The Hayward Gallery and the ICA

Published 28 September 2026 · By the Guide to London editorial team · Editor: Terje Moy

For most visitors the ICA is the better of the two, because it is open until 11pm, you can walk into the building for nothing, and it is fifty metres off Trafalgar Square. Go to the Hayward instead when it is showing a name you have travelled to see: the concrete rooms there are the best space for large sculpture in London.

Both are contemporary art galleries that visitors walk straight past. The Hayward is the low grey block with pyramids on the roof inside the Southbank Centre, and it charges for its exhibitions. The Institute of Contemporary Arts is behind a Nash terrace on The Mall, between Admiralty Arch and the Duke of York Steps, and it is a cinema, a bookshop, a bar and a gallery in one building.

The two have different rhythms, which is the practical point. The Hayward runs a small number of large exhibitions a year and closes in the evening except on selected nights. The ICA does not open until noon and then stays open late every day it opens at all.

The ICA: a door on The Mall that nobody opens

The ICA has been running since 1946 and has been on The Mall for decades, which means thousands of people walk past it every hour on their way between Trafalgar Square and Buckingham Palace without registering that it is there. From Charing Cross, go through Admiralty Arch onto The Mall and it is about fifty metres along on the right. From Piccadilly Circus, walk down Lower Regent Street to Waterloo Place; the entrance is at the bottom of the Duke of York Steps on your left.

It does not open until noon, and it is closed all day Monday. That is the single most useful fact on this page, because the address is in the middle of the morning sightseeing route and the door will be shut. Come in the afternoon or the evening.

What is on at the ICA, and what it costs

From 29 September to 29 November 2026 the Lower Galleries hold I Can't Complain, the first major UK presentation of the New York artist Autumn Knight. The main room is dominated by a canopy of balloons around a sound installation built from recorded conversations with people about their everyday irritations; the back gallery shows earlier video work. It is a show about complaining, and it is funnier and more uncomfortable than that description suggests.

The exhibition is ticketed in hourly timed slots through the afternoon and evening, and ICA Members go free. We could not read the price: the ICA publishes it only inside its own booking system, which does not render for us. Check it when you book, and treat any figure you find elsewhere with suspicion.

The performances are the thing to plan around. Knight performs on 1, 12 and 15 October 2026, and further performances in November involve the London artist Samra Mayanja and the Brussels duo Michelangelo Miccolis and nick von kleist. A gallery that programmes live work inside its own exhibition is unusual in London, and it is the reason to prefer an evening visit.

The ICA is also a cinema, and that changes the calculation

Two screens run a programme that no commercial cinema in London would touch: in autumn 2026, a season of Shohei Imamura's films from 22 October to 13 December, and artist-chosen screenings tied to the exhibition, including Park Chan-wook's No Other Choice, I Am Not Your Negro and Persepolis. There is also live music and a talks programme, usually in the evening.

Membership gives 50% off tickets across the programme and a free guest cinema ticket, which is worth arithmetic if you are in London for a week and intend to come twice. The bookshop is one of the best art bookshops in central London and free to browse. Our guide to cinemas in London worth visiting puts the screens in context, and London at night covers what else is open that late.

The Hayward: a concrete box built for sculpture

The Hayward opened in 1968 as part of the second wave of Southbank Centre building, and it is the clearest surviving example of the style: board-marked concrete, raised walkways, and pyramid rooflights that pour daylight into the upper galleries. It divides opinion, and our guide to Brutalist London makes the case for it.

The galleries are the reason it matters. They are tall, plain and awkwardly shaped, with mezzanines and outdoor sculpture courts, and they suit work that a conventional white room cannot hold. Large sculpture and installation look better here than at Tate Modern, where the Turbine Hall swallows everything and the upper galleries are conventional.

The gallery café is inside the building at Belvedere Road and holds a food hygiene rating of 5 from its March 2026 inspection. The Hayward also runs Relaxed Hours sessions, quieter openings for visitors who find a busy gallery difficult.

What is on at the Hayward, and the evening hours

Anish Kapoor occupies the gallery from 16 June to 18 October 2026. For the last four weeks of that run, from Wednesday 23 September to Sunday 18 October, the Hayward opens 10am to 9pm, and it also runs extended hours on selected Wednesdays, Fridays and weekends through the year.

Kapoor is the kind of artist the Hayward exists for: work at the scale of a room, dependent on how light falls into it. If you have one afternoon on the South Bank and a choice between this and a second Tate visit, take this. Our guide to museum late openings lists the other galleries that stay open after six.

Which one, and when

If neither current show appeals, the honest answer is to go elsewhere. Whitechapel Gallery in the East End has free rooms alongside its paid show, the Serpentine Galleries in Hyde Park are free, and so is most of what is on at Somerset House. For the older end of the same argument, the Royal Academy has free displays in Burlington House.

Getting to each, and one thing that will block your route

The Hayward is a ten-minute walk from Waterloo, or across Golden Jubilee Bridges from Embankment. Our guide to the South Bank covers the riverside walk that passes its door.

The ICA is harder than the map suggests on some days. The Mall, Carlton House Terrace and Waterloo Place all sit inside the ceremonial zone, and park roads close for part of the late morning when the Guard changes; during state visits there is a heavy police presence and further closures. None of that stops you walking in, but it stops taxis and buses, and no bus route uses The Mall at all. Read our page on the Changing of the Guard for the current days and times rather than relying on the ICA's summary, which differs from the Household Division's published schedule. Afterwards, St James's Park is across the road, and St James's begins at the top of the steps.

Frequently asked questions

Is the ICA free to enter?

The building is: you can use the bookshop and the café bar without a ticket. The exhibition itself is ticketed in hourly timed slots, and ICA Members enter free. The price is published only inside the ICA's own booking system, so check it when you book.

Is the Hayward Gallery free?

No. The Hayward's exhibitions are ticketed, although Southbank Centre Members get unlimited free entry all year. The Southbank Centre's foyers, walkways and riverside terraces around it are free and open to the public without a ticket.

What time does the ICA open?

Noon, Tuesday to Sunday, and it stays open until 11pm. It is closed all day on Mondays. The exhibition closes at 8pm, three hours before the building does, so an evening visit needs to start before then.

Which is better, the Hayward Gallery or the ICA?

The ICA for a general visitor, because it is central, open late, free to walk into and offers a cinema and a bookshop alongside the gallery. The Hayward when its current exhibition is a major name, because its concrete galleries handle large sculpture and installation better than almost anywhere else in London.

How long do you need at each?

Thirty to forty-five minutes for the ICA's gallery, or a whole evening if you add a film or a performance. Sixty to ninety minutes for a Hayward exhibition, which is usually spread over two floors and an outdoor sculpture court.

Sources

• Institute of Contemporary Arts - Visit: opening hours and getting here (checked September 2026)
• Institute of Contemporary Arts - Autumn Knight: I Can't Complain (checked September 2026)
• Institute of Contemporary Arts - Exhibitions and events listing (checked September 2026)
• Southbank Centre - Hayward Gallery (the site returns 403 to our requests; the Anish Kapoor dates and extended hours come from the Southbank Centre's own indexed pages, September 2026)
• Food Standards Agency - food hygiene rating register: Hayward Gallery Cafe, Belvedere Road SE1 8XZ, rating 5, inspected 6 March 2026 (checked September 2026)
• Household Division - Changing the Guard calendar (checked September 2026)