Guide · Interactive and immersive
Screens you can stand inside: Outernet, Lightroom and Frameless
Three places where the art is the whole room, walls and floor included. One is free and you walk in off the street; the other two sell timed slots and are worth booking a few days ahead.
Three places where the art is the whole room. One is free and you walk in off the street. The other two sell timed slots and can sell out on popular dates, so book a few days ahead.
Outernet, Tottenham Court Road
A four-storey atrium wrapped inside and out in 8K LED screens, on the corner of Tottenham Court Road and Charing Cross Road, beside the station. Most people walk through on the way out of the tube and take it for a giant advert. It also runs a free, scheduled programme of digital art that you stand inside, and the Now Arcade, an LED tunnel through to Denmark Street, hosts walk-through exhibitions. It opened in 2022, so older guidebooks miss it. Get the Outernet app for the day's schedule and go after dark, when the screens take over the street. Weekday evenings are calmer than Friday and Saturday nights.
Lightroom, King's Cross
A purpose-built projection hall behind Coal Drops Yard, ten minutes' walk from King's Cross through Granary Square. One show plays across four eleven-metre walls and the floor with spatial sound, and you wander or sit on the floor while it loops. The show changes every few months, which is why people who came for the Hockney opener have no idea what is on now. This autumn it is David Bowie: You're Not Alone, extended to January 2027, with Aardman's Larger Than Life as the daytime show from mid-October. Book a half-hourly slot at lightroom.uk and arrive no more than fifteen minutes before it; there are no day tickets. Weekday mornings are the cheapest and emptiest.
Frameless, Marble Arch
In a basement under an office block at 6 Marble Arch, one minute from the station, with nothing on the street to give it away. Four galleries of floor-to-ceiling projection animate more than forty paintings, Kandinsky, Monet, Van Gogh and Klimt among them, to original scores, and a Sistine Chapel room comes with every ticket. Allow ninety minutes to two hours. Prices move by day and time; when we checked, an adult ticket was £29.50 online for a weekday afternoon and a couple of pounds more on a Saturday. Book at frameless.com only, because tickets from resellers are not valid. Weekday late morning is quietest; Friday and Saturday evenings from 6pm are adult-only Lates with a bar in the galleries.
- Outernet: free, no booking. Open 10am to late every day; the week's times are on outernet.com and in the app.
- Lightroom: adults from £25, students and under-18s from £15, plus a £2 fee per online order. Last entry an hour before closing.
- Frameless: adult from about £29.50 online, child (3 to 15) from £20, under-2s free. Last entry two hours before closing; under-18s must arrive by 4pm.
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