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Hrair Sarkissian © Kate Elliott, Courtesy of The Photographers’ Gallery.
Hrair Sarkissian © Kate Elliott, Courtesy of The Photographers’ Gallery.

Things to do in London this week

Discover the biggest and best things to do in London over the next seven days

Rosie Hewitson
Alex Sims
Written by
Rosie Hewitson
&
Alex Sims
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Can you hear the clink of Guinness glasses and the thump of Bodhráns? The craic is about to descend on London with St Patrick’s Day falling on Sunday this week. If you’re in search of ways to paint the town green, hit up London’s huge parade that concludes in Trafalgar Square with singing and dancing, pay a visit to your favourite Irish pub to see it at its rowdiest, or look out for one of the smaller celebrations taking places across the city. 

If you’re a film or literature buff you’re also in luck with a wealth of movie and book festivals kicking off this week. Look out for the ever-brilliant BFI Flare, the largest showcase of LGBTQ+ cinema in Europe with a packed programme full of the best in contemporary queer cinema from around the globe. There’s also a fest celebrating the often overlooked role of women in mafia cinema with some brilliant guest speakers and the Human Rights Watch Film Festival full of hard-hitting documentaries. 

The London Book Fair begins this week, but if you’re after a cheaper alternative take a look at the programmes at The Alternative Book Fair in Islington or Depford Literature Festival in south east London. 

Still got gaps in your diary? Embrace the warmer days with a look at the best places to see spring flowers in London, or have a cosy time in one of London’s best pubs. If you’ve still got some space in your week, check out London’s best bars and restaurants, or take in one of these lesser-known London attractions.

RECOMMENDED: listen and, most importantly, subscribe to Time Out’s brand new, weekly podcast ‘Love Thy Neighbourhood’ and hear famous Londoners show our editor Joe Mackertich around their favourite bits of the city.

Top things to do in London this week

  • Things to do
  • Festivals
  • London

The Irish are experts when it comes to partying. They’re so good, in fact, they even have a special untranslatable term – the craic – to describe their unique brand of conviviality. With Trafalgar Square as the setting for London’s official bash in celebration of their patron saint, a blast is pretty much guaranteed. The celebration is set to see more than 50,000 turning out for Irish food, dancing and a huge parade featuring pageantry, floats and music that will wend its way from Hyde Park Corner to Trafalgar Square with concerts, films, performances from community choirs, schools, dance troupes and a singalong finale.

  • Things to do
  • Film events
  • South Bank

BFI Flare is back at BFI Southbank (and to the BFI Player online) for its 38th edition, showcasing the best new LGBTQ+ cinema from around the world over ten days. This year’s festival kicks off with a world premiere of ‘Layla’, a debut film from London-based drag performer, screenwriter and director Amrou Al-Kadhi, and closes with ‘Lady Like’, Luke Willis’s documentary on ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ contestant Lady Camden. In between there’ll be an extensive programme of LGBTQ+ films as well as talks with actors and makers including Elliot Page, Amrou Al-Kadhi and Jeffrey Schwarz and plenty of after-parties. 

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At the heart of London’s lively, eclectic dining scene is Madison, offering unparalleled views across the Capital’s skyline from its large rooftop terrace, delicious grilled food, great cocktails and live music. Madison invited you to be a part of its world with a delicious three-course menu that combines playful takes on American classics with a broad range of influences from the diverse communities of New York. Book in with this ideal catch-up spot and take in the rooftop views while you take in a refreshing glass of bubbly.

Get this three courses and bubbles at Madison for £29, only through Time Out offers

  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • Theatre
  • Musicals
  • Covent Garden
  • Recommended

‘Standing at the Sky’s Edge’ is a musical about three generations of incomers in Sheffield’s iconic – and infamous – brutalist housing estate, Park Hill. It’s a stunning achievement, which takes the popular but very different elements of retro pop music, agitprop and soap opera, melts them in the crucible of 50 years of social trauma and forges something potent, gorgeous and unlike any big-ticket musical we’ve seen before. It has deeply local foundations, based on local songwriter Richard Hawley's music and it was made in Sheffield, at the Crucible Theatre, with meticulous care and attention. It has all the feels – joy, lust, fear, sadness, despair, are crafted into an emotional edifice which stands nearly as tall as the place that inspired it.

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  • Things to do
  • Classes and workshops
  • Greenwich

After some brain-expanding fun? This year’s British Science Week has the concept of ‘time’ as its theme and promises a fascinating roster of workshops, events and behind-the-scenes adventures. What better place to get stuck in than the home of Greenwich Mean Time? Events range from planetarium shows on how Arab navigators used stars to find their way around the earth to specialist behind-the-scenes tour and talks on mysterious black holes. 

  • Things to do
  • Markets and fairs
  • Holloway Road

Book fairs can often be costly, but this alt festival is planning a week of publishing events showcasing aspiring authors and emerging writers for free. Based at Islington Central Library, the week-long fest will feature talks from award-winning crime writer Ajay Chowdhury as well as an Indie Press Fair by some of the UK’s most important independent publishers.

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  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • Theatre
  • Drama
  • South Bank
  • Recommended

Francesca Mills is luminous in the title role of this sadistic thriller by Shakespeare’s young contemporary, John Webster. Mills speaks blank verse immaculately and emotionally, her voice shimmering on the edge of laughter or tears. Webster’s plays are more lurid and less subtle than Shakespeare’s. In this one, the Duchess’s evil twin torments and destroys her and her babies because he is so jealous of her secret marriage. Intimate, lit only by candles or, for one nightmarish central scene, plunged into darkness – ‘Malfi’ was designed for a theatre exactly like the Sam Wanamaker. There’s a memorable lustre to this otherwise straightforward production.

  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • Art
  • Soho
  • Recommended

Death, pain and injustice course through this year’s Deutsche Borse Photography Foundation Prize. It’s in the mass graves of Hrair Sarkissian, the feminist ire of Valie Export, the indigenous erasure of Rajesh Vangad and Gauri Gill, and the historical trauma of Lebohang Kganye. So while it doesn’t make for especially pleasant viewing, it does make for some powerful art. Through all the anger, sadness and pain here, you get the sense of these artists using photography to fight against societal wrongs. This is the camera as witness, as testament, and, more than anything, as weapon.

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Lightroom is back with another spectacle set to take your breath away. See this exciting Apollo Remastered collaboration with Tom Hanks, Christopher Riley and 59 Productions with an insight into the impending return of crewed surface missions by going behind the scenes of the Artemis programme, including interviews between Hanks and Artemis astronauts. With a musical score by Anne Nikitin, Lightroom’s powerful projection and audio technology will transport you to another world.

Get tickets to 'The Moonwalkers: A Journey with Tom Hanks' at Lightroom for £19, only through Time Out offers

  • Things to do
  • Exhibitions
  • Lewisham

After celebrating its 75th anniversary last year, this multimedia exhibition at the Migration Museum in Lewisham delves into the history of the NHS, and to the thousands of dedicated non-British workers who have contributed to its delivery of healthcare. Through photography, artifacts, and a newly commissioned interactive music video installation, their stories are lovingly told. Around 1 in 6 people within the organisation today are non-British, and many others are descendants of migrant healthcare workers. It’s a wonderful way to gain some insight into how working for such a precious but pressured organisation has impacted their lives.

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  • Things to do
  • Literary events
  • Deptford

Deptford will be filled with words, stories and performances for this literature festival run by Spread the Word. Look out for readings, walks and workshops led by local writers and creatives including Caroline Bird, Tice Cin, Dean Atta and Remi Graves. This year’s theme is ‘Unheard Histories: Untold Stories’, and there’s even a special launch event on Friday. 

51% off bottomless dim sum and a glass of bubbly at Leong’s Legend
Andy Parsons

12. 51% off bottomless dim sum and a glass of bubbly at Leong’s Legend

Never ending baskets of delicious dim sum. Need we say more? That means tucking into as many dumplings, rolls and buns as you can scoff down, all expertly put together by a Chinatown restaurant celebrating more than ten years of business. Taiwanese pork buns? Check. Pork and prawn soup dumplings? You betcha. ‘Supreme’ crab meat xiao long bao? Of course! And just to make sure you’re all set, Leong’s Legend is further furnishing your palate with a chilled glass of prosecco. Lovely bubbly.

Get 51% off bottomless dim sum at Leong's Legend only through Time Out Offers

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  • Things to do
  • Film events
  • Hammersmith

Ever watched a mafia film and squirmed at the fact it probably wouldn’t pass the Bechdel Test? This two-day festival, which focuses on the role, presence and agency of women in this iconic genre of movies, promises to be an eye-opening event. There are four feature films (including ‘Burning Hearts’ and ‘Nevia’) on the programme, all showcasing the impact these often passive female characters have on shaping the stories, and there’ll be a panel of experts to answer your questions. Director Francesco Munzi (behind ‘Black Souls’ and ‘Futura’) will speak alongside journalists such as Clare Longrigg (deputy editor of the Guardian’s Long Read section) and academics like Gaetana Marrone (professor of French and Italian at Princeton). Think the mafia is a mans world? Think again. 

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Escape reality through maximum immersion and experience 42 masterpieces from 29 of the world’s most iconic artists, each reimagined through cutting-edge technology. Marble Arch’s high-tech Frameless gallery houses four unique exhibition spaces with hypnotic visuals reimaging work from the likes of Bosch, Dalí and more, all with an atmospheric score. Now get 90 minutes of eye-popping gallery time for just £20 through Time Out offers.

£20 tickets to Frameless immersive art experience only through Time Out offers 

  • Comedy
  • Musical
  • Soho

A 6' 8" clown belting out sad pop covers? Cult US comedy-cabaret act Puddles is a cult proposition indeed, but there’s something profoundly moving – not to mention hilarious – about the US performer’s none-more-singular mix of physical comedy and mournful but beautiful covers of classic songs. He returns to Soho Theatre a couple of years after his cover of Blink-182’s ‘All the Small Things’ memorably soundtracked a Christmas John Lewis advert.

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Undeniably one of Chelsea’s most iconic restaurants, Bluebird is a gleaming Art Deco London landmark on King’s Road. See why this D&D London restaurant sits at the forefront of the capital's food scene, With a best of British menu, created by executive Head Chef Owen Sullivan. With a three-star Sustainable Restaurant Association rating, you can enjoy refined dining with a clear conscience.

Get your three courses and a glass of Prosecco at Bluebird for just £23, only through Time Out offers

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