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Photo: Anthony O'Neil, CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
Somerset House is home to three art galleries: The exceptional Courtauld Institute displays a collection of 19th- and 20th-century art, including well-known works by Degas, Matisse and Kandinsky; The Gilbert Collection presents a collection of decorative art; and the Hermitage Rooms, the most recent addition to Somerset House, hosts temporary exhibitions of works on loan from the Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg. The central courtyard is filled with fountains in the Summer, but in the Winter, an ice rink is installed, it is very popular, so visitors should book in advance, or expect to wait a long time to skate.
Somerset House is a large neoclassical building complex situated on the south side of the Strand in central London, overlooking the River Thames, just east of Waterloo Bridge. The Georgian era quadrangle is built on the site of a Tudor palace originally belonging to Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset. The present Somerset House was designed by Sir William Chambers, begun in 1776, and was further extended with Victorian era outer wings to the east and west in 1831 and 1856 respectively. The site of Somerset House stood directly on the River Thames until the Victoria Embankment was built in the late 1860s.
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Baroque church in the Strand completed in 1724 to a design by James Gibbs.
LSE hosts a prestigious public lectures programme, which is nearly always free to attend, but may require a ticket in advance for a lecture by a Head of State or Nobel Prize winner.
Church in the Strand designed by Sir Christopher Wren in 1682 that is now used by the RAF.
Astor House
A former home for William Waldorf Astor, a wealthy American moved to London at the end of 19th century. This Victorian house, built between 1892-1895 by John Loughborough Pearson. is in an eclectic Neo-Gothic style. It's richly decorated from outside, but even more rich and heavily eclectic inside. The building is owned by the Bulldog Trust and it's open to the public during exhibitions. For exact dates/time check with the exhibitions schedule. A café, a shop and a cloakroom are open for visitors during these days.
Owned by LSE, and part of their campus, this theatre is leased to Sadler's Wells as "Sadler's Wells in the West End".
The building holds the High Court and the Court of Appeal, two of the highest courts in the United Kingdom, though only civil cases are heard here. Trials are open to the public, but tourists would probably be more interested in seeing the impressive entrance hall, and admiring the stunning Victorian Gothic exterior.