27 London events (and new openings) to get excited about in 2020

The Barbican launches a big new season Dig into some whopping topics at the Barbican’s year-long programme ‘Inside Out’, which explores the relationship between our lives and creativity. Highlights include boundary-breaking exhibition ‘Masculinities: Liberation through Photography’. If your new year’s resolution is to be more cultured, you’ll be set.

Nearest tube: Barbican. Throughout 2020. Prices vary.

Last year, Waltham Forest had the honour of being the first ever London Borough of Culture – this year, it’s Brent’s time. If you’re unfamiliar with the northwest borough, it spans Wembley, Kensal Green and Brent Park and is the birth place of Zadie Smith. The year-long programme includes an opening celebration in Wembley Park featuring 100 dancers and largescale projections. Now that’s Brentertainment. 

Various locations.

If you’ve been thinking, ‘London could really do with a street food market,’ you’ve probably not being paying much attention for the last few years. That said, Goods Way, in King’s Cross, avoids being overkill by virtue of its New Orleansinspired interior alone. Expect Breddos Tacos and The Duck Truck on the roster.

11 Goods Way. Nearest tube: King’s Cross. Opens winter 2020.

While you might have been cruelly snubbed by Harry and Meghan’s wedding invitation list, you can still have your cake and eat it courtesy of star baker Claire Ptak. The maestro behind the royal wedding cake honed her craft on Broadway Market, and is now bringing her Violet brand to the corner of Mare Street. Violet Corner will offer two floors of freshly baked goodness, and feature a wine bar.

121-123 Mare St. Nearest tube: Hackney Central Overground. Opens Jan 2020.

Following the success of its critically-acclaimed restaurant in Borough, fresh pasta specialists Padella are opening their second branch in Shoreditch. Opening in late-February 2020 for lunch and dinner seven days a week, owners Tim Siadatan and Jordan Frieda are also moving Padella's existing bakery to the new site. Expect the menu to feature the restaurant's usual high-quality but affordable dishes, perhaps classic hits like pici cacio e pepe or pappardelle with beef shin ragu. 

Phipp Street, EC2A. February.

If 2019 was the year of queueing for restaurants, 2020 is the year of queueing for even more restaurants. That’s because we’re getting another branch of much-loved Sri Lankan restaurant Hoppers. The restaurant’s heading to King’s Cross.

Pancras Square, N1C 4AG. February.

Few storytellers dig into abuses of power better than Caryl Churchill. So it’s big news that ‘Far Away’, potentially the winner of the hotly contested title of ‘best Caryl Churchill play’, is coming to London this year. It’s an examination of the brutalities of war that escalates wildly to a global, interspecies conflict on a surreal scale with everything from animals to gravity taking part.

Donmar Warehouse. Nearest tube: Covent Garden. Feb 6-Mar 2 8. £10-£40.

As soon as the weather warms up a little, you might want to head to Beavertown’s enormous Beaverworld complex, which sits right on the edge of the river Lea. As the name suggests, the brewery’s new HQ is basically a theme park for hopheads. If all goes to plan, expect it to open in March. Oh, and don’t quote us on the whole ‘no queues’ thing.

102 E Duck Lees Ln. March. 

It’s easy to find yourself getting jealous of Steve McQueen. The Turner Prize-winning artist is adept in photography, sculpture and film, which helped a bit when he dipped out of the art world to direct ‘12 Years a Slave’ and, you know, win an Oscar. If you can hold back your envy, you’ll be rewarded at Tate Modern with an exhibition of McQueen’s works across two decades, from his early Super 8 film ‘Exodus’ to the more recent ‘End Credits’, a tribute to black civil rights activist Paul Robeson.

Tate Modern. Nearest tube: Southwark. Feb 13-May 11.

She’s played a Dickensian great aunt, a zombie-fighting mortician, a superhero sorcerer and an immortal vampire – and that was just last year. Now one of the UK’s most versatile film stars can add a BFI retrospective to her list of accomplishments, with the South Bank cinema hosting a Swinton-centric season. 

BFI Southbank. Nearest tube: Waterloo. March. Prices vary.

In between pop art of slebs, this new Andy Warhol show features portraits of black and Latinx drag queens and trans women, which are on display for the first time in 30 years. And yes, those iconic Campbell’s soup tins will be in the mix too.

Tate Modern. Nearest tube: Southwark. £22. Mar 12-Sep 6.

Hackney Festival of Fitness is back in May. The main event is the Hackney Half, which saw a turnout of 17,000 runners last year. But there’ll be loads of other ways to get sweaty.

Various east London venues. May 15-17. Prices vary.

Last year, we were given a hint about one of the All Points East bill: a band celebrating their fiftieth anniversary. We thought: ‘rock dinosaur’. Turns out it’s actually German electronic pioneers Kraftwerk, who, in 1970, started a European love affair with synthesisers that would lead to techno and electro. 

All Points East. Victoria Park. Homerton Overground. May 29. £65.

Junction 2 treads a fine line between booking awesome names from the electronic underground (think Honey Dijon), while also being a BIG affair. Witness the main stage, for example, which sits directly under the M4.

Boston Manor Park. Nearest tube: Arnos Grove. Jun 5-6. Prices vary.

The V&A has spent years knocking it out of the park with immersive exhibitions on surprisingly specific subjects. Expect this to continue with its in-depth celebration of Lewis Carroll’s trippy classic, ‘Alice in Wonderland’.

V&A. Nearest tube: South Kensington. From Jun 27. Prices vary.

Appreciating art isn’t just about looking at paintings and nodding earnestly, as ‘Reverb: Sound into Art’ at the Hayward Gallery proves. The summer show will feature work from 14 artists who use sound as their primary medium – whether that’s music, noise or silence. You can expect to see installations that respond to the gallery’s brutalist architecture, too (what does concrete sound like anyway?). 

Hayward Gallery. Nearest tube: Waterloo. Jun 24-Sep 6. Prices TBC.

Following the release of his critically acclaimed genre-bending fifth album ‘Igor’ last year, a Tyler, The Creator headline show anywhere would be a big deal. The fact that this is the US rapper’s first festival appearance since he was banned from the country by Theresa May (yes, really) makes it even more attendance-worthy. Catch him at Lovebox in July, assuming he makes it through customs. 

Gunnersbury Park. Nearest tube: Acton Town. Jun 12-14. From £72.50.

Over in New York, the Nomad hotel bar is known for its high-end pub grub, its 007-does-Wild-West styling and, most importantly, its fantastical cocktails. Now the hotel’s opening in Covent Garden. Early renders show ninteenth-century architecture, shrubbery and velvet. As for the drinks? You’ll have to wait and see.

Nomad. Nearest tube: Covent Garden. Opens summer.

Not content with a Glasto appearance and a slew of questionable Hackney and Brixton references in ‘London Boy’, freshly minted anglophile Taylor Swift will be heading back to her new favourite city to play BST Hyde Park. Swifty fans will no doubt be thrilled to hear that Little Mix are headlining another day of the festival, with support from Rita Ora and Kesha.

Hyde Park. July 3-12

Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone? Such is the case with Hoxton’s Geffrye Museum. It closed for an £18 million do-over in 2018. Now it’s reopening as the Museum of the Home with double the gallery space. Here’s hoping the quirky living room time tunnel has survived.

Geffrye Almshouses. Hoxton Overground. Reopens summer.

Forget the Tokyo Olympics. The real sporting highlight of year is the Pokémon World Championships. In its first iteration outside the US, trainers from Cinnabar Island to Vermilion City will compete in London.

Location TBC. August.

It’s easy to become complacent about a lot of the stuff painted on London’s walls (largely because a lot of it is quite bad). But some of it is brilliant and it’s time it was celebrated. Which is exactly what will happen at the London Mural Festival. More than 100 artists like Mr Doodle and Camille Walala will be creating large-scale paintings.

Various venues. Sep 1-13. Prices TBC.

Thousands of Londoners made history last year when they headed to Piccadilly Circus as part of the city’s first Trans+ Pride. Now the event’s becoming annual, promising to remain an act of protest and speak out for safety and equality of trans people in London, as other Pride events become more corporate. The team are crowdfunding to ensure they are able to make it inclusive.

Venue TBC. Sep 12. Free.

Imagine the situation: you’re trying to squeeze through a doorway but there’s a naked man on one side of you and a naked woman on the other. Whaddya do? That’s one of the pieces that will be recreated at the Royal Academy’s Marina Abramović exhibition, which features work spanning the artist’s whole career.

Royal Academy. Nearest tube: Green Park. Sep 26-Dec 8. Prices TBC.

If you hate choosing between highbrow culture and science-fiction blockbusters, this one’s for you. The Royal Albert Hall hosts a concert performance of ‘Star Wars: Return of the Jedi’. That means you can get all your Ewok kicks on the big screen, while the score is played live by the London Symphony Orchestra in the pit below.

Royal Albert Hall. Nearest tube: South Kensington. Oct 23-25. From £37.

Good old Will Turner’s now one of the most canonical British artists. Back during the Industrial Revolution? He was a radical, capturing inventions with fresh style. See him in a new light in ‘Turner’s Modern World’.

Tate Britain. Nearest tube: Westminster. Oct 28-Mar 7 2021. Prices TBC.