3 Unusual Things to do in London

London is such a huge city with so many interesting and exciting things to do that it can be difficult when you have limited time to choose which things to do. But, when we were in London for lunch recently, we found three brilliant, and rather unusual things to do.

The Ultimate Selfie 

After lunch in what used to be the Old Smithfield Meat Market in Charterhouse Street, Farringdon we wandered up Clerkenwell Road and noticed an amazing shop on our way to another amazing shop.

Always up for a diversion we popped into the iMakr Store. This fascinating shop sells 3D printers and can do 3D printing on site too. We were shown the scanner they use to create a Mini-you. The technology can recreate your likeness in a 3D colour infused sandstone statue. The detail is fantastic and you can commission statues of yourself or your loved ones in five different sizes, the largest being 15”. For a special occasion we thought they were good value. The staff spent ages with us explaining the technology and whilst it is a shop and obviously they want to sell you stuff, we felt under no pressure to buy at all. With thanks to Jim, the manager for letting us use the image.

Do you believe in Magic

Our next stop was our original destination the only on street magic shop in London located at 89 Clerkenwell Road. This glorious establishment has been offering its wares for over 50 years and the floors are stacked from top to bottom with enticing looking magic tricks, some in packaging that looks as though it hasn’t been updated since the 1950s. Behind the counter the proprietor was delighted to show us some of the simpler tricks that could be mastered by granddads for grandchildren and by children for granddads!

We spent a very entertaining hour or so in there browsing the stock and enjoying an impromptu magic show. We definitely recommend putting both shops on your list of go to places and things to do when in London.

Can’t beat a good exhibition

Our ultimate destination before catching the train back home was the British Library. The exhibition we were aiming for is only on for a short time, but once we’d done that we headed into their permanent exhibition - Treasures of the British Library. There is a permanent display of over 200 of the British Library's greatest treasures and the ones that made the most impression on us were the handwritten lyrics of a few of the Beatles songs, listening to audio recordings of some favourite poetry and gazing in awe at the masterpieces of illumination on some of the sacred texts from different religions!

It is an amazingly eclectic collection of books and manuscripts. We loved it. Oh, and the exhibition we had gone to see Punk 1976 - 1978, finishes on 19th September 2016.

The nearest Trail to the area we were in is Bloomsbury Treasures. A fun treasure hunt for all the family.