Behind closed doors: No10 Downing Street is among the public buildings opening to the public next month
Open House is back next month, with a range of events in and around Croydon and the rest of the capital city, to give the public a glimpse behind the front doors and net curtains of some of London’s most famous addresses.
And Croydon, for once, appears to be participating in the events to a greater degree than for some time.
Open House is a mostly free London-wide festival that opens up and celebrates the city’s architecture, special sites and neighbourhoods, with open days and events taking place across all 33 boroughs.
Visitors to the Open House Festival can explore the city’s most remarkable homes, architecture and landscapes, and learn about London’s unique heritage and communities.
This year’s Open House Festival runs from September 14 to 22, with bookings opening from tomorrow, August 21. You should expect a Glastonbury-like scramble for some of the headline sites.
The tours on offer range from a Rock ‘n Roll Camden Tour, to “Beaks and Boroughs: nature in London”, to a Smithfield Market Tour, and include Dinosaur Swing Bridge in Crystal Palace Park.
No10 Downing Street will be open for two visiting slots – expect these to be vastly over-subscribed – together with a wide range of other public buildings.
Open house: there’s a varied range of tours and openings across London next month
There’s around 30 openings, tours and events registered for Croydon (the online list has some mis-filings). These include the banal, like the council’s poorly researched Heritage Music Trail, to the more intriguing, such as a walking tour with writer John Grindrod or a peak inside Stormzy’s Merky FC.
The Whitgift Almhouses will be open, as will Shirley Windmill, while the Museum of Croydon is actively offering a range of tours and glimpses behind-the-scenes.
Unlike previous years, sadly, there’s no entrée behind the tinted glass of Fisher’s Folly, although there are tours of the Town Hall on offer, for a rare sighting of its many pieces of fine art, publicly owned but rarely on public display.
- To get involved in the festival as a visitor, volunteer or contributor, you’ll need to register for an account. This will then allow you to log into the Open House Festival website to try to snaffle your choice of visits or tours.
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