What’s on in London this week: 22 - 28 September 2025
Discover our pick of events in London this week: 22 - 28 September 2025.
The British Art Fair 2025
The British Art Fair 2025 returns to London’s Saatchi Gallery this week, showcasing Modern and Contemporary British art. Over 80 leading UK dealers will exhibit works by celebrated artists including Frank Auerbach, Tracey Emin, David Hockney, Henry Moore, Ivon Hitchens, and Bridget Riley. This year’s programme features the Unsung exhibition, curated by Colin Gleadell, revisiting overlooked Modern British artists, alongside SOLO CONTEMPORARY, which spotlights emerging talent, and Digitalism, celebrating digital art.
Date: 25–28 September 2025. Location: Saatchi Gallery, Duke of York HQ, King’s Road, London SW3 4RY. Price: Collectors’ Preview £60, General Admission £25, Concessions £22, Under 16s free (booking required). Book now
Cristina Schek - Time to Crow, 2025, Archival Pigment Print, Digitalism edition of 5.
Caroline Guiela Nguyen: LACRIMA
LACRIMA by Caroline Guiela Nguyen opens at the Barbican, delving into the dramatic world of couture fashion. The play follows a Parisian fashion house tasked with creating a British royal princess’s wedding dress, bringing together a British designer, French lacemakers, and a beadworker in Mumbai. It reveals the intense, emotional labour behind a garment that shines for only minutes. Performed in French, with scenes in French Sign Language, Tamil, and English, and English subtitles, the show runs for approximately three hours and contains depictions of psychological and physical violence, as well as suicide.
Date: 25 – 27 September 2025. Location: Barbican Centre, Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS. Price: from £16 + £4 booking fee. Book now
Booker Prize 2025 Shortlist Announcement
The judges of the Booker Prize 2025, chaired by Roddy Doyle and including Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀, Sarah Jessica Parker, Chris Power, and Kiley Reid, will announce this year’s shortlist live at the Royal Festival Hall. The event offers a unique glimpse behind the judging process, featuring readings of unpublished judges’ correspondence and excerpts from the six shortlisted books by actors Louise Brealey and Alfred Enoch.
Date: 23 September 2025. Time: 7.30pm. Location: Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, London, SE1 8XX. Price: from £20 + £3.50 booking fee. Book now
Neo Gilder for Booker Prize Foundation
Acosta Danza: A Decade in Motion
Acosta Danza celebrates its 10th anniversary with A Decade in Motion at Sadler’s Wells, bringing the spirit of Havana to London from 23–27 September 2025. Founded by Carlos Acosta, the company showcases its versatility with two UK premieres: Javier de Frutos’ 98 Días, inspired by Federico García Lorca’s Cuban visit, and Goyo Montero’s Llamada, exploring sexuality, rage, and faith. The programme also features George Céspedes’ La Ecuación, combining Cuban social dance with precise technique, and De Punta a Cabo by Alexis Fernández and Yaday Ponce, set on Havana’s Malecón. From pointe shoes to salsa rhythms, it celebrates the vibrancy and energy of Cuban culture.
Date: 23 – 27 September 2025. Location: Sadler’s Wells Theatre, Rosebery Avenue, London EC1R. Price: from £15 + £4 building maintenance fee. Book now
Ketanji Brown Jackson: Lovely One
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the first Black woman to serve on the US Supreme Court, will discuss her memoir Lovely One with Afua Hirsch at the Royal Festival Hall. The book traces her family’s rise from segregation to her historic confirmation, charting her journey from a determined young girl to Harvard graduate, oratory champion, and leader in student organisations. Jackson shares what it takes to succeed in a profession where few leaders looked like her, while balancing the demands of career, marriage, and motherhood.
Date: 24 September 2025. Time: 7.30pm. Duration: approx. 1h 15m. Location: Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, London, SE1 8XX. Price: from £20 +£3.50 fee). Book now
Acosta Danza - De Punta a Cabo © Hugo Glendinning
Chelsea History Festival 2025
The Chelsea History Festival returns this week, celebrating the rich heritage of Chelsea with over 80 events across Chelsea Physic Garden, the National Army Museum, and Royal Hospital Chelsea. The festival features talks by leading historians and authors, family-friendly walking tours, concerts, exhibitions, and garden visits. Highlights include award-winning journalist Emily Maitlis, historian Greg Jenner, Alan Turing’s nephew Dermot Turing, Sunday Times columnist Mark Urban, and bestselling author Simon Jenkins. Special concerts, free family activities, and exclusive exhibitions such as Lost and Found in Hong Kong: The Unsung Chinese Heroes of D-Day and Beyond Burma: Forgotten Armies will run throughout the festival.
Date: 24–28 September 2025. Location: Chelsea Physic Garden, 66 Royal Hospital Road, London SW3 4HS; National Army Museum, Royal Hospital Road, London SW3 4HT; Royal Hospital Chelsea, Royal Hospital Road, London SW3 4SR. Tickets are on sale at chelseaheritagequarter.co.uk.
Santtu & Víkingur Ólafsson – Philharmonia Orchestra
The Philharmonia Orchestra celebrates its 80th birthday season with a programme of fresh compositions and classical masterpieces. The evening opens with a new work by Gabriela Ortiz, the orchestra’s triple Grammy-winning Featured Composer, known for her vibrant, Mexican-inspired style. This is followed by Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto, performed by acclaimed pianist Víkingur Ólafsson, the Philharmonia’s Featured Artist for the season. The concert concludes with Saint-Saëns’ Organ Symphony, featuring Olivier Latry on the Royal Festival Hall organ, delivering a powerful, immersive orchestral experience.
Date: 25 September 2025. Time: 7.30pm. Duration: Approx. 2 hours. Location: Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, London, SE1 8XX. Price: from £17 + £3.50 booking fee. Book now
Old Royal Naval College, Film100 Guinness World Records™ attempt
In a landmark celebration of a decade of UK cinematic legacy, the Old Royal Naval College (UNESCO World Heritage Site and the UK’s most filmed heritage location) and Elstree Film Studios (home to Star Wars, Indiana Jones, The Shining and more) invite families, film fanatics and set-jetters to dress up for an epic Guinness World Records™ attempt for the largest gathering of people dressed as film and TV characters. From Bridgerton to Bond, Star Wars to Marvel’s Thor, attendees will have photo opportunities with iconic props including the Batmobile, access to film themed food and drinks, and be part of a historic once-in-a-century moment in UK screen culture.
Date: 27 September 2025, activities from 11am. Location: Grounds of the Old Royal Naval College, King William Walk, Greenwich, London, SE10 9NN. Price: Tickets: Free, VIP: £13.50. Book now
Image credit National Theatre
Hamlet
Hamlet returns to the National Theatre for the first time in 15 years, starring Olivier Award-winner Hiran Abeysekera in a bold, contemporary take on Shakespeare’s iconic tragedy. The production explores duty, doubt, and betrayal, confronting the gripping questions of life, death, and revenge in the Lyttelton Theatre.
Date: 25 September — 22 November 2025. Location: Lyttelton Theatre, National Theatre, South Bank, London SE1 9PX. Price: £20 - £89. Book now
Fleurs de Villes Downton Abbey 2025
Fleurs de Villes presents a new floral art series inspired by the beloved Downton Abbey series and films, coinciding with the release of the third film on 12 September 2025. The show will take place at Kew Gardens, featuring exquisite fresh floral mannequins celebrating the series’ iconic characters, period fashion, and opulent settings. The exhibition includes floral workshops, talks, demonstrations, pop-up flower markets, elegant high teas, specialty cocktails, and film screenings of the first two Downton Abbey films, bringing the drama, style, and timeless elegance of the Crawley family to life through the artistry of top florists.
Date: 22 September - 1 October 2025. Location: Kew Gardens, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Richmond, TW9 3AE. Price: from. £30. Book now
Fleurs de Villes Downton Abbey 2025, Kew Gardens. Image credit MTotoe
Cinema
Deaf
Deaf follows Ángela, a young deaf ceramicist and new mother, as she navigates the challenges of a society that often overlooks her needs. Told with intimate observation and poetic visuals, the film meditates on identity, communication, and resilience, exploring the spaces between sound and silence, voice and gesture. Eva Libertad’s debut feature, acclaimed at the Berlinale and Málaga Festivals, offers a tender yet uncompromising portrait of a woman shaping her life on her own terms.
Date: 24- 25 September 2025. Location: Institute of Contemporary Arts, The Mall, London SW1Y 5AH. Price: from £11. Book now
Deaf (dir. Eva Libertad, Spain 2025, 100 min., Spanish with English subtitles, 12A)
Arts & Culture
Opening this week
Dirty Looks: Desire and Decay in Fashion
Dirty Looks, opening at the Barbican, examines how designers worldwide have used dirt, decay, and imperfection as creative forces in contemporary fashion. The exhibition features over 100 looks from more than 60 designers, including Hussein Chalayan, Vivienne Westwood, IAMISIGO, Robert Wun, and Comme des Garçons, tracing fifty years of distressed and decomposed aesthetics that challenge traditional notions of beauty, luxury, and value. Displays range from rusted, buried garments and mud-stained couture to regenerated textiles and spiritually inspired designs, revealing how decay has been reclaimed as a symbol of resistance, renewal, and transformation.
Date: 25 September 2025 - 25 January 2026. Location: Barbican Art Gallery, Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS. Price: from £20+ BF. Concessions available. Book now
Dirty Looks, IAMISIGO, handwoven raffia-cotton blend look dyed with coffee and mud spring/Summer 2024 Shadows. Photograph by Fred Odede, courtesy of IAMISIGO
Grant Mooney
Grant Mooney’s upcoming exhibition at Chisenhale Gallery will present a series of sculptures exploring the tactile and sensory qualities of metal, blending abstract, autonomous, and site-specific approaches. Drawing on his background in metalsmithing and deep knowledge of metal alloys, Mooney will investigate the physical interactions and transformations of materials. For this commission, he will respond directly to the gallery’s environment and architecture, creating works that engage with the building’s infrastructure and surroundings.
Date: 26 September – 7 December 2025. Location: Chisenhale Gallery, 64-84 Chisenhale Road, London E3 5QZ. Price: Free. Book now
Yto Barrada: Thrill, Fill, Spill
Thrill, Fill, Spill, a solo exhibition by internationally acclaimed artist Yto Barrada at the South London Gallery, spans sculpture, textiles, film, and painting. The works explore resistance, cultural identity, and environmental fragility, featuring textiles dyed at her eco-residency The Mothership in Morocco, sculptures inspired by Moroccan human pyramids, and Tintin in Palestine, which reinterprets colonial imagery through hand-dyed silk grids. Opening ahead of Barrada’s presentation for France at the 2026 Venice Biennale, the exhibition offers a timely reflection on history, memory, and collective resilience.
Date: 26 September 2025 - 11 January 2026. Location: South London Gallery, 65–67 Peckham Road, London SE5 8UH. Price: Free. southlondongallery.org
Yto Barrada, A day is a day, 2020. Courtesy the artist and Pace Gallery
Lawrence Lek: Life Before Automation
Life Before Automation, by London-based artist Lawrence Lek, presents an ambitious exploration of artificial intelligence, technology, and speculative futures. The exhibition interweaves film, installation, video games, and sound to create immersive “worlds for non-humans,” centring on Lek’s Sinofuturist vision where AI and technological influence shape society. The exhibition challenges perceptions of human-machine relationships and the impact of technology on everyday life.
Date: 26 September – 14 December 2025. Location: Goldsmiths CCA, Goldsmiths, University of London, New Cross, London SE14 6NW. Price: Free. goldsmithscca.art
Lawrence Lek. UnrealEstate(TheRoyalAcademyIsYours)
#FLOFavourites: Pick of the Week
Free event of the week
Tate Modern Lates
Tate Modern exterior from the North Bank. © Tate Photography
From 26 September 2025, Tate Modern is extending its opening hours to stay open until 9 pm every Friday and Saturday. This decision follows a surge in attendance from younger visitors, with 70% of the 76,000 attendees at the May 2025 anniversary weekend under the age of 35. The extended hours aim to provide greater accessibility for those with daytime commitments and to support London’s vibrant cultural nightlife. Regular Tate Lates events, featuring DJ sets, live music, creative workshops, artist talks, and short film screenings, will continue at the end of each month, running from 6–10 pm.
Click here to discover more on the new late openings and upcoming events at Tate Modern.
Interview of the week
In conversation with Maya Gurung-Russell Campbell
Maya Gurung-Russell Campbell
Maya Gurung-Russell Campbell works across sculpture, image, and text, exploring memory and fragile structures through her Caribbean and Nepalese heritage. Currently showing I Want to Be Ready at Incubator, she is a Royal Academy Schools student (graduating 2026) and Bloomberg New Contemporaries alumna (2021), with past exhibitions at Teaspoon Projects, Ginny on Frederick, Royal Overseas League, Sadie Coles HQ, and Chilli Art Projects.
Click here for the full interview.
Food of the week
Carbone London
Capone London. Chancery Rosewood. Image credit by Douglas Friedman.
Carbone London has just opened in Mayfair, at the newly launched Chancery Rosewood hotel. This is the London outpost of the cult New York restaurant, famous for its luxe take on Italian-American classics. The menu is packed with favourites from across the Atlantic, from chicken scarpariello and veal parmesan to the legendary spicy vodka rigatoni, all served in a glamorous yet playful setting of crimson walls, Murano chandeliers, and cosy booths. It’s a slice of New York swagger with a London twist!
Location: Carbone London, The Chancery Rosewood, 30 Grosvenor Square, London W1K. Website: carbonelondon.com; Location: @carbonerestaurants
Cause of the week
Number Champions
Number Champions
Number Champions is a charity supporting primary school children in London who struggle with maths, helping to boost both their skills and confidence through fun, one-to-one sessions. Volunteers can sign up as In-School Volunteers, giving just 1½ hours a week during the school day to work with the same child for an entire school year. Full training, safeguarding checks, and ongoing support are provided, and placements are currently available across 14 London boroughs, with plans to expand further.
Click here to discover more on how to get involved with Number Champions.
