A list of over 600 Open House Festival 2026 venues and walks has just dropped on the official website.
Started in 1992 as Open House London (a name which many still call it), the free event opens doors to venues across the capital, and has garnered a reputation as a 'Christmas for architecture lovers'. In recent years, Open House expanded to cover two weekends, with a sprinkling of mid-week events. 2026's festival runs from 12-20 September.
At the moment, the website only shows which venues/tours are happening. Specific dates and booking don't kick in until 12pm on Wednesday 19 August. But consider this your clarion call to start gently perusing what tickles your fancy, and putting together a 'to visit' list. The extremely handy map of locations will presumably become available in August too.
Some Open House venues can easily be visited as drop-ins, while others will require booking (these are often major buildings, or otherwise those with limited space, as well as walking tours).
Separately, ballots for extra special venues (think 10 Downing Street; the BT Tower) open on Wednesday 29 July, with the winners announced on Monday 17 August.
For us to even begin cherrypicking suggestions from the extensive list of houses, high-rises, churches, civic centres, theatres, museums and what-not would be quixotic to say the least (especially as we aren't sure which are the 'new for 2026' entries). The most helpful thing we can do is suggest you put aside an hour or two, visit the site yourself and get jotting and plotting.
