London at Christmas: A Grown-Up Guide From Someone Who Keeps Going Back

And my first piece of advice after all those visits? Go in late November.

December sounds like the obvious time to visit London for Christmas.

I actually prefer the end of November.

By then, London is already firmly in festive mode. Hyde Park Winter Wonderland opens on 19 November in 2026, Covent Garden’s Christmas season begins in November, and the major shopping streets and neighbourhoods are dressed for Christmas.

But you have a slightly better chance of experiencing it before December brings the truly enormous crowds.

I have done London in December too, and it can become the sort of busy where you feel as though you are simply moving along with a wall of people.

Late November is still busy - this is London, after all - but it is the sweet spot I would choose.

And there is another bonus: when you come home, you still have almost the entire Christmas season ahead of you.

If it were my trip, these would be non-negotiable: Covent Garden, Fortnum & Mason, Harrods, Winter Wonderland, Borough Market, the Christmas lights through central London, one proper afternoon tea, and Poppies for fish & chips.

Not because they form some perfectly optimised London itinerary, but because these are the things I genuinely return to.

Covent Garden is one of my favourite places in London at any time of year.

At Christmas, it becomes something else entirely.

The Market Building gets its enormous bells, baubles and Christmas tree, while the surrounding streets are lit up too. For 2026, Covent Garden is again promising its famous 55-foot tree and oversized festive installations.

We go every time.

I would much rather spend an hour wandering here, going into shops and stopping somewhere for a drink than rush through it because an itinerary tells me I have another four attractions to complete before lunch.

That is probably the biggest difference between the way we travel now and the way many city guides are written: we leave room to enjoy where we already are.

Harrods is spectacular at Christmas - and absolutely worth seeing - but Fortnum & Mason is my favourite.

The building itself feels like part of the experience: the displays, those beautiful staircases through the centre of the store, the food halls, the Christmas collections.

Last year, Bas and I finally did a proper afternoon tea at the Diamond Jubilee Tea Salon.

It isn’t a cheap cup of tea and a sandwich. Classic Afternoon Tea currently starts at £84 per person, before service, so I would treat this as one of the splurges of the trip rather than something you casually squeeze between two attractions.

And that is exactly why I liked it.

Give it time. Dress nicely if you feel like it. Sit down. Have the tea.

A grown-up Christmas trip does not need to consist entirely of standing outside in the cold holding paper cups.

I also never skip Harrods.

Partly because it is Harrods at Christmas, and partly because I have created a tiny tradition of my own: I buy one Christmas ornament there to take home for the tree.

Their Christmas collection is enormous - the 2026 range already includes London-themed ornaments, Harrods bears, baubles and decorations at a very wide range of prices.

It is not a souvenir I need. That is rather the point.

Years later, an ornament hanging on the tree brings back a particular London Christmas far better than another fridge magnet ever could.

Hyde Park Winter Wonderland is enormous. It is busy. It is commercial. You need an entry ticket.

And I still love it.

For 2026 it runs from 19 November 2026 until 3 January 2027, normally from 10am until 10pm, with some adjusted opening times. Entry is tied to an allocated arrival slot, although you can stay once you are inside.

There are rides, an ice rink, bars, food stalls, shows and a Christmas market - much closer to an entire Christmas fairground than a traditional little market.

If you are someone who loves Christmas, it is enormous fun.

I sometimes think travel advice has become too obsessed with avoiding anything remotely touristy. There are places that are touristy because they are genuinely enjoyable.

Winter Wonderland is one of those for me.

I would probably give it a sizeable part of an afternoon and evening rather than attempting to tack it onto an already packed day.

Borough Market isn’t something I only love at Christmas.

It is simply one of those London places where I want to arrive hungry.

Our approach tends to be very unsophisticated: walk around, see what smells good and eat it.

That is also how I prefer Christmas markets.

Not “stall number 43 has been identified as the optimum lunch stop.”

Just: that smells incredible. Shall we have one? Yes.

At least once per London trip, we go to Poppies for fish and chips.

The original Spitalfields restaurant is on Hanbury Street, just a few minutes from Spitalfields Market and Shoreditch High Street station, which also makes it particularly easy when we are staying in Shoreditch.

There are now four London locations, but the East London one is the original Poppies restaurant.

It has become one of those things that belongs to London for us.

Not fine dining. Not the newest place everyone is trying to get into.

Just something we look forward to eating again.

This is where my guide probably differs most from some London itineraries.

I wouldn’t plan something like: 8.15 breakfast, 9.00 Covent Garden, 10.15 Regent Street, 11.07 Liberty, 12.30 Borough Market, 14.00 Harrods, 16.00 Winter Wonderland, 19.00 dinner.

I would hate that.

Our days are much looser.

We decide in the morning which part of London we want to explore. We go out, wander, shop and have lunch somewhere we have found beforehand.

And then quite often: we go back to the hotel.

Shoes off. Quiet. An hour on the bed. Proper bathroom. Reset.

Then somewhere around late afternoon, we put our coats back on and go out again.

That second part of the day is often my favourite.

It gets dark early. The lights become much more beautiful. London feels completely different.

That hotel break isn’t wasted sightseeing time. It is the reason I still enjoy the evening.

You can do Christmas in London in three days.

Personally, I prefer about five.

London is huge and the Christmas crowds can be intense. After a few hours surrounded by thousands of people, I get overstimulated.

Five days means we don’t have to win at London.

We can linger over lunch. Go back to the room. Decide we have had enough for one afternoon. Spend too long in Fortnum & Mason.

If you only have three days, go.

But if you are choosing between three extremely full days and four or five more comfortable ones, I would always choose the latter.

We have stayed at citizenM London Shoreditch repeatedly, which is a much stronger endorsement from me than simply saying I once slept there.

It isn’t a traditional grand London hotel.

The rooms are compact but clever, with an XL king bed, blackout blinds, mood lighting and app/tablet controls for things such as the blinds, lights and television. citizenM describes the standard room as around 14 square metres.

For us, it works.

Shoreditch has plenty happening around it, and the hotel is close to public transport; Shoreditch High Street station is essentially beside it and Liverpool Street is about a nine-minute walk according to the hotel.

Would I say everyone visiting London at Christmas should stay in Shoreditch? No.

Someone wanting a grand, traditional, Christmas-in-Mayfair hotel experience might choose completely differently.

But this is where we keep returning, and that matters to me when I recommend somewhere.

For us, the nicest way to travel to London is the train.

We board the Eurostar in Rotterdam and get off at London St Pancras.

No airport outside the city followed by another long journey into London.

Current direct services show journey times of roughly 2½ hours from Rotterdam Centraal to London St Pancras, depending on the service, before allowing for the required pre-departure process.

We have flown before. I would still take the train.

Once you include airport arrival time and getting from a London airport into the city, flying has never felt more convenient to us.

Book early and the train can also be much more reasonable than people assume.

Most importantly, it feels like the city break starts when I sit down in Rotterdam.

Once there, we use London’s public transport constantly.

You do not need to construct every day around walking distance from your hotel. That is one of the reasons staying slightly outside the most obvious tourist core works perfectly well for us.

And yes, London transport can be packed.

Keep your belongings close, accept that sometimes you are going to be standing shoulder-to-shoulder with other people and move on.

It is still an extraordinarily easy city to navigate.

Choose London if you want everything.

Not just wooden market stalls and mulled wine.

Christmas lights stretching across famous streets. Huge department stores dressed for the season. Beautiful food halls. Pubs. Markets. Theatre. Shopping. Afternoon tea. Winter Wonderland. Restaurants. A city that feels as though it has collectively decided to put Christmas on maximum volume.

If what you want is something quieter and more nostalgic, I would send you to Vienna.

If the Christmas markets themselves are the main event, I would send you to Cologne.

But if you are the sort of person who starts thinking about Christmas months too early, owns far too many decorations and wants several days in which almost everything you do can somehow be festive?