Check out this week's alternative guide to what's on in London. | A two-week Christmas edition seeing you through the New Year - the next edition will be sent on Wed 1st Jan. Enjoy the holidays. | = Event is free of charge | | = Pre-Booking required. |
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| | | Saturday, 21st December | | Waterloo Classics is a monthly classic car show/meet in central London. | | | | Love it or hate it, the concrete landscape of Europe’s largest art centre has been dividing opinion for generations. | | | | Robin Ince is back to host another four nights of the acclaimed Nine Lessons and Carols for Curious People. | | | | | | Sunday, 22nd December | | | | Monday, 23rd December | | It's quiet over Christmas, so if you've never been, it's a good time to visit Parliament for a tour. | | | | | | Tuesday, 24th December | | The Charles Dickens Museum will be filled with festive greenery, authentic Victorian fayre and the scent of citrus and spice. | | | | Good news for meat lovers and lovers of a meaty bargain as the exceptionally good fun Christmas Eve auction will return to Smithfield this year. | | | | | | Wednesday, 25th December | | Watch from the shore the famous Christmas morning swim in Hyde Park's Serpentine Lake. | | | | On Christmas Day 2019 a free bus service will run on route 430 between Roehampton and Putney Bridge. | | | | The one ice rink that will be open on Christmas Day. | | | | | | Thursday, 26th December | | A folk tradition to perform a mummers play at three Middlesex pubs. | | | | Morris men are inviting everyone to an ancient midwinter play during their Boxing Day tour of Ewell Village. | | | | | | Friday, 27th December | | It's quiet over Christmas, so if you've never been, it's a good time to visit Parliament for a tour. | | | | | | Saturday, 28th December | | | | Sunday, 29th December | | A monthly open day at a quirky transport museum housed in an old water pumping building. | | | | A lecture about a short-lived island in the Mediterranean that appeared in 1831. | | | | | | Monday, 30th December | | Tuesday, 31st December | | | | Wednesday, 1st January | | Spend New Year's Day riding a steam train on the Epping to Ongar railway. | | | | Probably the largest New Year’s Day Classic Vehicle Gathering in the UK. | | | | Annual USA-style parade through the centre of London. | | | | A New Year's Day walk around Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park | | | | | | Thursday, 2nd January | | | | Friday, 3rd January | | It's quiet over Christmas, so if you've never been, it's a good time to visit Parliament for a tour. | | | | Explore Hogarth: Place and Progress after normal opening hours, accompanied with a Gin & Tonic. | | | | | | Saturday, 4th January | | Fire, noise and celebration will scare off the bad spirits ensuring a good harvest in the coming year as we bless the apple trees in our orchard with this old English tradition. | | |
| Exhibitions closing shortly | | Highlights include self-driving cars, autonomous flying drones and smart underwater vehicles like the Autosub Long Range Boaty McBoatface. (Ends on Sat, 21st Dec) | | Nine buildings will be lit up at night will illustrations of trees from the Nine Elms. (Ends on Sat, 21st Dec) | | The exhibition looks at Pope’s early life in Twickenham and the creation of his villa, garden and grotto. (Ends on Sun, 22nd Dec) | | An enchanting experience of light, colour and sound as our grounds are transformed into an illuminated world. (Ends on Sun, 22nd Dec) | | Grosvenor Square is set to grow and glow this festive season, as the Ever After Garden; an installation of symbolic, illuminated roses. (Ends on Sun, 22nd Dec) | | To celebrate the work of Freddy Warren, a selection of photographs are showcased in this exhibition that captures the atmosphere and movement of jazz. (Ends on Sat, 4th Jan) | | Step inside to join the rebel celebrations and discover centuries-old traditions that were forced to go underground in the 1600s. (Ends on Sat, 4th Jan) | | To celebrate 50 years since NASA’s Apollo 11 mission landed the first humans on the Moon, the UK’s biggest exhibition dedicated to Earth’s nearest celestial neighbour. (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | This winter, more twinkling and fantastical than ever before, Christmas at Kew returns. (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | A huge floating "Moon" will fill a darkened room and it's oddly exciting to see (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | A series of striking photographs of science in action will soon go on display at the Science Museum as part of the Royal Photographic Society’s inaugural Science Photographer of the Year competition. (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | Discover what it was like to go to a show in eighteenth and nineteenth century Britain (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | Jide Odukoya’s photographic series shows Nigeria abuzz through the lens of traditional Nigerian weddings. (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | Discover artists who have risked their lives in times of conflict for the music they love. (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | The exhibition explores why cultural heritage is attacked during war and the ways we save, protect and restore what is targeted. (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | Created in close collaboration with the artist, Elizabeth Peyton: Aire and Angels, explores the development of Peyton’s unique art from the 1990s to the present day. (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | All of the paintings and engravings in Hogarth's series have been united for the first time to examine his complex views on morality, the society and the city. (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) | | The Museum of Architecture brings its hugely popular Gingerbread City exhibition to Somerset House. (Ends on Sun, 5th Jan) |
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