London has scores of excellent small museums, and then there are those really, really tiny collections — the ones secreted along corridors, in alcoves and backrooms. Sometimes they consist of a single glass case and a handful of objects, but we consider them miniature museums nonetheless. Here's one such mini museum.
The enduring fact about the Langham Hotel is that here, in August 1899, the Lippincott's editor Joseph Marshall Stoddart commissioned the second Sherlock Holmes novel, The Sign of the Four; and Oscar Wilde's only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, in the same meeting. If that's not a deafening endorsement for liquid lunches, then I don't know what is.
Opened in 1865 — before brethren like the Savoy and the Ritz — the Langham was Europe's first 'grand hotel' and was immediately renowned for its array of mod cons: electric lights, hydraulic lifts and air con. In its time, the Langham has hosted everyone from Mark Twain to Soviet spies.
In 1965, its across-the-road neighbour the BBC actually bought the Langham, then in 1980, applied to demolish it in order to erect a Norman Foster-designed office. This is incredible because a) the Langham is a stunning old building and b) the BBC had money?!
The 'museum' is a single glass vitrine in a nook en route to the downstairs toilets, sprinkled with various objects — it's not even the size of the Savoy's erstwhile (and much missed) shrine to cocktail making. There's little in the way of curation (labels stretch to things like 'Langham Artifacts [sic] through the ages), but the fact someone's gone to the trouble of assembling these bits and pieces is very much appreciated.
I'm not suggesting you go creeping around the corridors of one of London's most exclusive hotels, but I do highly recommend a visit to the Langham's Artesian bar, where a new cocktail menu's been launched as of May 2025 (actually I was at the launch when I stumbled across the mini museum). This then gives you the perfect excuse to nip to the powder rooms downstairs, and cram in five minutes of museum culture post-ablutions. (The toilets, by the way, are some of the only ones I've ever seen with dedicated 'In' and 'Out' doors.)
Crockery, a photo of a bell boy from way back when, various postcards and guide books feature. Best of all, there are vintage menus (show me someone who does NOT enjoy perusing vintage menus), including one from a 'Dejuner de Mariage' on 4 August 1866 (so just a year after the hotel first opened), with a Francophile roll call of viands including 'Quartier d'Agneau', 'Chaud-froid de Pigeon' and 'Salade Russe'.
As for Conan Doyle, he became mildly obsessed with the Langham, often featuring it in his Sherlock stories. "What is your London address, Mr. Green?" Holmes asks the Honourable Philip Green* in The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax, to which Green replies: "The Langham Hotel will find me." As it stands there are no deerstalkers on show in the mini museum (nor, as far as I could see, any nods to Conan Doyle or Wilde), although you will find a pair of tennis sneakers signed by Stan Smith. There's a 'game's afoot' pun in there somewhere.
Another small museum in the immediate vicinity which may have flown beneath your radar (though it's not quite as small as the Langham's), is that of the Royal College of Nursing on Cavendish Square. Note: this museum does not feature a bar mixing upscale cocktails.
*Yes, apparently there was an honourable Philip Green once.
All images by Londonist.
