Freddie Mercury V&A display: free, no ticket, 24 October

Eight of Freddie Mercury’s stage looks go on show at the V&A in South Kensington from Saturday 24 October, and the museum is charging nothing to see them.

Freddie Mercury | Splendid Things is a free display with no ticket required, laid out as a trail across the museum rather than in a single gallery. The costumes are loaned by Mary Austin. The V&A has not published a closing date.

The practical details

• Opens: Saturday 24 October 2026.
• Where: V&A South Kensington, Cromwell Road, SW7 2RL.
• Cost: free, and no ticket is needed. General admission to the museum is free too.
• Opening hours: daily 10am to 5.45pm, and until 10pm on Fridays.
• Format: a trail across the museum, so you walk between the eight looks rather than queue for one room.

The opening-night talk has already gone

The V&A is running a paid talk the evening before, and it has sold out.

Staging Freddie is on Friday 23 October, 6.30pm to 7.30pm, in the Lydia and Manfred Gorvy Lecture Theatre. Tickets were £15 to £20 and the listing now reads “sold out”. A livestream of the same talk costs £8 and was still listed when we checked.

The talk pairs two of the people who made the clothes: fashion and textile designer Wendy de Smet, and costume designer and stylist Diana Moseley. The V&A notes that it does not include a tour of the display, though the costumes can be seen during the evening.

The Kensington High Street connection

The V&A’s listing for that talk is the fullest account it has published of the clothes themselves. It names as the speakers’ work:

• the black “spine suit” and the “White Queen” ensemble, made by de Smet for Queen’s A Night at the Opera tour of 1975 to 1976
• the crown and cloak worn on Queen’s The Magic Tour in 1986, designed by Moseley
• the costumes for the Made in Heaven music video of 1985, also Moseley

The museum does not say which of these are among the eight looks in the display. What it does say is how de Smet got the work in the first place: Freddie invited her to make clothes for the stall he and Roger Taylor ran on Kensington Market, before she went on to make the A Night at the Opera pieces.

That market stood at 49 to 53 Kensington High Street, about a mile north west of the museum. The London Museum’s account records that it opened on 15 September 1967, that Roger Taylor and Freddie Mercury, then Freddie Bulsara, ran a stall there before Queen existed, and that it closed on 29 January 2000. The building stood empty for a year and was demolished in 2001.

So the display is not only a Queen exhibit landing in the borough. Part of what it shows was made by someone who got the commission through a market stall up the road, in a building that is no longer there.

Why now

The V&A calls 2026 Mercury’s 80th anniversary year. The display takes its title from a line the museum attributes to him in 1978: “I like to be surrounded by splendid things. I want to lead a Victorian life surrounded by exquisite clutter.”

What it means for you

If you live in the borough, this is a free thing to do on your doorstep, and it does not need booking. The trail format means you can see it on an ordinary visit rather than setting a day aside.

If you want the talk, the room has gone. The £8 livestream is the remaining option, and it was still listed on the V&A’s site when we checked on 3 September.

If you are planning the journey, the museum is a short walk from South Kensington station. Our tube and travel page has the zones and typical journey times, and the roadworks and travel page has the current closures, including several at junctions with Kensington Road through the autumn.

More to do locally is on our things to do in Kensington page.

Sources

• Freddie Mercury | Splendid Things, V&A for the opening date, the free no-ticket admission, the eight looks, the trail format, the loan from Mary Austin, the 1978 quotation and the 80th anniversary framing.
• Staging Freddie, V&A for the talk’s date, time, venue, £15 to £20 price, sold-out status, the £8 livestream, the speakers and the named garments.
• Kensington Market led British alt fashion for 33 years, London Museum for the market’s address, its opening on 15 September 1967, the Mercury and Taylor stall, the closure on 29 January 2000 and the demolition in 2001.