★★★★★ 5.0
Discover
The Photographers' Gallery
That sleek glass frontage you're looking at hides a secret... this entire building started life in 1910 as a textiles warehouse, and you're standing at Britain's photography revolution headquarters. Sue Davies was so determined to open the UK's first public photography gallery that she literally re-mortgaged her house in 1971, starting in a converted Lyon's Tea Bar just down the road in Covent Garden. When Irish architects O'Donnell and Tuomey gutted this former warehouse in 2012, they kept those original industrial bones but added three floors of pristine white gallery spaces above you. Here on Ramillies Street, tucked behind Oxford Street's chaos, this place introduced British audiences to photography legends like Robert Capa and Sebastião Salgado for the very first time. The opening exhibition back in January 1971 was called "The Concerned Photographer" and it changed everything... suddenly photography wasn't just documentation, it was art. Step inside and you'll climb through 54 years of photographic history, from that brave Lyon's Tea Bar beginning to today's cutting-edge digital exhibitions. Pretty amazing what one determined woman with a vision can create, right?
Did You Know?
- The Photographers’ Gallery was the first public gallery in the United Kingdom devoted solely to photography, opening in 1971 in a converted Lyon’s Tea Bar in Covent Garden—a bold move that helped establish photography as a respected art form in its own right, not just a documentary medium.
- The gallery’s current home at 16–18 Ramillies Street is a five-story former textiles warehouse, redesigned by Irish architects O’Donnell and Tuomey in 2012; it features three exhibition spaces, a print sales gallery, a digital media screen, and a vibrant café—making it a modern, multifunctional hub for both art lovers and families.
- Since 1996, The Photographers’ Gallery has hosted the prestigious Deutsche Börse Photography Prize, which spotlights international talent and innovation in photography, and it also runs the Bar-Tur Photobook Award—offering visitors a chance to see cutting-edge work and discover new artists from around the world.