Let's explore the "RIBA" at Warren Street! - London's hidden museum gems

“Thamesmead: A Town for the 21st Century”

(Royal Institute of British Architects)

This upstairs gallery is just besides RIBA’s beautiful hall and staircases. Do check them out as you walk past them.

1. “Thamesmead” is a post-war housing estate in southeast Greater London.

2. A good exhibition starts with a compelling intro text. And our story starts with how the estate quickly degenerated into a red district with poor transportation and limiting facilities.

(You can say it with irony: brutalism meets dystopia.)

(Trivia alert: And to make things more quirky – A Clockwork Orange was shot there.)

See for yourself: “Thamesmead: A Town for the 21st Century” (Royal Institute of British Architects)

3. But then came a promising twist, with the whole thing changing hands to Peabody in 2014. (Could privatization save the day? An opposite view is brewing in the exhibition downstairs.)

4. You’ll also find yourself in multiple language games, where excerpts from cold official documents are surrounded by residents’ oral accounts.

(And last but not least – obviously, the photography. All the works here are either ancient b&w’s from Riba’s collection or recent colours by Nina Manandhar.)

When you feel like life is too short, come join my 25-min museum tour. Or find yourself in my novel, check out the photo of the day and finish it off with a secret prize.

Tags - in_depth_tourism; museum; London_writer; London_travel; indie_writer; independent_blogger