South Kensington, SW7
Telephone: 020 7942 2000
The Victoria and Albert Museum specialises in applied and decorative arts. The museum has a huge range of collections of European, Indian, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Islamic decorative arts, which are arranged in 7 miles of galleries.
It has galleries for sculpture, glass, jewellery, church plate, armour, weapons, costume, fashion - including 1960s paper dresses, textiles, musical instruments, wrought iron, stained glass, metalwork, ceramics, furniture, architecture, photography, British watercolour artists and much more. The V&A also houses: Britain's national collection of sculpture up to 1900, including Bernini's fountain of Neptune and Triton and Canova's The Three Graces
One of the dramatic parts of the museum is the Cast Courts, comprising two large, skylighted rooms two storeys high housing hundreds of plaster casts of sculptures, friezes and tombs. One of these is dominated by a full-scale replica of Trajan's Column, cut in half in order to fit under the ceiling. The other includes reproductions of various works of Italian Renaissance sculpture and architecture, including a full-size replica of Michelangelo's David. Don't miss the V & A's complete rooms such as Frank Lloyd Wright's Kaufmann office.
Admission free
Open: Daily 10.00-17.45 (on Wednesdays and the last Friday of the month except December, the museum is open until 22.00).
Nearest tube: South Kensington. A tunnel links the station to the museum
