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Society of London","area":"Piccadilly","address":"Burlington House, Piccadilly, W1J 0BG","station":"Piccadilly Circus","walk":4,"lat":51.508637,"lng":-0.138783,"hours":null,"hours_raw":null,"hours_source":null,"hours_url":null,"hours_short":null,"hours_checked":null,"hours_extra":"Open for lectures, conferences and events; the library is used by arrangement.","runs":null,"website":"https://www.geolsoc.org.uk/","instagram":null,"attrs":[],"osm":"node/352673650","types":["building","library","talks"],"deep":null,"scope":null,"scope_icon":null,"route":null,"venue_group":null,"geo":null,"geo_zone":null,"verdict":"The oldest geological society in the world, founded 1807, with a lecture programme and a library in Burlington House.","note":"It was founded in 1807 by thirteen men dining at the Freemasons Tavern, at a moment when the age of the Earth was an open question and the evidence for answering it was being dug out of English quarries. The Society ran the argument through its meetings, and the map William Smith made of the strata of England and Wales - the first geological map of a country anywhere - hangs in the building.\n\nThe programme now is conferences, lectures and public events across the earth and planetary sciences, and the library is one of the largest geological collections in the world.","note_links":null,"reading":null,"figure":null,"figures":null,"from":null,"country":null,"country_name":null,"also":null,"years":null,"plaque":null,"maps_q":"Geological Society of London, Burlington House, Piccadilly, W1J 0BG, London","in_area":{"slug":"mayfair","name":"Mayfair"},"bank":1,"near_all":[{"n":"Hatchards","s":"hatchards","c":"shopping","cn":"Shopping","m":53},{"n":"Fortnum & Mason","s":"fortnum-mason","c":"shopping","cn":"Shopping","m":61},{"n":"Fortnum & Mason Food Halls","s":"fortnum-mason-food-halls","c":"food-markets","cn":"Food Markets","m":61}],"near_same":[{"s":"royal-astronomical-society","m":47},{"s":"linnean-society","m":52},{"s":"society-of-antiquaries-of-london","m":59},{"s":"royal-society","m":567},{"s":"royal-society-of-arts","m":1125},{"s":"kings-college-london","m":1633}]},{"slug":"gresham-college","name":"Gresham College","area":"Holborn","address":"Barnard's Inn Hall, Holborn, EC1N 2HH","station":"Chancery Lane","walk":2,"lat":51.517588,"lng":-0.10974,"hours":null,"hours_raw":null,"hours_source":null,"hours_url":null,"hours_short":null,"hours_checked":null,"hours_extra":"The hall opens for lectures rather than to fixed hours; register in advance, and note the lectures are not all given here.","runs":null,"website":"https://www.gresham.ac.uk/","instagram":null,"attrs":[],"osm":null,"types":["building","free","talks"],"deep":null,"scope":null,"scope_icon":null,"route":null,"venue_group":null,"geo":null,"geo_zone":null,"verdict":"Free public lectures since 1597, roughly one every weekday in term, given by professors appointed to do nothing else.","note":"Sir Thomas Gresham, who built the Royal Exchange, left money in his will for seven professors to lecture the citizens of London for nothing. The college has done that since 1597 without ever enrolling a student or awarding a degree - there is no one to teach but whoever turns up, which is the whole design. The professorships are still the original subjects plus later additions, and the holders are appointed for a few years to give a series and then hand on.\n\nThe programme runs at roughly a lecture a weekday in term and every one is free. A week might hold the changing sky, the mathematics of whips and dinosaur tails, whether the HIV pandemic is over, and what a jury trial is actually for. Registration is asked for because the hall is not large.\n\nBarnard's Inn Hall is the home: a fifteenth-century hall with a timber roof, one of the last survivors of the Inns of Chancery that once trained lawyers around here. Not every lecture is given in it - the college also uses the Museum of London, LSE and other rooms when the subject draws a crowd - so the booking page is worth reading before setting off.","note_links":null,"reading":null,"figure":null,"figures":null,"from":null,"country":null,"country_name":null,"also":null,"years":null,"plaque":null,"maps_q":"Gresham College, Barnard's Inn Hall, Holborn, EC1N 2HH, London","in_area":{"slug":"the-city","name":"The City"},"bank":1,"near_all":[{"n":"Enigma Quests","s":"enigma-quests","c":"whats-on","cn":"What\u2019s On","m":40},{"n":"Gresham College lectures","s":"gresham-college-lectures","c":"whats-on","cn":"What\u2019s On","m":54},{"n":"Giuseppe Mazzini","s":"giuseppe-mazzini","c":"world","cn":"The World in London","m":158}],"near_same":[{"s":"london-school-of-economics","m":582},{"s":"kings-college-london","m":671},{"s":"royal-society-of-arts","m":1264},{"s":"royal-society","m":1960},{"s":"geological-society-of-london","m":2242},{"s":"linnean-society","m":2279}]},{"slug":"kings-college-london","name":"King's College London","area":"Strand","address":"Strand Campus, Strand, WC2R 2LS","station":"Temple","walk":3,"lat":51.513152,"lng":-0.116328,"hours":null,"hours_raw":null,"hours_source":null,"hours_url":null,"hours_short":null,"hours_checked":null,"hours_extra":null,"runs":null,"website":"https://www.kcl.ac.uk/events/events-calendar","instagram":null,"attrs":[],"osm":"relation/5747097","types":["free","talks"],"deep":null,"scope":null,"scope_icon":null,"route":null,"venue_group":null,"geo":null,"geo_zone":null,"verdict":"Free public lectures on the Strand most weeks in term, from naval history to what artificial intelligence is doing to work.","note":"The Strand Campus sits between the Aldwych and the river, and a good part of what happens in its lecture rooms is open to anyone who books. The college marks those events as public lectures on its own calendar, and they run through term most weeks: a book talk where the author is the person who did the archival work, an annual lecture where the speaker has been flown in for it, a professor giving the inaugural lecture that marks their appointment.\n\nThe subjects follow the college's own shape rather than a programmer's taste, which is why the run is so uneven and so much better for it - Russian foreign policy, the economics of shipping, moral philosophy, prize money in Nelson's navy. Most are free and most are recorded, and several are run as hybrids with the room and a video call at once.\n\nRooms are spread across the campus and named on each event's own page: the King's Building on the Strand, Bush House round the corner on the Aldwych, the east wing of Somerset House. The college has other campuses at Guy's, Denmark Hill, Waterloo and the Cut, and a lecture is sometimes at one of those instead, so the booking page is the thing to read before setting off.","note_links":null,"locations":[{"id":"guys","name":"Guy's Campus","address":"Great Maze Pond, SE1 9RT","lat":51.503331,"lng":-0.086771},{"id":"denmark-hill","name":"Denmark Hill Campus","address":"Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, 16 De Crespigny Park, SE5 8AF","lat":51.469975,"lng":-0.089082}],"reading":null,"figure":null,"figures":null,"from":null,"country":null,"country_name":null,"also":null,"years":null,"plaque":null,"whats_on":[{"slug":"british-statecraft-and-the-baltic-sea-region","name":"British Statecraft and the Baltic Sea Region","href":"/societies/kings-college-london/british-statecraft-and-the-baltic-sea-region/","verdict":"Two historians on four centuries of Britain in the Baltic, from the archives up.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-17","to":"2026-09-17"},"types":["talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"spirals-chatbots-and-psychological-harm","name":"SPIRALS: chatbots and psychological harm","href":"/societies/kings-college-london/spirals-chatbots-and-psychological-harm/","verdict":"What 391,562 messages to chatbots show about the harm some of them did.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-24","to":"2026-09-24"},"types":["free","science","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Science & nature"]},{"slug":"shipping-on-the-road-to-net-zero","name":"Shipping on the Road to Net Zero","href":"/societies/kings-college-london/shipping-on-the-road-to-net-zero/","verdict":"An economic historian on what earlier upheavals in shipping can teach an industry trying to decarbonise.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-24","to":"2026-09-24"},"types":["talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"international-assistance-and-the-end-of-the-war-ukrainian-perspectives","name":"International Assistance and the End of the War: 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Lecture","href":"/societies/kings-college-london/centre-of-european-law-52nd-annual-lecture/","verdict":"The European Commissioner for migration on making the new asylum pact actually function.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-19","to":"2026-10-19"},"types":["talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"we-shall-outlast-them-putins-global-campaign","name":"We Shall Outlast Them: Putin's Global Campaign","href":"/societies/kings-college-london/we-shall-outlast-them-putins-global-campaign/","verdict":"How Russia rebuilt its whole foreign policy around outlasting the West.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-20","to":"2026-10-20"},"types":["talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"breaking-barriers-making-leaders-women-law-and-global-finance","name":"Breaking Barriers, Making Leaders: Women, Law and Global Finance","href":"/societies/kings-college-london/breaking-barriers-making-leaders-women-law-and-global-finance/","verdict":"The chief executive of Hong Kong's exchange on the route from law into running a market.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-21","to":"2026-10-21"},"types":["talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"society-for-applied-philosophy-annual-lecture","name":"Society for Applied Philosophy Annual Lecture","href":"/societies/kings-college-london/society-for-applied-philosophy-annual-lecture/","verdict":"A Berkeley philosopher on why an obligation owed to one person can rest on what would happen if everyone broke it.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-21","to":"2026-10-21"},"types":["talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"the-naval-war-in-the-baltic-1914-1915","name":"The Naval War in the Baltic, 1914-1915","href":"/societies/kings-college-london/the-naval-war-in-the-baltic-1914-1915/","verdict":"How the outnumbered Russian fleet drove the German navy out of the eastern Baltic, and took its codebooks.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-22","to":"2026-10-22"},"types":["talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]}],"maps_q":"King's College London, Strand Campus, Strand, WC2R 2LS, London","in_area":{"slug":"holborn","name":"Holborn"},"bank":1,"near_all":[{"n":"Australia House","s":"australia-house","c":"harry-potter","cn":"Harry Potter","m":32},{"n":"Hidden London: Aldwych family tour","s":"hidden-london-aldwych-family-tour","c":"whats-on","cn":"What\u2019s On","m":138},{"n":"Hidden London: Aldwych \u2014 the end of the line","s":"hidden-london-aldwych-the-end-of-the-line","c":"whats-on","cn":"What\u2019s On","m":138}],"near_same":[{"s":"london-school-of-economics","m":154},{"s":"royal-society-of-arts","m":593},{"s":"gresham-college","m":671},{"s":"royal-society","m":1297},{"s":"geological-society-of-london","m":1633},{"s":"linnean-society","m":1675}]},{"slug":"linnean-society","name":"Linnean Society","area":"St James's","address":"Burlington House, Piccadilly, W1J 0BF","station":"Green Park","walk":4,"lat":51.5088,"lng":-0.1395,"hours":null,"hours_raw":null,"hours_source":null,"hours_url":"https://www.linnean.org/research-collections/access/linnean-society-tours-1","hours_short":"Tours by arrangement; the library Tuesday to Friday 10:00\u201317:00 by appointment","hours_checked":"2026-09-05","hours_extra":null,"runs":null,"website":"https://www.linnean.org/","instagram":null,"attrs":[],"osm":null,"types":["building","collection","free","library","talks"],"deep":null,"scope":null,"scope_icon":null,"route":null,"venue_group":null,"geo":null,"geo_zone":null,"verdict":"Linnaeus's own specimens and library, in Burlington House, with free evening lectures through the year.","note":"The world's oldest active biological society, at Burlington House since 1856 beside the Royal Academy, keeps the herbarium, insects, shells and library that Carl Linnaeus assembled and that its founder bought from his widow in 1784, in a bomb-proof strongroom under the courtyard. Upstairs is the meeting room where, on a July evening in 1858, the secretary read out Darwin's and Wallace's papers on natural selection to an audience that did not notice, with neither author present. Tours by arrangement go into the vault; the library is open to readers.","note_links":null,"reading":null,"figure":null,"figures":null,"from":"science/linnean-society","country":null,"country_name":null,"also":null,"years":null,"plaque":null,"whats_on":[{"slug":"open-house-at-the-linnean-society","name":"Open House at the Linnean Society","href":"/science/linnean-society/open-house-at-the-linnean-society/","verdict":"The rooms where Darwin and Wallace were first read out, open with no booking.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-19","to":"2026-09-19"},"types":["family","free","science"],"clue":["Science & nature"]},{"slug":"herbarium-plants-in-a-new-light","name":"Herbarium: Plants in a New Light","href":"/science/linnean-society/herbarium-plants-in-a-new-light/","verdict":"Linnaeus's own pressed plants, photographed from behind with the light coming through.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-21","to":"2026-09-21"},"types":["photography","science","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Photography"]},{"slug":"outsider-animals-cherishing-shunned-creatures","name":"Outsider Animals: Cherishing Shunned Creatures","href":"/science/linnean-society/outsider-animals-cherishing-shunned-creatures/","verdict":"What the rat, the raccoon and the gull know that the chimpanzee does not.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-15","to":"2026-10-15"},"types":["nature","science","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Science & nature"]},{"slug":"jane-coldens-plants","name":"Jane Colden's Plants","href":"/science/linnean-society/jane-coldens-plants/","verdict":"The first woman to describe American plants, working in colonial New York.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-19","to":"2026-10-19"},"types":["history","science","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Science & nature"]},{"slug":"an-evening-with-the-sunbirds-of-the-world","name":"An Evening with the Sunbirds of the World","href":"/science/linnean-society/an-evening-with-the-sunbirds-of-the-world/","verdict":"The Old World's answer to the hummingbird, which it is not related to.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-22","to":"2026-10-22"},"types":["nature","science","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Science & nature"]},{"slug":"astonished-by-beauty-the-essential-practice-of-natural-history","name":"Astonished By Beauty: The Essential Practice of Natural History","href":"/science/linnean-society/astonished-by-beauty-the-essential-practice-of-natural-history/","verdict":"A defence of looking at things closely as a serious method.","runs":{"from":"2026-11-03","to":"2026-11-03"},"types":["books","nature","science","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Science & nature"]},{"slug":"a-cabinet-of-curiosities-decorative-papers-and-natural-history","name":"A Cabinet of Curiosities: Decorative Papers and Natural History","href":"/science/linnean-society/a-cabinet-of-curiosities-decorative-papers-and-natural-history/","verdict":"Make marbled paper the eighteenth-century way, then a cabinet to line with it.","runs":{"from":"2026-11-17","to":"2026-11-17"},"types":["art","history","workshop"],"clue":["Make something","Art & design"]}],"also_in":[{"name":"Science & Engineering","href":"/science/linnean-society/"}],"maps_q":"Linnean Society, Burlington House, Piccadilly, W1J 0BF, London","in_area":{"slug":"mayfair","name":"Mayfair"},"bank":1,"near_all":[{"n":"Penhaligon's","s":"penhaligons","c":"classic-british-shops","cn":"Classic British Shops","m":48},{"n":"Burlington Arcade","s":"burlington-arcade","c":"shopping","cn":"Shopping","m":53},{"n":"Royal Academy of Arts","s":"royal-academy-of-arts","c":"museums","cn":"Museums","m":53}],"near_same":[{"s":"society-of-antiquaries-of-london","m":9},{"s":"royal-astronomical-society","m":24},{"s":"geological-society-of-london","m":52},{"s":"royal-society","m":619},{"s":"royal-society-of-arts","m":1173},{"s":"kings-college-london","m":1675}]},{"slug":"london-school-of-economics","name":"London School of Economics","area":"Holborn","address":"Houghton Street, WC2A 2AE","station":"Holborn","walk":5,"lat":51.514535,"lng":-0.116585,"hours":null,"hours_raw":null,"hours_source":null,"hours_url":null,"hours_short":null,"hours_checked":null,"hours_extra":null,"runs":null,"website":"https://www.lse.ac.uk/events","instagram":null,"attrs":[],"osm":"relation/4124110","types":["exhibitions","free","talks"],"deep":null,"scope":null,"scope_icon":null,"route":null,"venue_group":null,"geo":null,"geo_zone":null,"verdict":"Seventy public lectures a term from economists, historians and politicians, free and open to anyone who registers.","note":"The school puts its public events programme on the same footing as its teaching: roughly seventy lectures and discussions a term, free, open to anyone, and booked out by people with no connection to the place. The subjects are what LSE is for - economics, government, inequality, climate, the shape of the world order - and the speakers are the ones writing about them, from central bank presidents to the authors whose books came out that month. Most are recorded afterwards, which is worth knowing but is not the same as being in the room when somebody asks the awkward question.\n\nTwo other things run alongside. The Library Gallery mounts free exhibitions from LSE's own archives, which hold the papers of the Fabians, the Women's Library and a great deal of the documentary history of the British left. And the Shaw Library, a panelled room on the sixth floor of the Old Building, has free lunchtime recitals through term.\n\nThe campus is a dense block of streets off the Aldwych rather than a quadrangle, and the venue for a given talk is often only given to ticketholders, so the booking email is the thing to keep.","note_links":null,"regular":[{"what":"Lunchtime concerts in the Shaw Library","when":"Thursdays in term, 13:05","price":"Free","url":"https://www.lse.ac.uk/arts/music/lunchtime-concerts"}],"reading":null,"figure":null,"figures":null,"from":null,"country":null,"country_name":null,"also":null,"years":null,"plaque":null,"whats_on":[{"slug":"daron-acemoglu-what-happened-to-liberal-democracy","name":"Daron Acemoglu: What Happened to Liberal Democracy?","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/daron-acemoglu-what-happened-to-liberal-democracy/","verdict":"The Nobel laureate on how liberalism stopped keeping its own promises.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-15","to":"2026-09-15"},"types":["books","free","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Books & writers"]},{"slug":"the-road-to-cop32-the-african-agenda-for-climate-action","name":"The road to COP32: the African agenda for climate action","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/the-road-to-cop32-the-african-agenda-for-climate-action/","verdict":"Four people who work on African climate finance on what a practical agenda looks like, chaired by Nicholas Stern.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-23","to":"2026-09-23"},"types":["free","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"innovation-and-energy-for-a-sustainable-future","name":"Innovation and energy for a sustainable future","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/innovation-and-energy-for-a-sustainable-future/","verdict":"An LSE economist and the head of Tata Power on why better technology is not enough.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-24","to":"2026-09-24"},"types":["free","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"alberto-musalem-on-monetary-policy","name":"Alberto Musalem on monetary policy","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/alberto-musalem-on-monetary-policy/","verdict":"The president of the St Louis Fed, who sits on the committee that sets American interest rates, in conversation.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-29","to":"2026-09-29"},"types":["free","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"cass-sunstein-do-social-media-platforms-make-people-happier","name":"Cass Sunstein: do social media platforms make people happier?","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/cass-sunstein-do-social-media-platforms-make-people-happier/","verdict":"The behavioural economist on why people keep using something they believe is harming them.","runs":{"from":"2026-09-30","to":"2026-09-30"},"types":["free","science","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Science & nature"]},{"slug":"america-as-a-revisionist-power","name":"America as a revisionist power","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/america-as-a-revisionist-power/","verdict":"A strategist on the United States dismantling the order it spent eighty years building.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-01","to":"2026-10-01"},"types":["free","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"evgeny-morozov-socialism-after-ai","name":"Evgeny Morozov: socialism after AI","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/evgeny-morozov-socialism-after-ai/","verdict":"The technology critic on what artificial intelligence exposes in socialist thinking.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-05","to":"2026-10-05"},"types":["free","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk"]},{"slug":"every-last-girl-educating-indias-forgotten-daughters","name":"Every last girl: educating India's forgotten daughters","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/every-last-girl-educating-indias-forgotten-daughters/","verdict":"The founder of Educate Girls on finding the girls nobody counts.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-06","to":"2026-10-06"},"types":["books","free","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Books & writers"]},{"slug":"can-we-talk-to-the-animals","name":"Can we talk to the animals?","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/can-we-talk-to-the-animals/","verdict":"The winner of the Coller Dolittle Prize on decoding what zebra finches say to each other.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-07","to":"2026-10-07"},"types":["free","nature","science","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Science & nature"]},{"slug":"reni-eddo-lodge-in-conversation","name":"Reni Eddo-Lodge in conversation","href":"/societies/london-school-of-economics/reni-eddo-lodge-in-conversation/","verdict":"The author of Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race, with LSE's president.","runs":{"from":"2026-10-08","to":"2026-10-08"},"types":["books","free","talk"],"clue":["Lecture / talk","Books & writers"]},{"slug":"sustainable-post-crisis-development-a-human-rights-approach","name":"Sustainable 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