Reasons for the proposed move included the claim that the current site was difficult for visitors to find, and that by expanding, from 17,000 square metres to 27,000, a greater proportion of the museum's collection could be placed on display.

In 1914, it moved to Lancaster House, which had been bought by William Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme, soap magnate and founder of the model town of Port Sunlight, and given to the nation as a home for the London Museum.

It included a Roman boat, a carriage belonging to the Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, a parlour decorated in the Stuart style, and prison cells.

[7] The Kensington Palace museum kept a generally chronological structure to its layout, but alongside the rooms devoted to various time periods, there were separate galleries for historical shop fronts; prints; theatre; glass; paintings, toys and games; and royal costume.

There was also a clown costume worn by the comedy pioneer Joseph Grimaldi, a piano belonging to W. S. Gilbert, a death mask of David Garrick, and Walter Lambert's Popularity, a painting of dozens of music hall and variety stars.

The architects appointed to oversee the construction of the new museum building were Philip Powell and Hidalgo Moya, who designed a complex with four main parts: a tower block containing offices and not open to the public; two floors of exhibition space arranged around a courtyard; a lecture theatre and education wing; and a rotunda containing a small garden and restaurant.

The redesign, by London-based architects Wilkinson Eyre, comprised the entire lower floor of the main galleries, covering the period from the 1670s to the present day.

Star exhibits included a mummified cat, a 1928 Art Deco lift from Selfridges department store on Oxford Street, and a complete 18th century debtors' prison cell covered in graffiti.

[20] World City was the gallery containing objects dating from the 1950s to the present day, including 1950s suits, a Mary Quant dress from the 1960s, Biba fashion in the 1970s, outfits from London's punk scene, and a pashmina from Alexander McQueen's 2008 collection.

[22] In 2016, the museum announced it would be closing its London Wall site and moving to a set of disused market buildings in West Smithfield in 2021.

[24] Museum director Sharon Ament said that one reason for the move was "a failing building with problematic entrances and a location which is difficult to find".

[26] It also includes the River Fleet, a tributary of the Thames which has long since become buried underground due to the high volume of construction work around it.

Another idea for the new museum is to revive the ancient St Bartholomew's Fair, which took place on the site regularly in the medieval period until being shut down by authorities in 1855.

The museum will also feature spiral escalators taking visitors to the underground storage rooms which will function as the main historical galleries.

ft office block, citing dangerous structural issues, poor energy performance, fire safety and limited possible uses as reasons in favour of demolition.

It includes 453 bronze objects, such as axe heads, spearheards and knives made between 900 and 800 BCE, which had almost all been broken or damaged, and buried carefully in four separate groups around the site.

It also includes entire wall paintings and floors such as the Bucklersbury Mosaic; metalwork such as hipposandals, cutlery, jewellery and tweezers; four leather "bikini bottoms", possibly worn by female acrobats; and a wooden ladder.

An estimated 400,000 members of the public visited the site while it was being excavated,[39] a job which was mostly carried out by archaeology students led by the then director of the London Museum, W. F. Grimes.

[41] The museum holds over 1,500 pieces of Tudor and Stuart cutlery, mostly recovered from the Thames, and some purchased from the private collection of Hilton Price.

[46] The museum also collects more general social and working history objects relating to the everyday lives and trade of ordinary Londoners.

In the summer of 2014, Johnson bought three water cannon trucks from the German federal police for £218,000 in order to combat civil unrest.

[58] As part of the Collecting Covid project, London Zoo donated a large illuminated sign showing the logo of the UK's National Health Service surrounded by hearts, which was hung outside their giraffe house during lockdown in March 2020.

[59] In July 2020, sound designers String and Tins made recordings of soundscapes in London streets that had become deserted due to pandemic lockdowns for the museum's collection.

[60] In October 2020, Arsenal football player Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang donated his shirt featuring a Black Lives Matter logo, which had been worn by him during games that season.

The logo had been added to all Premier League shirts for the summer 2020 season following widespread protests against racial violence in London and around the world.

[63] In February 2021, Mayor of Lambeth Philip Normal donated his chain of office, which he had made from card and t-shirt fabric while the real one was locked up in the town hall.

The museum's collection includes pieces by Lucile, Hardy Amies, Norman Hartnell, Victor Stiebel, Mary Quant, Katharine Hamnett, and Vivienne Westwood.

Outside of clothing, the museum holds banners and sashes related to the female suffrage campaign of the early 20th century, the Kindred of the Kibbo Kift, and dockworker trade unions.

[67] The museum holds over 100,000 paintings, prints and drawings, including works by Wenceslaus Hollar, Paul Sandby, Canaletto, William Powell Frith, George Elgar Hicks, Walter Greaves, Henry Moore, Graham Sutherland, Thomas Rowlandson, C. R. W. Nevinson, and Spencer Gore.

The largest work in this collection is a camera obscura print made by Vera Lutter showing Battersea Power Station, at 7 feet (2.1m) high.