A legendary actor, a pioneering Victorian photographer, and an advocate for racial equality will be awarded Blue Plaques in London this year.
English Heritage — which runs the scheme celebrating the link between significant figures of the past and the buildings in which they lived and worked — has just released the nine names who'll have Blue Plaques unveiled in their honour at sites across London in 2026. Selected from suggestions from the public, they are:
🎭 Laurence Olivier: The actor known for his leading roles in Shakespeare plays, and in films including Rebecca and Marathon Man, is probably the best-known on this list. His statue appears in front of the National Theatre, a building whose creation he was instrumental in, and he already has an official Blue Plaque in Dorking, but not yet one in London.
📷 Julia Margaret Cameron: It wasn't until the age of 48 that the Calcutta-born Cameron took up photography, a pursuit in which she excelled, becoming known for her portraits characterised by soft focus, dramatic lighting and emotional intensity.
🪖 Brigadier Dudley Clarke: A master of large-scale deception operations, Clarke created fictional orders of battle and double agents, bamboozling Axis forces during the Second World War, and speeding up Allied victories.
🎥 Jill Craigie: The Way We Live and To Be a Woman are among the works by feminist and political documentary filmmaker and writer, Jill Craigie. Following the Second World War, she came to London to make films about housing shortages, labour rights and post-war reconstruction.
✊ Kamal Chunchie: If you've visited City Hall in London's Docklands, you might remember it's on Kamal Chunchie Way. Chunchie was a Methodist pastor who advocated tirelessly in the East End for racial equality, at a time when the likes of Oswald Mosley did everything they could to stoke hatred.
📰 Dusé Mohamed Ali: Founder and editor of the African Times and Orient Review, Ali oversaw what was the first political journal in Britain to be owned and edited by a Black person.
🪐 Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin: Declaring in 1925 that stars are composed primarily of hydrogen and helium, the astronomer Payne-Gaposchkin was initially poo-pooed by the establishment, but was eventually proved right.
🪧 Gertrude Tuckwell: One of the first women magistrates in Britain, Tuckwell spent much of her life fighting for the rights of working women, trade unions and fair wages.
✍️ Stefan Zweig: Escaping from his native Austria to London during the Second World War, Stefan Zweig wrote bestselling biographies of the likes of Charles Dickens and Fyodor Dostoevsky. Zweig still has his critics, however, described by the translator Michael Hofmann as "the Pepsi of Austrian writing."
The locations of each of the Blue Plaques is yet to be revealed, with English Heritage saying they are still confirming details with the property owners. Blue Plaques tend to be rolled out gradually over the course of the year.
In 2025, Blue Plaques were awarded to Audrey Hepburn, Winifred Atwell and Marc Bolan among others.
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