic looks worn by fashion royalty like Naomi Campbell, Kate Moss, and Liz Hurley, alongside pieces once worn by Princess Diana, George Michael, and Elton John – one of Versace’s closest friends. The exhibition also includes personal sketches, rare footage, campaign imagery, and interviews that reflect Versace’s deep ties to British pop culture and London’s fashion scene. More than a celebration of the past, the show explores how Versace’s fearless vision continues to influence today’s style, identity, and celebrity culture.
Get Up to Close to the Dinosaurs at This Immersive Exhibition
Until 25th January 2026
12 Lewis Cubitt Walk, London N1C 4DY
Travel back in time to the era of the dinosaurs with Prehistoric Planet: Discovering Dinosaurs at Lightroom in King’s Cross. The immersive exhibition. Produced in collaboration with Apple TV+, the experience features some of the best scenes from the first two seasons of Prehistoric Planet alongside new material, extended CGI scenes and bespoke illustrations. With Lightroom’s state-of-the-art 360-projections, you can see Ammonites, Mosasaurs, Adaltheriums and Tyrannosaurus Rexes like never before as you discover the role they played in shaping our world from 66 million years ago.
Our INSIDERS can get 25% off tickets to the exhibition here.
Find Out What the Future of Food Could Look Like at the Science Museum
24th July 2025 - 4th January 2026
Exhibition Road, South Kensington, London SW7 2DD
With the free Future of Food exhibition, the Science Museum is exploring the ways that science is creating more sustainable ways of producing and consuming food. Over 100 historic and contemporary objects, including 3,500-year-old bread, the first ever Quorn burger, cell-grown salmon and the first beef steak grown outside a cow, will be on display. As well as diving into the way ecological and biotechnological advances will change the future of food, the show will also highlight the people and communities that are creating innovative alternatives to current industrial food systems, such as seed-swapping ceremonies in the Amazon and growing meat from cells at home in Japan.
See How Public Transport in London Has Evolved at This Exhibition
Until spring 2026
London Transport Museum, London WC2E 7BB
With the Then and Now: London’s transport in photographs exhibition, the London Transport Museum is celebrating the 25th anniversary of TfL and showing how public transport in the city has changed over the last 160 years. Historical images from the Museum’s collection are on display alongside newly commissioned images taken by photographer and TfL train driver Anne Maningas, who shot her photographs on a vintage Bronica medium format film camera from the 1990s.
Each year, the City of London works with artists and partners to curate a new trail of artworks that forms the annual sculpture park, Sculpture in the City. This summer marks the 14th edition of the sculpture park and features the work of 11 world-class artists and spans the Square Mile. New pieces, like a cast iron root sculpture by Ai Weiwei, an ink drawing-based piece based on scans of ancient oak trees from Jane and Louise Wilson, and a looping sculpture from Andrew Sabin, will be joining works retained from previous editions of the trail by the likes of Julian Opie, Maya Rose Edwards, and Richard Mackness. The nature of the sculpture park means that it’s 100% free and open 24/7, so you can stroll up and view the art any time you like.
The Wellcome Collection Is Exploring Humanity's Connection With Freshwater
26th June 2025 – 1st February 2026
Wellcome Collection, 183 Euston Road, London NW1 2BE
With Thirst: In Search of Freshwater, the Wellcome Collection is diving into humanity’s connection with freshwater as a source of life and key to good health. The exhibition will bring together art, science, technology, history and indigenous knowledge, and span ancient Mesopotamia to Victorian London to modern-day Nepal, in its exploration of our relationship with freshwater. Divided into five sections – Aridity, Rain, Glaciers, Surface Water and Groundwater – the show will feature over 125 objects that highlight the impact that access to freshwater has on the health of both individuals and ecosystems, the consequences that water mismanagement has around the world, and the innovative solutions being created to combat water crises.
See Whether Life Could Exist Beyond Earth at the Natural History Museum
16th May 2025 - 22nd February 2026
Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD
The Natural History Museum is going interplanetary with its next major exhibition, Space: Could Life Exist Beyond Earth? Experience some of the Museum’s latest scientific research with this multi-sensory show that explores the search for life beyond our planet. You’ll be able to explore different extraterrestrial environments, like the icy moons of Saturn and Jupiter; snap a selfie with a piece of Mars; touch a fragment of the Moon; check out a meteorite collection, including the Allende meteorite (which at 4.567 billion years old is older than Earth) and Ivuna (which is made from the same material as the Sun); guide a rover over rocky Martian terrain; and listen to the sounds of the Red Planet.
Uncover the Secrets of the Thames at This Exhibition
4th April 2025 – 1st March 2026
West India Quay, Hertsmere Rd, London E14 4AL
The London Museum Docklands is hosting the UK’s first major exhibition dedicated to mudlarking, where people unearth objects from London’s past when the tides recede to expose the riverbed of the Thames. Over 350 mudlarked objects, ranging from personal items to historic relics will be on display at the Secrets of the Thames exhibition. You’ll also be able to learn how mudlarks explore the river’s foreshore, uncover artefacts and curate their own collections, as well as reflect on the role that the moon and the tides have on the river and on mudlarking.
