Barbican Art Gallery – Art, design & fashion

It is my firm belief that if the whole of London closed down except the Barbican Centre, us Londoners could still satisfy all our cultural desires in this one building.

My favourite bit of it, though, is the Barbican Art Gallery. Located on the third floor of the Brutalist building, the gallery has a rolling programme of exhibitions which mostly focus on architecture, design and fashion. Previous exhibitions that I’ve enjoyed are retrospectives of the work of Viktor & Rolf, Le Corbusier and Ron Arad (to name just a few) and most recently an exploration of Japanese avant-garde fashion.

You’d be forgiven for thinking, as I always do, that the building itself has been tailored around each individual exhibition. The upper level of the gallery is made up of over 10 open rooms around the outside, which house exhibitions of a retrospective nature perfectly.

There’s a good bookshop on the lower level, always stocking books I’ve yet to come across on subjects such as fashion, art, architecture and design. When I’ve had a peruse around here and I’ve stocked up, I always take the weight off my feet in the Barbican riverside café with great views and great tea. Try the lemon drizzle cake, too – it’s divine.