12 Great Places to Read Around London
We’ve scouted out the best places to nose-dive into your favourite tome, from cavernous libraries to bookshop cafés where phones are forbidden. Bookworms, unite.
13 August, 2021
It’s
a truth universally acknowledged that there’s no greater
pleasure than getting lost in a good book. We’ve scoured cavernous
libraries, stumbled upon inner-city oases and found the bookshop
cafés serving up London‘s
best fiction and flat whites to bring you these capital reading
nooks.
Grab a
book – these are the capital’s best reading spots
Barbican
Moorgate
Like a beacon of creativity, the Barbican is renowned for its
roster of events, exhibitions and performances. There are plenty of
quiet corners perfect for reading here, but our favourite is the
Conservatory, in which you can read surrounded by over 2,000
species of tropical plants.
shopping
London Review Bookshop
Bloomsbury
A stone’s throw from the British Museum (but sans tourists),
this well-curated bookshop is a must for discerning bookworms.
Shelves are stocked with around 20,000 titles ranging from classic
literature to cutting-edge poetry – pick one up and head to the
London Review Cake Shop, the 21st-century answer to London’s
long-lost literary coffeehouses. The shop has a packed calendar of
talks, debates and screenings too.
shopping
Libreria
Spitalfields
Get inspired in the snug alcoves of this off-beat bookshop near
Brick Lane. The space, dreamed up by Spanish architects SelgasCano,
is designed to help visitors uncover new tomes and explore new
ideas with section names such as “enchantment for the
disenchanted”. Don’t expect to take a shelfie, though – phones are
forbidden here.
This image is on holiday
La Médiathèque
South Kensington
The UK’s largest French library, the Grade II-listed, art-deco
style Institut Français is inviting and airy, making it a great
spot for retreating from Kensington’s busy streets (though it’s
best to bring your own book if you can’t read à la française). The
children’s library is worth a nosey too – it features a mural by
Quentin Blake.
St Dunstan-in-the-East
Billingsgate
Halfway between London Bridge and the Tower of London, this
12th-century church was largely destroyed in the Second World War.
Today, foliage cocoons the ruins while a low-lying fountain tinkles
in the middle of the nave, making St Dunstan-in-the-East an
otherworldly, inner-city oasis in which to read (albeit not when
raining).
Address
St Dustan’s Hill
EC3R 5DD
This image is on holiday
Books for Cooks
Notting Hill
Like to devour your books in a more literal sense? Head to
Notting Hill where, just off Portobello Road, more than 8,000 tasty
titles have drawn gastronomes to Books for Cooks since 1983.
Cookbooks are put to the test in the relaxed café at the back of
the shop (a great spot for reading over lunch), while cookery
classes take place in the demo kitchen upstairs.
shopping
Daunt Books
Marylebone
Decked out with stained glass and long oak galleries, this
Edwardian flagship store has a book-loving army of loyal fans
(recognisable by the Daunt Books totes slung across the shoulder).
You won’t be surprised to read that the basement travel section is
our go-to; it’s much quieter than the rest of the shop and has
several secluded corners ideal for adventuring between the
pages.
This image is on holiday
bar
Scarfes Bar, Rosewood London
Holborn
Marrying the atmosphere of a drawing room and gentlemans’-club
suave, Scarfes Bar is the kind of place where you can sink into a
velvet armchair with a good title – a Portobello antiques dealer
hand-selected 1,000 titles especially for the shelves here. Order a
“poetic justice” cocktail (featuring tonic wine, small-batch cider,
maple and hazelnut liqueur) and leaf through a few pages to a
backdrop of live jazz.
thingstodo
The British Library
St Pancras
It would be remiss to overlook the world’s largest library (by
number of items catalogued) when looking for London’s best places
to read. Beyond The British Library’s 170 million items (including
the Magna Carta, Beatles’ lyrics and Jane Austen’s manuscripts),
the space benefits from hushed reading rooms, a vast open-air
courtyard and several eateries – we love gobbling up our books in
the Terrace Café.
bar
Swans Bar, Maison Assouline
Piccadilly
Sure the Waterstones on Piccadilly has an estimated eight and a
half miles of shelving, but what the nearby Maison Assouline lacks
in size, it more than makes up for in style. The building – a
former bank designed by Edwin Lutyens in 1922 – is part bookstore,
part museum, part Parisian-style café, and is the ideal place to
browse coffee table tomes with a glass of bubbles in hand.
11. South Bank
There are few things quite so whimsical as an afternoon spent
meandering along the South Bank, dipping in and out of its many
reading spots – pull out a book on a bench overlooking the Thames
(there’s a great second-hand stall under Waterloo Bridge), find a
nook in the Southbank Centre (we love its National Poetry Library),
head to the Tate Modern’s balcony or grab a riverside table at the
BFI’s Bar & Kitchen.
This image is on holiday
12. Bush Theatre
Shepherd’s Bush
Housed in the former Shepherd’s Bush Public Library, this West
London theatre keeps the building’s history alive with shelves
stacked with plays. Days here are best spent getting lost in a
script against the thrum of The Library Bar (there are some great
tipples on tap) or perched on the outdoor terrace. Check online for
writing masterclasses, plays and artistic events.