Naked bike rides. Men dressed as holly bushes flinging cider at the gates of the Globe Theatre. A 'ghost parade' that almost no one ever sees. London is downright strange sometimes, and we love it all the more for that. Mark your calendars with these kooky events — some tracing back centuries, others box fresh.
Twelfth Night (first Sunday of January)
While some of us spend the nascent days of the new year browsing the January sales, David Risley has an entirely different way of putting together a winter wardrobe; dressing up as the Holly Man, to lead this Bankside bacchanal featuring cider-flinging (at the gates of the Globe Theatre no less), an al fresco mummers' play (think Mighty Boosh, then dial up the doolally) and the chance to be crowned King Bean or Queen Pea. Alternative wassailing events take place around this time, but Bankside's is the daddy. Read more.
Blessing of the River Thames (first Sunday after 6 January)
As the life source of London, and numerous settlements besides, people have paid spiritual tribute to the Thames for centuries — that continues to this day with the Blessing of the River Thames, a nifty service held between two congregations smack dab in the middle of London Bridge, which culminates with a wooden cross being lobbed off the side and scooped out up by a police boat. The cross isn't the only thing to get wet; it always seems to be raining for this outdoor service. Read more.
No Trousers Tube Ride (January)
For the uninitiated, the event is exactly what it sounds like: people getting together to ride the Tube with no trousers on. If nothing else, it's a hell of an icebreaker: "The first time I did the No Trousers Tube Ride, a man in his sixties sitting opposite me said sternly: 'Young man! What are you doing in your pants?'" one participant told Londonist. "I told him, and he said, 'that sounds splendid!'". In the interest of keeping things legal, underwear with decent coverage is very much required. Why they chose January of all months is beyond us. Read more.
March in Commemoration of Charles I (last Sunday of January)
A very long time ago, we executed one of our monarchs, and some people are never going to let us forget it. On the last Sunday of the first month, The King's Army — a branch of the English Civil War Society — garbs up in Royalist costume and parades up and down The Mall to mark "His Majestie's horrid murder". A sombre, but crowd-mustering event. Wonder if Charles III ever goes to watch. Read more.
Clown's Church Service (first Sunday of February)
You can celebrate Joseph Grimaldi — godfather of all clowns, and a man who sadly wound up drinking himself to death — anytime you like, by dancing on his 'grave'. But it's only once a year you can join in a cuckoo memorial to him, surrounded by a congregation of clowns from all over the country, honking their noses, making balloon animals and causing general mayhem. Respectfully, of course. Read more.
Trial of the Pyx (February)
The Chancellor of the Exchequer is put on trial every year — well, in a roundabout way. The Trial of the Pyx, which dates back to 1282, making it one of the most storied happenings on this list, sees randomly selected coins from the Royal Mint examined for weight, shape, metal content, etc — to ensure they're up to code. The results aren't announced till a few months later, and no Chancellors have wound up behind bars yet, so far as we know. Limited public tickets are released for this one. Read more.
Swearing on the Horns (perhaps February, March, August and potentially other times)
A nonsense ceremony harking back to 17th century, the Swearing on the Horns began as a farcical trend around the pubs of Highgate, in which revellers were bid to take an oath read out by a clerk, swearing their allegiance to debauchery, while putting their hands on a set of antlers and promising to do things like forgoing brown bread whenever white bread is an option (told you it was peculiar). The pub most associated with it is the Wrestlers, which bears a plaque claiming it hosts the ceremony in March and August each year (although the above video from when the Joolz Guides did it was actually at the end of February). We've heard tell of other pubs doing similar things at other times of the year. Keep your ear to the ground. Read more.
Pancake Day races (Shrove Tuesday)
Pancake races are held across the country every Shrove Tuesday: in London a few of the biggest are at Leadenhall Market (where bowler-wearing local workers and visitors go head-to-head across a 20-metre cobbled course), and the Inter-Livery Pancake Race outside Guildhall, in which the Poulters provide the eggs, the Worshipful Company of Gunmakers fires the starting pistol and the Clockmakers time the race. Talk about a team effort. Read more.
Boar's Head ceremony (March)
Dating back to 1343, this livery company tradition saw the Butchers of London thank the Mayor for providing a space where they could clean and dispose of offal, by parading a boar's head to the Mansion House once a year, for an ultimate meat feast. The ritual continues to this day, and you can watch the boar's head (now papier mache) piped from outside the Worshipful Company of Butchers to Mansion House, where the Mayor is presented with the porcine noggin. Read more.
Pints Day at the French House (1 April)
Unlike 'Washing the Lions' at the Tower of London, here's an April Fools Days event that's no joke. Soho's French House pub usually frowns deeply on anyone who orders a pint; measures here are strictly in halves. That is, unless it's 1 April (or the nearest weekday if 1 April falls on a weekend). On this day — and this day alone — the crates of pint glasses are lugged up from the cellar and given a good rinse, before full pints are poured day-long — with celebrities auctioning them off for charity, sometimes for hundreds of pounds at a time. (You can just buy yourself a pint for a normal price, too.) Read more.
The Widow's Buns (Good Friday)
This story begins with a death: that of a young sailor who drowned on duty in the Navy. His mother — a widow — had promised to bake him a hot cross bun on his return. She did so anyway, and continued every year for the rest of her life, nailing the buns to the wall. The wistful tradition has carried on in the Widow's Son pub since it was built on the site of the cottage in 1848. A sailor is hoist up to place a locally-baked bun in a net above the bar, bulging with incrementally-ageing buns. We haven't been for a few years, but last time we were there, the bun lift was followed by a disco and a free buffet (feat. hot cross buns) — proper East End pub style. Read more.
Chair Lifting (Easter Monday)
"It's an Easter celebration which used to happen all over England — we're one of the few groups who still do it," explains Humphrey, aka the 'Blackheath Bagman', of the chair lifting ceremony that takes place each Easter Monday around the landmarks (and, importantly, pubs) of Greenwich. "It was an old custom all over Britain until a hundred years ago. It consists of the simple compliment of being elevated on Ēostre's Throne of Flowers. Ēostre was the Anglo Saxon Goddess of spring." If you've got a head for (slight) heights, perhaps this year you'll catch a lift. Read more.
The Tweed Run (April)
While the World Naked Bike Ride (see June) encourages cyclist to saddle up without a stitch on, this upmarket cycle ride does pretty much the opposite. Tweed jackets, faux-fur collars, golfing socks, tank tops and straw bonnets are the order of the day... you might even spot the odd pearly king and queen. No energy gels here, either; it's all cups of tea and post-pedal cocktails. Read more.
Islington Milkmaids Garland (1 May)
Harking back to the days when London's milkmaids decked themselves out in flowers and ribbons, the Islington Milkmaids Garland is these days performed by New Esperance Morris, a group of women morris dancers. A verdant pyramidal garlands stands nearby, laden with silver trinkets. Read more.
London Hat Walk (May)
'Wear More Hats' is the simple message that the London Hat Walk has for us (in fact this is a global movement, sweeping through some 50-odd cities across the world). The capital (or should that be cap-ital, geddit?) becomes one big catwalk for millinery disciples, many who've crafted their own headgear. If you like this walk, know that there's an entire London Hat Week to go with it. Read more.
Grand Flaneur Walk (May)
This really is the dapperest time of the year. If you haven't got your fashion fix from the Hat Walk/Tweed Run (above) the Grand Flaneur Walk oughta do it; an almost forcibly nonchalant flotilla of dandies/flappers, who make a point of not straining themselves too hard as they drift around London, going nowhere in particular. One of the only rules is that they congregate at the statue of London's original dandy, Beau Brummel. Read more.
Beating the Bounds (May)
Anyone who takes their bounds serious will give them a good beating this time of the year; that's certainly the case for All Hallows by the Tower, whose clergy folk lead a procession of stick-wielding students around the parish boundary markers, which they in turn give a whack and a prayer (maybe the prayer's that they don't get done for petty vandalism). One of the boundaries in unhelpfully out in the Thames, which doesn't stop a group of beaters commandeering a boat, and giving the water a good thrashing too. Read more.
Oak Apple Day (29 May)
If you had an episode in which you went and hid up an oak tree as a fully grown adult, you may choose to forget about it. Not so with Charles II. After a life-saving game of arboreal hide and seek, which led to him reclaiming the throne, Parliament decreed that "the Nine-and-twentieth Day of May, in every Year, being the Birth Day of his Sacred Majesty, and the Day of his Majesty’s Return to his Parliament, be yearly set apart for that Purpose…" While most of us have become somewhat lax with our oaky commemorations of late, at the Royal Hospital Chelsea (which was, after all founded by Charlie boy), they still make a big deal of it. In fairness, it's a happier occasion than the one marking his dad's decapitation (see January). Read more.
Bubble Sermon (first of Tuesday June)
"Life is but a bubble" the congregation is told at a sermon at St Bride's Church, organised by the London Stationers' Company. It's the highlight of the annual Richard Johnson service, Johnson being the Stationers' benefactor. What makes this particularly lovely is the demonstrative blowing of bubbles (although we're told this happens outside the church, not in the service itself). There's also apparently a rendition of I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles — a shoo-in for West Ham fans, then. Read more.
World Naked Bike Ride (June)
London becomes a sea of flesh each June, as the World Naked Bike Ride streaks into town, with hundreds of cyclists in various states of undress (many in little but their shoes) pedalling around in the name of body freedom, cyclists' rights, curb car culture and other such wholesome clarion calls. Any adult is welcome to dress down and saddle up, although it certainly helps if you know how to ride a bike. Read more.
Covent Garden Rent Day (July)
Who says rent in London is expensive? While City butchers get away with forking out a single boar's head (see above), Covent Garden Area Trust has but to pay a peppercorn rent of five red apples and five posies of flowers — symbolically at least. Since 1994, the centuries-old tradition has been revived, a town cryer bellowing out "Covent Garden Area Trust is paying its rent!" and various musicians and street performers adding to the sense of occasion. Well it is Covent Garden, after all. Read more.
Soho Waiter's Race (July)
An offshoot of the quirky Soho Village Fete, which takes place on the same day, the Soho Waiters' Race has its roots in Paris, by way of Chiswick, but since 1955 has firmly been part of Soho's social calendar. The idea — as if you need it explained — is that local waiters do a circuit of the surrounding streets, the twist being they're holding a tray with a napkin, a bottle of fizz and a glass balanced on it. Post smoking ban, the ashtray no longer features. Gather by the finish line outside the French House and open your gob in case you're lucky enough to get some prosecco sprayed your way. Read more.
Scotch Egg Race (July)
We reckon someone who was really good at Leadenhall Market's Pancake Race (see Shrove Tuesday) couldn't wait a whole year to bask in glory once again, and so invented the Scotch Egg Race — a traditional sports day egg and spoon race, but with extra pork meat and breadcrumbs. Will this, like the Trial of the Pyx (see February) last 800 years? We'll let you know. Read more.
Regent's Canal Rubber Duck Race (July)
The launching of 3,000 rubber ducks into the Paddington Bason might sound like a very serious bathtime-related case of fly-tipping, but no — everything's above board here. For a few quid, you can sponsor a duck, with the money going towards local charity Cosmic (Children of St Mary’s Intensive Care). If you're lucky enough that your ducky is first across the finish line, you'll clean up with the prizes. Read more.
Cart Marking Ceremony (July)
Before the days of sliding a tax disc in your windscreen (come to think of it, that's an ancient tradition now too), vehicles passing through the City of London were brandished with a licence to show they'd paid their dues. It's continued today as this ceremonial event, in which a parade of vintage carts, fire engines, vans and what-not are branded with a hot iron (well a piece of wood attached to them is, anyway) by members of the Worshipful Company of Carmen. They even do it to bikes. Read more.
Swan Upping (third week of July)
When it comes to the Thames' swans, the upper echelons of society are unabashedly possessive. Specifically, the Crown, the Vintners' Company and the Dyers' Company lay claim to these feathered beauties, and to hammer the point home, for about five days in late July, they row along the river in skiffs, catching swans and ringing them to flag who's whose, before set them loose again. (Think of it, if you will, as the feathered version of cart marking). Thankfully the swans are no longer served up at banquets, though this was still happening as late as the 1960s. Read more.
London Pearly Kings and Queens Costermongers Harvest Festival (September)
Pearly kings and queens have been a fixture of London since road sweeper Henry Croft decided to pimp up his threads with mother of pearl buttons in the 1870s for a charitable cause, but the best way to glimpse them now is at this annual knees-up in Guildhall Yard, followed by a service at home of the famous Bow Bells, St Mary-le-Bow. Read more.
Sheep Drive (September)
Those City of London folk: when they're not upping swans, they're driving sheep. Specifically, driving 50 North of England Mule Sheep over Southwark Bridge every September, in a nod to the drovers who herded various livestock over London Bridge (it's now too busy with traffic to host), en route to Smithfield when it was a livestock market. In this revived tradition, a different celebrity is called on to do the honours each year, and have lately included Mary Berry, Alan Titchmarsh and Damien Lewis. While the hoi polloi don't get that hounour, you can watch, before buying some wool at the accompanying livery fair. Read more.
Surbiton Ski Sunday (October)
Beckton's ski slope is long gone; so too is Hampstead Heath's shortlived ski jump. But every October the spirit of the Winter Olympics lives on in London, thanks to Surbiton Ski Sunday, an afternoon of makeshift ski and luge events played out on a very wet layer of tarp. Participants ski with blocks of ice tied to their shoes and clamber into bathtubs for scenes which recall a bougie twist on Last of the Summer Wine. For not taking itself too seriously, this event wins Gold. Read more.
Peckham Conker Championships (October)
There's nothing all that bizarre about conker fights — at least not in the UK — but in Peckham they (literally) hit different. Here, in the oak-tree flecked badlands of SE15, everything's ratcheted up to 11. A Battle Royale to win the coveted Golden Nut means you'll find yourself up against names like Willie Conker, Stompy Mcstampface, and Conk-ussion, as you brave graffitied alleyways, baying mobs and the looming threat of stampsies. "It would have been an easier loss if I hadn't kissed the floor thinking I'd won," 2022's runner-up Lil Lilz admitted to us. Read more.
Halloween dog parade (Halloween time)
A mere puppy of a London tradition, Chelsea's Halloween Dog Parade only made its debut in 2025, and so we wait with bated breathe to see if it'll return for a second instalment. Anyone keen to coo over pooches dressed as Scooby-Doo, Dogzilla or a classic pup-kin will have their paws crossed. Read more.
London to Brighton Veteran Car Run (November)
Maybe it's because this happens to pass a road near to where we live, but the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run is an utterly endearing Wacky Races-esque event, in which pre-1905 road vehicles pootle their way from central London, down to the coast. Lots of them break down, and every participant gets sodden wet, making it all the more important to be on the sidelines giving them a wave. Read more.
Lord/Lady Mayor's 'Ghost Parade' (November)
This 'secretive' event has no official title — in fact it doesn't even officially happen. But you can bet your bottom dollar that a few days before the Lord/Lady Mayor's Show, there'll be a dry run through the City in wee small hours, featuring the historical golden coach, pulled by a herd of glossy-coated steeds. We've seen it with our own eyes — I swear!. Also listen out (or rather, don't) for the Silent Ceremony, which takes place the day before the parade. Read more.
Santacon London (December)
"What do we want? Christmas! When do we want it? Now! Hoooooooooooooo!" It was over three decades ago that Santacon started out in the streets of San Francisco, with hoards of Santas accruing on the streets, not unlike the nightmarish opening scene from The City of Lost Children. Now, it's ensnared on the tree of London's yuletide traditions, like a particularly tangled set of fairy lights. To be fair, there is plenty of goodwill to all men (and women) on this epic drinking crawl — though when people start clambering on the back of rubbish trucks, perhaps it's time to put the cork back in the sherry bottle and head back to the North Pole. Read more.
Smithfield Meat Auction (24 December)
Vegans may choose to swerve this festive tradition, in which the remaining pre-Christmas stock of Smithfield — i.e. turkeys, sides of beef, suckling pigs, etc — are flogged by traders at serious discounts. Though it's called an auction, prices are set, and this is really more a case of catching the seller's attention. It's all good spirited, so you shouldn't go away empty handed, though it doesn't hurt to come prepared with a sign begging for a particular piece of meat. Also, it's cash only — now that is unusual. Read more.
Peter Pan Cup (25 December)
What an end of year mic drop: a gaggle of hardened swimmers plunging into the icy Serpentine on Christmas Morning, making a 100-yard dash then towelling off pronto in the hope they don't have hypothermia for Boxing Day. If that doesn't earn them the right to eat all the good Celebrations, I don't know what does. The Peter Pan Cup is so called because author JM Barrie donated the prize in 1904 — the same year Peter Pan was first performed on the London stage (Barrie himself didn't take part, coward). Only swimming club members can partake these days. Aww, what a shame! Read more.
Note: by and large we've kept this list to events which anyone can attend. Almost all are free. Do check details ahead of attending any of these — exact dates and times are liable to change yearly.
