The House Mill, Three Mill Lane, Bromley-by-Bow, East London

 

Built in 1776,  but originally dating from the medieval period, the Grade I-listed House Mill claims to be the world’s largest surviving tidal mill. It sits on an island in the River Lea, opposite the Clock Mill, which was rebuilt in 1817. The House Mill stopped milling in 1941 after the area was bombed during the Second World War, but the Clock Mill continued to operate until 1952.

Carnegie Library Protest, south London

A demonstration against the closure of the striking Carnegie Library in Herne Hill, south London. The Friends of Carnegie Library say the building "was closed by Lambeth Council on 31st March, to stand empty until it is converted into a fee-paying gym run by the leisure company GLL. No plans have been seen for the gym, nor has anyone applied for any planning permission to convert this Grade II listed building for this purpose."

HMS Belfast, the Thames

A veteran of the Second World War and the Korean War, HMS Belfast is a light cruiser ship moored near Tower Bridge.  Under the auspices of the Imperial War Museum, it is open to the public

Museum of London, London Wall, central London

Seemingly in the middle of a roundabout and surrounded by the towering glass and steel of the financial district, the Museum of London is a tour de force that does justice to the history of one of the world's great cities. Laid out in chronological order, the galleries begin with prehistoric flints, bones and skulls, before immersing you in Roman Londinium using several impressive and intricate models of Roman settlements, plus a mock-up of a kitchen and larder, complete with an unskinned rabbit, fruit and vegetables. Next-up, are the medieval galleries, which includes a model of a late Anglo-Saxon hut with rock hard beds, animal skins and cooking utensils. Then you have the War, Plague and Fire galleries covering the 1500s and 1600s, dwelling on the horrors of the Black Death and the Fire of London, as well as the cut and thrust of the Civil War. The five horrendous days of the fire are told by a video fronted by a dark model of London which lights up gradually as the flames consume the city. You'll also find ornate pistols, muskets, halberds and rapiers, as well a fine model of the Elizabethan Rose Theatre.

The Monument, Monument Street, central London

Commemorating the Great Fire of London and designed by Sir Christopher Wren, the Monument is a grandiose, seventeenth century Doric column crowned with a gold flaming urn just visible above the surrounding office blocks. You can climb the 311 black, polished steps up a narrow spiral staircase inside the column to a small 360 degree viewing gallery. Despite the mesh cage preventing visitors from jumping or falling off, there are good views of nearby Tower Bridge, distant Canary Wharf and particularly the high-tech cluster of office blocks dominated by the distinctive rocket-shaped Gherkin. On an overcast day, the City of London looks very grey from here with only the red buses providing splashes of colour. On the way down, the vertiginous should avoid looking over the heavy iron railing around the staircase. Admission for adults is three pounds and you may have to queue for 15 minutes or so at weekends, but you do get a certificate on the way out. 7/10

London Transport Museum, The Piazza, Covent Garden, central London

The London Transport Museum occupies an elegant Victorian building, with large arched cast iron windows, that used to be home to the flower market on the edge of Covent Garden's popular piazza. It houses an extraordinary collection of tube and bus memorabilia from the past 150 years. From beautifully-preserved Victorian train carriages to antique trams with precarious spiral staircases to stylish vintage advertising posters to fading bus tickets, this museum uses the transport prism to give an enthralling insight into London's recent social history. As you can clamber on and walk inside iconic old tube trains and buses from many of the decades of the twentieth century, longtime London residents are in for a nostalgia trip. Some of the vehicles are populated with charismatic mannequins in appropriate period dress and matching hairstyles, such as sixties moptops, often playing conversational soundtracks.

Realistic simulator
There are also some extraordinarily intricate models, such as one of the first Underground tunnels being dug out by scores of men pretty much by hand. Children will get stuck into the many interactive exhibits, including a very realistic simulator of driving a tube train between stations, trying to ensure it stops exactly parallel with the platform. Adults will be fascinated by the visualizations of the future of London and its transport system. You can have a time out in the pricey cafe, overlooking the piazza and the imaginative shop, selling a few hot snacks and rather stingy portions of cake. Admission to the London Transport Museum is £10 (including a voluntary £2 donation) for adults and free for kids. Good value given the thought that has gone into making this one of London's best museums. 8/10

Science Museum, Exhibition Road, South Kensington, London

Crammed with machines, devices, gadgets, vehicles, planes and spacecraft of historic significance, the Science Museum is much more hands-on than London's other renown museums. Its huge halls are dotted with electronic touchscreens and there are several large zones, aimed primarily at children, given over to interactive, effective and very robust exhibits demonstrating how everything from levers to pulleys to periscopes to electricity works, while the enthusiastic staff sometimes give demos and talks. But these zones are often very busy and there can be an unseemly scramble to play with some of the kit.

George Stephenson's Original Rocket
More peaceful are the main galleries, which contain plenty of diverting models, full-size replicas and actual examples of groundbreaking cars, boats, satellites, spacecraft and aeroplanes. These include the ridiculously fragile, wooden biplanes of the early years of flight, and the very first steam engines, notably George Stephenson's original Rocket, which will send a tingle down the spine of anyone with a passing interest in the industrial revolution. Suspended from the ceiling is a large shining wheel, the Energy Ring, displaying short text messages about the future of energy inputted by visitors to the gallery. Back on the ground floor, there are glass screens protecting large displays of nostalgia-laden innovations from different phases of the twentieth century taking in everything from the Rubik's Cube to early mobile phones to vintage typewriters to 1960s screwdrivers to the Chopper bike.

Quite commercial
Although entrance is free, the Science Museum can feel quite commercial - it has several shops, including a branch of Waterstones, an IMAX cinema and several simulators, costing anything from £1.50 to £8 a ride, plus some temporary exhibitions with an entrance fee. Of the places to eat, the Deep Blue restaurant, located in the futuristic Wellcome Wing, seems rather dark and gloomy. The Revolution café, with its multicoloured walls, is more cheerful, but the benches are uncomfortable and you have to make your own tea in paper cups. While the Science Museum's twentieth century building isn’t as distinguished as those of London’s other great museums, it does have a part-glass roof allowing natural light to illuminate the memorable collection of flying machines on the third floor. But the galleries can get uncomfortably warm and the interactive exhibits uncomfortably crowded. Moreover, the untrained eye may begin to glaze over after seeing too many often-nondescript engines and the innards of electronic devices. 8/10

Brunel Museum, Railway Avenue, Rotherhithe, south east London

Housed in a venerable old pump house, the two rooms of the Brunel Museum are devoted to the story of the construction of the first tunnel under a river anywhere in the world. The Thames Tunnel, hyped by the Victorians as the 'Eighth Wonder of the World', was designed by the pioneering engineer Marc Brunel. It opened in 1843, eighteen years after construction began. It is still used by Tube trains today. Unfortunately, this modest and somewhat unkempt museum (admission £2) fails to really convey the magnitude of this achievement. Pending the completion of a new museum enabling a much-needed expansion, the exhibits today are really limited to a model of the tunnel being constructed, some paintings and a couple of small, but clever, Victorian three-dimensional pictures of the tunnel. Downstairs, you can watch a DVD about Brunel's life, while the kids attempt to make their own 3D picture. There is a tiny cafe with a semi-obscured view of the river, while outside are a couple of unassuming sculptures of Tower Bridge and a steam engine aimed at children. 5/10

Hampton Court Palace, south west London

The extravagant, lion-topped stone gateway, the elongated chimneys and sprawling red-brick Tudor facade of Hampton Court Palace are a remarkable and inviting sight from the busy A308 that mars this picturesque and historic part of south west of London. The path from the gates to the palace is flanked on one side by a fine red-brick terrace and on the other by a tree-lined stretch of the Thames. Up close, you are struck by the scale of this well-preserved and handsome palace, which was built by social-climber Cardinal Wolsey in the early sixteenth century before being commandeered by the egomaniac, King Henry VIII. While the grassy Base Court is being renovated, you enter via an atmospheric cobbled courtyard enclosed by weathered red-brick walls, where you may be greeted by a couple dressed as medieval aristocrats. They usher you into the extensive Tudor Kitchens, where chefs in period costume may be preparing smelly medieval meals on ancient wooden tables and roasting meat on spits in front of the huge open fire. Above the kitchens is the extraordinary Great Hall, notable for its soaring and ornate hammer-beam roof, lavishly-carved wooden screens and elaborate sixteenth century tapestries.

British Museum, Bloomsbury, central London

The mother of all museums, the British Museum is an imposing and vast neo-classical building surrounded by the Georgian terraces and squares of Bloomsbury. The hordes of visitors are initially sucked into the striking Great Court - a large rectangular space covered by a glass roof and surrounded by cream-coloured classical facades with doorways leading into the scores of galleries packed with antiquities plundered from across the ancient world. In the middle of the court is a large, circular reading room flanked by broad spiral staircases leading up to a smart restaurant at the top. To the east are several charming and venerable wood-panelled rooms, dripping with a sense of adventure and history. Behind glass panels is a wide variety of objects, from stone age axes to eighteenth century medals, designed to show the breadth of the museum's collection. Beyond these rooms is the Paul Hamlyn library where children can pick up backpacks, which contain a series of activities based around a couple of galleries in the museum, or a colourful booklet detailing one of half-a-dozen trails, which mostly involve spotting particular artefacts.

Foreign and Commonwealth Office, King Charles Street, London

One of the hundreds of properties around London that open their doors for one weekend a year, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office is a heavily-restored throwback to the mid-nineteenth century. The grandeur of the British Empire lingers on in its ornate meeting rooms, stately staircases and the marble splendour of Durbar Court - a covered courtyard ringed by balconies with beautifully-tiled floors and intricate plasterwork. The lavish India Office and the golden Locarno Suite, with its ostentatious arched ceilings, are still in use as offices or meeting rooms. One of the highlights is the Grand Staircase with its bronze bust of Anthony Eden, heroic neo-classical paintings and massive golden chandeliers. But all this extravagance is somewhat offset by the mundane reminders, such as the plastic water dispensers and waste paper bins, that this building has to earn its keep in the cash-strapped public sector. On Open House weekend, admission is free and the friendly security guards make you feel very welcome. 7/10

Amazing Butterflies Exhibition, The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London

To enter this unusual living exhibition, you first have to find your way through a maze of blue mesh fences. At each junction of the maze, there are rhyming poems, sometimes supplemented by a game, tracing a stage in the life of a butterfly. Kids are issued with a black and white picture card, which they can decorate with insect stamps dispensed by small machines sprinkled around the maze. But some of the games appear to be broken and the maze can get a bit wearing for adults.

When you finally enter the porch of the temporary butterfly house, you immediately notice the warm, moist atmosphere. Inside are a myriad of exotic and colorful flowers, scented plants, young citrus trees and bowls of rotting fruit. Scores of colourful and intricately-patterned butterflies cling to the side of the marquee or flutter around your head. Some of these tropical butterflies are as large as a child's hand, but their paper-like wings look very flimsy. In one corner, a glass cabinet contains hundreds of chrysalis in various stages of the metamorphosis into butterflies. At weekends, it can get rather crowded and there is sometimes a shortage of the laminated sheets identifying each butterfly. But this enthralling exhibition is still worth the modest entrance prices - an adult ticket is £5, while a family ticket costs £14. 7/10

The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, South Kensington, London

An atmospheric Victorian Gothic building of epic proportions, this is the archetypal museum and a perfect movie set. The centrepiece of the spectacularly ornate and cathedral-like entrance hall is the skeleton of a Diplodocus, which dwarves the scores of visitors milling around the intricate mosaic floor. This dramatic exhibit, which is surrounded by handsome archways leading to the museum's many galleries, is overlooked by stain glass windows, grand stairways and balconies made from attractive brown and fawn brickwork.

A large and typically-crowded gallery to the left of the hall houses many more dinosaur skeletons accompanied by informative posters pitched at both adults and kids. Towards the end of the elevated stairway are two small animated predators who eye the passing visitors, their teeth stained red from a recent meal. From behind a large screen at the end of the walkway, you can hear bloodcurdling roars. Rounding the corner, you are confronted with a full-size Tyrannosaurus Rex. The huge swivelling head and snapping jaws are realistic enough to raise the hairs on the back of your neck. But the effect is spoiled somewhat by a voice over the tannoy telling you to keep moving and an information board explaining that if a charging Tyrannosaurus were to trip up, the fall would probably kill it.

More recent fauna are covered in other galleries devoted to mammals, fish, amphibians, birds and reptiles. These contain impressive full size models of giraffes, African elephants, rhinos and even a massive blue whale, while monkey skeletons swing around the upstairs balconies. Many other aspects of life on earth from giant sequoia to climate change are tackled elsewhere in the museum. You are unlikely to have seen even one third of the exhibits before retreating to one of the cafes or restaurants. The self-service, but elegant, cafe behind the entrance hall sells moist and mouthwatering slices of cake for three pounds or four pounds bundled with a hot drink. It could end up being an expensive pit stop, but at least you don't have to pay to get into this excellent museum. 8/10

Victoria & Albert Museum, Cromwell Road, South Kensington, London

A vast, palatial neo-Gothic edifice, the Victoria & Albert Museum houses a dizzying array of artifacts from all over the world and spanning many hundreds of years. The common theme is design and art. The dozens of dimly-lit rooms and corridors are laid with intricate mosaic floors and furnished with elaborate period fittings. Each gallery is dedicated to displaying a diverse collection of finely-crafted and often-beautiful objects from a particular region and a particular era. Some of the exhibits, such as the swirling green and yellow glass sculpture hanging over the ticket desk, are very large and very striking. The centrepiece of the Islamic Middle East room is a ancient rug the size of a badminton court, while nearby is an elegant Moorish wooden staircase. Next door, the South Asia room has a beautifully-decorated and finely-detailed black and white cabinet. Another rather gloomy gallery is dedicated to fashion, displaying a succession of dresses, suits and other outfits from the past two centuries.

Downstairs is an extraordinary series of rooms packed with lavish and ostentatious pieces of furniture from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Equally fascinating are the twentieth century rooms on the second floor, which show off modern design icons, such as the Swatch Watch, Alessi kitchen gadgets and the distinctive poster advertising the Trainspotting film. These rooms overlook a picturesque courtyard garden surrounded by the museum's fine Gothic architecture. Make time for a visit to the large and bustling cafe at the back of the ground floor. Go through the main sitting area decked out in white minimalism and aim for a table in one of several spectacularly ornate rooms, featuring elaborate arches and pillars lit by chandeliers that resemble great balls of light. The food is delicious - the freshly-baked cookies are served warm, so that the chocolate oozes out with each bite. The V&A is free to get in, except for the temporary exhibitions, so it is justifiably busy, but not as packed as the neighbouring Natural History Museum. 8/10

Museum in Docklands, West India Quay, Canary Wharf, London

The venerable brickwork and the sturdy wooden floorboards make this vast Georgian warehouse a fittingly evocative home for an absorbing, five-year-old, under-visited museum. You start on the top floor with the Romans and work your way through the history of London's once thriving port. The exhibits on floor three are fairly ho-hum until you reach the powerful and deeply disturbing section dedicated to explaining how London prospered on the back of the slave trade. The audio presentation, which depicts a slave master trying to dehumanise his charges, pulls no punches. Some of the panels document the forced separation of families and the brutal way in which disobedient slaves were branded or forced to wear iron masks.

Sailor Town
You will probably descend the stairs depressed by what we are capable of. The second floor begins in the 19th Century and is home to Sailor Town - a life size and rather spooky recreation of a poverty-stricken East End street at night. Even on a Sunday afternoon, you may find yourself stalking the raggedy paving stones of this dark, gloomy alley alone, peering into a primitive living room, window-shopping at the mildly-grotesque Animal Emporium or entering the tiny, spit and sawdust pub. The rest of this floor uses more conventional means, such as models, display panels and videos, to narrate the next 150 years of the roller coaster history of London's docks.

Forage among the pebbles
Finally, down on the ground floor, there is a large and unusual children's area, called Mudlarks, in which your kids can try on a diver's mask, haul sacks of grain or forage among the pebbles of a stream. You can get refreshments at the modest ground floor cafe, adjacent to a large model of HMS Northumberland. Admission to the museum is £5 for adults (free for children) and the tickets are valid for a year. Well worth it. 8/10

Horniman Museum, London Road, Forest Hill, London

A quirky and sometimes charming museum set in 16 acres of manicured gardens perched on top of a hill providing fine views across much of south London. Entrance to the permanent exhibits is free. These include a large gloomy Victorian room stuffed full of stuffed animals, a full-scale model of a walrus and a couple of skinny, but living, snakes. More entertaining and interesting is the music gallery, which contains a dizzying array of instruments from all over the world and interactive screens that enable you to hear the sounds many of the exhibits make in the hands of a musician. In an adjacent room, kids can bash a jumble of unusual percussion instruments to their hearts' content.

Also worth seeking out are the imaginatively decorated tanks of jellyfish, sea horses and radiant Angel fish in the recently refurbished aquarium downstairs. By comparison, a small ground-floor room containing a beehive in a transparent box seems neglected and run-down. The temporary exhibitions, which usually involve an admission fee, are also hit and miss.

When you have seen enough, a reasonable cafe is on hand to provide refreshments or you could enjoy a picnic beside one of the colourful flowerbeds that surround the museum. The hillside gardens are partitioned into themed sections, many with elaborate borders dotted with sculptures of exotic animals, birds and mythological creatures. Alongside the museum is a large, gleaming white Victorian conservatory available for hire for wedding receptions and the like. Elsewhere in the gardens, there is a large animal cage containing a trio of grumpy goats, some equally grumpy geese and fluffy rabbits. 7/10

Horniman Museum, London Road Forest Hill, South London

A quirky and sometimes charming museum set in manicured gardens perched on top of a hill providing fine views across south London. Entrance to the permanent exhibits is free. These include a large gloomy Victorian room stuffed full of stuffed animals, a full-scale model of a walrus and a couple of skinny, but living, snakes. More entertaining and interesting is the music gallery, which contains a dizzying array of instruments from all over the world and interactive screens that enable you to hear the sounds many of the exhibits make in the hands of a musician. In an adjacent room, kids can bash a jumble of unusual percussion instruments to their hearts' content. Also worth seeking out are the imaginatively decorated tanks of jellyfish, sea horses and radiant Angel fish in the recently refurbished aquarium downstairs. By comparison, a small ground-floor room containing a beehive in a transparent box seems neglected and run-down.

The temporary exhibitions, which usually involve an admission fee, are also hit and miss. Walking with Beasts, based on the BBC series of the same name, contains full-sized models of a Woolly Mammoth being attacked by a cave man, a sabre-toothed tiger and other long-gone beasts, but isn't large enough or varied enough to justify the adult admission charge of £4.50. When you have seen enough, a reasonable cafe is on hand to provide refreshments or enjoy a picnic beside one of the colourful flowerbeds that surround the museum. 7/10

National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

Set in a grand 18th century building, which used to house the Royal Hospital School, this well-heeled museum places a heavy emphasis on education. Many of the exhibits, such as the large wave tank on the ground floor and the nearby interactive displays, appear to be aimed at 10 to 14 year olds. Their younger siblings will enjoy the regular tours, recently run by a witty, enthralling and very green Neptune and his trident, and craft activities, such as drawing maps, making model long-boats or constructing monster masks. On the third-floor is an interactive area, where even toddlers can get to grips with a mini-crane for loading ships or a wind machine for propelling a model yacht across a steel rod.

For adults, the museum's highlights include an extravagant 18th Century barge, decorated extensively in gold-leaf, used by Prince Frederick to cruise up and down the Thames. Also on the ground floor is a long glass cabinet containing a row of intricate and detailed models of cruise liners and other large passenger ships from the 19th and 20th centuries. Nearby are life-size mannequins of passengers, strangely painted all white, which capture the sense of adventure and risk involved in Edwardian emigration. The museum, which contains many more model boats, naval uniforms, nautical paintings and paraphernalia, should fill an afternoon for the casual visitor and far longer for any enthusiastic seafarer or history buff. Better still, entry is free, but donations are encouraged. 8/10

Imperial War Museum, Lambeth Road, London

The entrance to this imposing building is fittingly guarded by a huge twin-barrelled artillery gun. Entrance is free, but go at 10am on a Sunday to avoid the crowds of boys and men drawn to this exceptional museum. Inside, the main gallery contains a dizzying array of military hardware from across the 20th Century, including a brutish First World War tank, a huge V2 Rocket, an American Sherman tank and a charming Edwardian London bus used to ferry British soldiers to the trenches. Up above, soar several fighter aircraft including the legendary spitfire and a couple of fragile by-planes. To one side is a self-service cafe selling moist and scrumptious blueberry muffins, chocolate chip cookies, cheese scones and hot meals.

Downstairs, a maze of galleries display a wealth of artifacts, uniforms, maps, insignias and other paraphernalia from the many armies that served in the two World Wars and the Cold War. Nearby, is the Trenches Experience where life-size models, sandbags, flashing lights, the rattle of machine guns and audio excerpts of frantic orders being issued to frightened men combine to create almost to realistic simulation of the front line in France. Ten minutes in here will leave you wondering how those soldiers were able to stand the trenches for 24 hours, never mind months on end. Nearby, there is also an evocative and extraordinarily-detailed reconstruction of a 1940s British house complete with an air-raid shelter made of corrugated iron. There are many more high-quality, informative and moving exhibits within the Imperial War Museum, which should be a port of call for any British Prime Minister contemplating conflict. 9/10