DIARY / JULY 2026
Don't Miss: What's On In London
From Cole Porter glamour and Marilyn Monroe at the National Portrait Gallery to unseen Jimi Hendrix archive material in Mayfair and a technicolour immersive dreamworld at Excel Waterfront, London’s cultural calendar is showing off again. Here’s what to book, browse and make time for now..
Words by Katie Hutley
House of Dreamers arrives in London this summer, bringing its European immersive hit to Immerse LDN at Excel Waterfront. Created by twin designers Elena and Giulia Sella, the exhibition has already drawn more than two million visitors across Milan, Madrid, Rome and Paris, and now lands here with 16 installations built around dreams, imagination and pleasingly shameless escapism. Expect colour, light, sound, projections and enough surreal set pieces to keep both children and grown-ups happily absorbed.
For its London debut, the experience also introduces AI-powered personalisation through the House of Dreamers DreamBand, a wearable device that responds to each visitor in real time. Among the installations are Change Perspective, a fully upside-down apartment designed to make you see things differently; Never Give Up, where visitors quite literally punch through fears and insecurities; and Do What You Love, a heart-shaped tunnel with its motivational messaging very much worn on its sleeve. There’s also a pink ball pool, an enchanted forest and a swing through the clouds, because sometimes subtlety is overrated.
House of Dreamers opens at Immerse LDN at Excel Waterfront on 26 June 2026.
At the National Portrait Gallery, Marilyn Monroe: A Portrait marks what would have been the Hollywood icon’s 100th birthday with a major exhibition looking at the woman, the image and the machinery of fame that made her one of the most recognisable faces of the 20th century. And somehow, given the ubiquity of her likeness, manages to breathe new life into a story told so many times before. The show brings together portraits by some of the great photographers and artists of the age, tracing Monroe’s evolution from Norma Jeane into Marilyn, and exploring how carefully, and cleverly, she helped shape that transformation herself – part of the growing reshaping of her story from tragic victim to underestimated, ambitious artist. Expect glamour, yes, but also a more interesting look at performance, control, vulnerability and the reverberating afterlife of an image that has yet to fade.
At the National Portrait Gallery until 6 September 2026.
If you’re a fan of old-school glitz and glamour, High Society at the Barbican is the obvious ticket. Rachel Kavanaugh’s revival of the Cole Porter musical has opened to, er, high praise, with Helen George, Julian Ovenden, Freddie Fox, Nigel Lindsay and Felicity Kendal bringing champagne fizz to the story of socialite Tracy Lord’s complicated wedding plans. It’s glamorous, knowingly glossy and full of numbers that still know exactly what they’re doing, from True Love to Well, Did You Evah? and Let’s Misbehave. In keeping with the stars of the original film version, like Grace Kelly it is beautifully dressed; like Bing Crosby, it delivers the musical numbers perfectly; and like Ole Blue Eyes himself, it sends you back out into the City with a little more elegant swagger than when you arrived At Barbican Theatre until 11 July 2026
Barbican.org.uk or 020 7870 2500
Over in Mayfair, Handel Hendrix House is opening a new permanent display on Jimi Hendrix, featuring previously unseen archive material from his life and work in London. The material includes corporate records from Anim Records, which managed The Jimi Hendrix Experience, alongside more intimate traces of the musician’s day-to-day life, from dry-cleaning tickets and phone bills to invoices for the equipment that helped shape his sound.
There’s a lovely domestic dissonance to it: Hendrix the rock god, yes, but also Hendrix in Brook Street, living above the bustle of Mayfair, ordering food, wearing extraordinary clothes and trying to make a home in London. The display also brings in the story of Patricia “Trixie” Sullivan, who helped manage the day-to-day chaos around Hendrix and the bands, and whose archive gives the exhibition much of its texture.
The timing also neatly chimes with renewed interest in Hendrix imagery. At Wilderness Festival this summer, legendary photographer David Montgomery is due to speak about shooting the iconic Electric Ladyland cover, adding another thread to the story of Hendrix as both musician and image-maker – if you’re heading to Cornbury Park, make sure you don’t miss it.
The Hendrix in London display opens at Handel Hendrix House on 19 June 2026 handelhendrix.org
Wilderness Festival is at Cornbury Park in Oxfordshire from 30th July - 2nd August 2026 wildernessfestival.com
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