Victoria and Albert Museum

Victoria and Albert Museum is a leading museum in the areas of arts and design. It is located in South Kensington.

The collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum include over two million items spanning over five millennia. The museum was established in 1852, and it is named according to Queen Victoria and Prince Albert.


The museum has collections from several areas of art, fashion and design. These include:

  • Art Nouveau
  • shoes (over 2000 pairs from different eras)
  • jewellery (one of the most comprehensive collections in the world)
  • opera (costumes and accessories)

There are also temporary exhibitions, which require a ticket. These exhibitions are often of a specific topic. Some examples from 2019 include exhibitions of fashion designed by Christian Dior and Mary Quant, the latter of which continues to February 2020. At the same time, there are exhibitions ongoing about food and even car design.

Virtual tours

The museum has an extensive collection of items available online in many categories. There are collections in the following categories:
- Spaces - Periods and Styles - People - Materials and Techniques - Places
Another location to check out is again the Google Arts and Culture service, which has over 5000 items from the V&A collection on display as well as 11 online exhibitions. Some of our favourite include the “Balenciaga: Master Craftsman” and “Schiaparelli and Surrealism”.

Getting there

The nearest tube station is South Kensington (Circle, District, Piccadilly), which is very close to the museum. When coming from the direction of Harrods, the Knightsbridge (Piccadilly) station is about ten minutes away.

Nearby

South Kensington has several popular museums and the Natural History Museum and the Science Museum are located only a couple minutes away in the next block. Harrods is about five minutes walking distance away on the same road.