The South Bank is an entertainment and commercial area on the south bank of the

River Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the The Isis, River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, s ...

, in the

London Borough of Lambeth Lambeth () is a London borough in South London, England, which forms part of Inner London. Its name was recorded in 1062 as ''Lambehitha'' ("landing place for lambs") and in 1255 as ''Lambeth''. The geographical centre of London is at Frazi ...

central London Central London is the innermost part of London, in England, spanning the City of London and several boroughs. Over time, a number of definitions have been used to define the scope of Central London for statistics, urban planning and local gove ...

, England. The South Bank is not formally defined, but is generally understood to be situated between County Hall in the west to the Oxo Tower on the borough boundary with

Southwark Southwark ( ) is a district of Central London situated on the south bank of the River Thames, forming the north-western part of the wider modern London Borough of Southwark. The district, which is the oldest part of South London, developed ...

, to the east. South Bank consists of a narrow strip of riverside land opposite the

City of Westminster The City of Westminster is a London borough with City status in the United Kingdom, city status in Greater London, England. It is the site of the United Kingdom's Houses of Parliament and much of the British government. It contains a large par ...

and adjoins the Albert Embankment to the west and

Bankside Bankside is an area of London, England, within the London Borough of Southwark. Bankside is located on the southern bank of the River Thames, east of Charing Cross, running from a little west of Blackfriars Bridge to just a short distance befo ...

in the

London Borough of Southwark The London Borough of Southwark ( ) in South London forms part of Inner London and is connected by bridges across the River Thames to the City of London and the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It was created in 1965 when three smaller council ...

to the east. As such, the South Bank may be regarded as akin to the riverside part of an area known previously as

Lambeth Marsh Lambeth Marsh (also Lower Marsh and Lambeth Marshe) is one of the oldest settlements on the South Bank of London, England. Until the early 19th century much of north Lambeth (now known as the South Bank) was mostly marsh. The settlement of La ...

and North Lambeth. Throughout its history, it has twice functioned as an entertainment district, interspersed by around a hundred years of wharfs, domestic industry and manufacturing being its dominant use. Change came in 1917 with the construction of County Hall at Lambeth replacing the Lion Brewery. The name South Bank was first widely used in 1951 during the

Festival of Britain The Festival of Britain was a national exhibition and fair that reached millions of visitors throughout the United Kingdom in the summer of 1951. Labour Party cabinet member Herbert Morrison was the prime mover; in 1947 he started with the ...

. The festival redefined the area as a place for arts and entertainment. The area's attractions includes the County Hall complex, the Sea Life London Aquarium, the

London Dungeon The London Dungeon is a tourist attraction/ haunted attraction along London's South Bank, England, which recreates various gory and macabre historical events in a gallows humour style. It uses a mixture of live actors, special effects and ...

, Jubilee Gardens and the

London Eye The London Eye, originally the Millennium Wheel, is a cantilevered observation wheel on the South Bank of the River Thames in London. It is the world's tallest cantilevered observation wheel, and the most popular paid Tourist attractions in the ...

, the

Southbank Centre Southbank Centre is an arts centre in London, England. It is adjacent to the separately owned National Theatre and BFI Southbank. It comprises the three main performance spaces – the Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall, and Purcell R ...

Royal Festival Hall The Royal Festival Hall is a 2,700-seat concert, dance and talks venue within Southbank Centre in London, England. It is situated on the South Bank of the River Thames, not far from Hungerford Bridge, in the London Borough of Lambeth. It is a G ...

, National Theatre, and

BFI Southbank BFI Southbank (from 1951 to 2007, known as the National Film Theatre) is the leading repertory cinema in the United Kingdom, specialising in seasons of classic, independent and non-English language films. It is operated by the British Film Inst ...

History

Royal Festival Hall and Shot Tower c1959

Before the Thames was embanked, this area of Lambeth was often flooded, so the area was slower to develop than the north bank of the Thames. Throughout its history, it has twice functioned as an entertainment district, interspersed by around a hundred years of wharfs, domestic industry and manufacturing being its dominant use. During the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

this area developed as a place of entertainment outside the formal regulation of the City of London on the north bank; this included theatres, prostitution and

bear-baiting Bear-baiting was a historical blood sport in which a chained bear and one or more dogs were forced to fight one another. It also sometimes involved pitting a bear against another animal. Until the 19th century, it was commonly performed in Gr ...

. By the 18th century the more genteel entertainment of the

pleasure garden A pleasure garden is a park or garden that is open to the public for recreation and entertainment. Pleasure gardens differ from other public gardens by serving as venues for entertainment, variously featuring such attractions as concert halls, b ...

s had developed. The shallow bank and mud flats were ideal locations for industry and docks and went on to develop as an industrial location in a patchwork of private ownership. The Queen's Walk pedestrianised embankment is part of the Albert Embankment, built not only for public drainage but also to raise the whole tract of land to prevent flooding. Change began in 1917 with the construction of County Hall, near North Lambeth's Lower Marsh. which replaced the Lion Brewery. Its

Coade stone Coade stone or ''Lithodipyra'' or ''Lithodipra'' () is stoneware that was often described as an artificial stone in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. It was used for moulding neoclassical architecture, neoclassical statues, a ...

symbol was retained and placed on a pedestal at Westminster Bridge and is known as the South Bank Lion. The construction of County Hall returned the first section of river frontage to public use. This was extended eastwards in 1951 when a considerable area was redeveloped for the

. It was renamed 'South Bank' as part of promoting the Festival. The legacy of the festival was mixed, with buildings and exhibits demolished to make way for Jubilee Gardens, while the

and The Queen's Walk were retained as part of the

. During the years following the festival the arts and entertainment complex grew with additional facilities, including the

Queen Elizabeth Hall The Queen Elizabeth Hall (QEH) is a music venue on the South Bank in London, England, that hosts European classical music, classical, jazz, and avant-garde music, talks and dance performances. It was opened in 1967, with a concert conducted by ...

, and other arts venues opened along the river such as the

Royal National Theatre The National Theatre (NT), officially the Royal National Theatre and sometimes referred to in international contexts as the National Theatre of Great Britain, is a performing arts venue and associated theatre company located in London, England, ...

. The recent developments, particularly the South Bank Place project by Canary Wharf Homes, underscore the ongoing transformation of the South Bank into a vibrant residential and cultural hub, a trend that is set to continue with more riverside projects on the horizon.

Geography

The South Bank is not formally defined, but is generally understood to be situated between County Hall in the west to the Oxo Tower on the borough boundary with

, to the east. South Bank consists of a narrow strip of riverside land opposite the

and adjoins the Albert Embankment to the west and

in the

to the east. As such, the South Bank may be regarded as akin to the riverside part of an area known previously as

and North Lambeth. There are public open space along the riverside, including Bernie Spain Gardens between the London Studios and the Oxo Tower. The gardens were named after Bernadette Spain, a local community activist who was part of the Coin Street Action Group.

Cultural aspects

The South Bank is a significant arts and entertainment district. The Southbank Centre comprises the Royal Festival Hall, the Queen Elizabeth Hall and The Hayward Gallery. The Royal National Theatre, the London IMAX super cinema and

adjoin to the east, but are not strictly part of the centre. Polish-British visual chronicler and artist

Feliks Topolski Feliks Topolski Royal Academician, RA (14 August 1907 – 24 August 1989) was a Polish expressionist painter and draughtsman working primarily in the United Kingdom. Biography Feliks Topolski was born on 14 August 1907 in Warsaw, Poland. He st ...

was provided a studio under one of the arches of Hungerford Bridge in 1951, where he worked consistently until his death in 1989. Topolski was commissioned to produce a 60ft by 20ft mural under the arch over Belvedere Road for the

, unknowingly painting only two arches up from his eventual studio. Offered to him by David Eccles, it was not until 1953 and Queen Elizabeth II's coronation, when the windows from the dismantled annex to Westminster Abbey were repurposed to fit Topolski's studio. Over the years the studio became a central feature of the South Bank, hosting countless people at his 'Open Studio' Fridays from 3pm, with an open door to whosever wished to pop their head in. Now the Studio functions as an archive and exhibition space operated by Topolski Memoir, the charity set up to preserve the artist's legacy. Topolski was provided with three further arches in 1975 by the Greater London Council (GLC), where he painted his epic 600ft long, 12-20ft high 'Memoir of the Century'. Telling his broad-ranging experience of the 20th century, Topolski painted the work from 1975 until his death, writing that he hoped to die working on it, with a brush in his hand. It remained open until 2006 in its original state, working with students, but, due to its poor condition, underwent a £3,000,000 conservation and renovation program, funded by the

Heritage Lottery Fund The National Lottery Heritage Fund, formerly the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), distributes a share of National Lottery funding, supporting a wide range of heritage projects across the United Kingdom. History The fund's predecessor bodies were ...

, private donations and several other grant bodies, and raised by the artist's son, Daniel Topolski. Reopened by the Duke of Edinburgh in 2009, the Memoir only ran for a year due to commercial pressures and was converted into the Bar Topolski, where some of Topolski's work can still be seen. County Hall was converted into ''The London

Marriott Hotel Marriott Hotels & Resorts is Marriott International's brand of full-service hotels and resorts based in Bethesda, Maryland. As of June 30, 2020, there were 582 hotels and resorts with 205,053 rooms operating under the brand, in addition to 160 h ...

County Hall'', Sea Life London Aquarium and the

. The OXO Tower Wharf at the eastern end of South Bank, houses Gallery@Oxo, shops and boutiques, and the OXO Tower Restaurant run by

Harvey Nichols Harvey Nichols Group Limited ( trading as Harvey Nichols) is a British luxury department store chain founded in 1831 by Benjamin Harvey; it is headquartered at its flagship store in Knightsbridge, London. It sells designer fashion collections ...

. Gabriel's Wharf is a redeveloped

wharf A wharf ( or wharfs), quay ( , also ), staith, or staithe is a structure on the shore of a harbour or on the bank of a river or canal where ships may dock to load and unload cargo or passengers. Such a structure includes one or more Berth (mo ...

on the South Bank, which has been converted into a shopping area.

The London Studios The London Studios (also known as The South Bank Studios, The London Television Centre, ITV Tower, Kent House and LWT Tower) in Lambeth, Central London was a television studio complex owned by ITV plc and originally built for London Weekend Te ...

, the former home of ITV faces the Thames and

Rambert Dance Company Rambert (known as Rambert Dance Company before 2014) is a leading British dance company. Formed at the start of the 20th century as a classical ballet company, it exerted a great deal of influence on the development of dance in the United Kingd ...

have their new studios on Upper Ground. The

Old Vic Old or OLD may refer to: Places *Old, Baranya, Hungary *Old, Northamptonshire, England *Old Street station, a railway and tube station in London (station code OLD) *OLD, IATA code for Old Town Municipal Airport and Seaplane Base, Old Town, Mai ...

and

Young Vic The Young Vic Theatre is a performing arts venue located on The Cut, near the South Bank, in the London Borough of Lambeth. The Young Vic was established by Frank Dunlop in 1970. Nadia Fall has been artistic director since 2025, succeeding ...

theatres are nearby. The Florence Nightingale Museum to nursing, medicine and the Crimean War adjoins the 'district'. The undercroft of the Queen Elizabeth Hall has been used by

skateboard A skateboard is a type of sports equipment used for skateboarding. It is usually made of a specially designed 7–8-ply maple plywood deck and has polyurethane wheels attached to the underside by a pair of skateboarding trucks. The skateboard ...

ers since the early 1970s. Originally an architectural dead-spot, it became a landmark of British skateboarding culture, but later was under threat, though supported by the

Long Live Southbank Long Live Southbank, commonly known as LLSB, is a non-profit organisation that successfully campaigned against the redevelopment of the Southbank Undercroft skateboarding spot at the Southbank Centre site in London, England. The organisation is ...

campaign. Part of the Southbank Centre was turned into shops looking out over the river. The South Bank was the main scene of the 1952 comedy film '' The Happy Family'', set around the Festival of Britain. South bank Panorama

Transport

Part of the success of the area as a visitor attraction is attributed to the high levels of public transport access. Several major railway terminals are within walking distance of the South Bank, on both sides of the river, including Waterloo,

Charing Cross Charing Cross ( ) is a junction in Westminster, London, England, where six routes meet. Since the early 19th century, Charing Cross has been the notional "centre of London" and became the point from which distances from London are measured. ...

and Blackfriars. The London Underground has stations on or near the South Bank, from west to east, at

Westminster Westminster is the main settlement of the City of Westminster in Central London, Central London, England. It extends from the River Thames to Oxford Street and has many famous landmarks, including the Palace of Westminster, Buckingham Palace, ...

, Waterloo, Embankment, Blackfriars and

. The development of the

Thameslink Thameslink is a mainline route on the British railway network, running from , , , , , and via central London to , , , Rainham, , , and . The network opened as a through service in 1988, with severe overcrowding by 1998, carrying more than ...

Blackfriars railway station in the early 2010s, which has access from both the southern and northern side of the river, prompted the additional named signage "for Bankside and South Bank". Accessibility to the north bank is high, with connections made, from west to east, over the

Golden Jubilee A golden jubilee marks a 50th anniversary. It variously is applied to people, events, and nations. Bangladesh In Bangladesh, golden jubilee refers the 50th anniversary year of the separation from Pakistan and is called in Bengali language, ...

, Waterloo and Blackfriars bridges. The river is utilised as a means of transport with piers along the South Bank at the London Eye, Royal Festival Hall and Bankside.

References

External links

*
South Bank London

Southbank Centre
{{Authority control Areas of London Districts of the London Borough of Lambeth Districts of London on the River Thames Tourist attractions in London Festival of Britain London sub-regions