London Christmas lights walk

London Christmas lights walks map  |

Distance: 7km |

S l o w  time:  3 hours |

Ice skating, Squares, Markets, Dials, and Yards, Angels & mistletoe

First up in our new Slow Cities series is our favourite, London town. We think it must be one of the most walker-friendly super cities in the world. London is a maze of 300 year old streets, soaring architecture, and cosy little cafes hidden in secret squares.

Read more: 3 Winter Walks in London

And come December, London is just crammed full of Christmas!

We have been travelling around London for a good dollop of festive feeling for years, and walking is just about the perfect way of experiencing it all. So we’ve formulated a London Christmas walk – a London Christmas lights walk no less.

This 7km walk goes from Somerset House to Sloane Square and takes in all the big Christmas lights of the capital. Hopefully we will be leading you to all those places you really, really want to see!

So let’s make a start, our London Christmas lights walk:

Somerset House

You need to get yourself to eighteenth century Somerset House, a former royal house and once home to the Royal Academy. We got there around 3pm, to be walking around when the lights are all twinkling.

Somerset House is a great winter attraction in London, transforming its famous courtyard into an ice skating rink. If you want to have a go, you can find out about it here.

(Skating is almost a type of walking, no?)

Covent Garden

From Somerset House, your next stop on our London Christmas lights walk is Covent Garden. Even though indeed a tourist-trap, mid-afternoon during the week it can be a tranquil little oasis. And we loved the oversize mistletoe inside the market this year (whisper it: they might be our favourite in London).

Seven Dials

After roaming around the market, head to Covent Garden Underground station, cross over Long Acre, and start to explore the wonderful Seven Dials.

We had to enter the area via the Instagrammers paradise of Neal’s Yard. It’s a tiny little alley, historically shabby and overlooked, but is now a beautiful jumble of organic shops. The fronts are painted a whirligig of colours and the air is full of spices and fragrances wafting out of the open doors. It’s like nowhere else in London, and has atmosphere dripping from its very walls.

Step through Neal’s Yard and turn left on Monmouth Street and you will see the marvellous Seven Dials display, a highlight of our London Christmas lights walk.

Seven streets lead off the seventeenth century sundial pillar at its centre, trees brightly lit round each passage. It has a cosy, cheery feel that is just about perfect for Christmas meanderings.

Seven Dials is also committedly foodie. We never seem to get through this area without stopping at some eatery or other. Our favourites are Homeslice (pizza, yum) and Rosa’s (Thai, YUM). 

Soho & Carnaby Street

Next, it’s through Soho to Carnaby Street. Our route goes along Old Compton Street which crosses Dean Street, the home of The French House. Soho has changed a lot, but the French House is a pub that can still tell you what the old buzz of Soho is all about. It’s worth a mulled wine or two en-route.

Carnaby Street itself went all tropical this year, and we liked it! There’s palm trees, flamingos, and parakeets – all apparently harking back to its swinging 60s heyday.

Oxford Street & Regent Street

Now, we couldn’t go and do a London Christmas walk without the giants that are Oxford Street and Regent Street. You just have to go to Oxford Circus, and yep, with everyone else in the world it seems. But do it because it looks like this:

Piccadilly

Skip away from the crowds and head down Regent Street towards Piccadilly Circus. You can walk via Piccadilly Circus, but we opted for a short-cut along Swallow Street to get onto the Piccadilly.

We’re always excited to be in this part of town: the grandest of roads, the most beautiful of arcades and shops.

Along it is Fortnum & Mason, and popping in here may well derail the rest of the walk. Established in 1707, it is a department store in the old-fashioned style: official food suppliers for the Queen, it still has Georgian interiors with creaking wooden staircases, panelling, and its halls decked with boughs of holly (fa la la la la).

You are your best Christmas self in this shop and we only managed to continue on our London Christmas walk because we restricted ourselves to getting two Christmas decorations. They have the best collection – you must check it out!

Piccadilly is nowhere near as busy as Oxford Street, and with The Royal Academy of Arts and Burlington Arcade also along it, it’s full of sparkle in the London twilight.

Our next highlight of this London Christmas lights walk is Shepherd Market in Mayfair. To get there continue along Piccadilly, passing The Wolseley and The Ritz, and turn right onto Berkeley Street. Before the square cut through to Curzon Street and you will see a little lane on the left. Slip unseen into Shepherd Market.

This little place is a bit magical. And it is still pretty unknown, hidden as it is. Shepherd’s Market certainly has a bit of a crazy past if you look it up, but these days it’s one beautiful little court. We had the best mince pie of the season here, baked in the Market’s Greek cafe.

Continue through Mayfair to Park Lane and take the underpass to get to the Hyde Park side. Here you can wander into the park and go to Winter Wonderland.

Knightsbridge

We chose to crack on into Knightsbridge to see Harrods. The Harrods lights -only there at Christmas- lining every curve and corner of its façade have to be up there with the world’s best.

Sloane Square

It’s tempting to stop and catch a tube from Knightsbridge station onto wherever you want to go next. But we decided to go a little further, down to Sloane Square – just one more stop.

Sloane Square is dappled with lights in every one of its trees, and overlooked by department store Peter Jones, hung with silver icicles from top to toe. No-one seems to come here to admire the lights, but to us they are a perfect place to round off this route.

Peter Jones does have a nice cafe right at the top too if you want to stop for a coffee at the end.

So there you have it, our London Christmas lights walk. Doing it yourself or just experiencing it with us here – we hope you feel a little more festive for it.

And of course: a very happy Christmas to every single person who is here exploring with us