Somerset House — Attraction in London

We purchased tickets for the 16:00 session for my 8-year-old daughter, who is an accomplished figure skater with several medals from Australia. We were told unequivocally upon arrival at the box office that she had to be accompanied by an adult due to her age. Consequently, my wife, who does not skate, was compelled to purchase a ticket for herself simply to accompany daughter onto the rink. The situation worsened when daughter struggled to find a suitable pair of skates of her size, despite trying multiple pairs. She tried size 33 which were too small for her feet. She was then offered size 35 which were too big and the staff suggested that we stuffed some tissues inside. She felt unsafe on them as they were loose at her ankle. As a result, she was unable to utilize her ticket and was relegated to sitting on the sidelines. By the time Mr. Vaughan Bhagan, appeared it was already 16:10, He was called in as the front staff could not get daughter into some safe skates. He exhibited a appalling level of customer service, to say the least especially on behalf of a charity organisation. His initial refusal to provide any refund and subsequent unwillingness to refund my wife's ticket were met with extreme patronization and impersonal conduct. We explained to Mr. Bhagan that the only reason my wife had to be on the rink in the first place was to comply to Somerset House's policy(the only one we were told at time of purchase) of not allowing a child to skate without adult supervision. Despite our plea and the clear distress of our daughter, Mr. Bhagan remained obnoxious, impersonal, and unempathetic throughout our interaction. We explained to him that it would be comical and a completed waste of time and money for my wife to avail of her ticket alone and just stand there on the rink for no reason (We would noy have bought a ticket for my wife, had my daughter not been interested in skating). We escalated our complaint to another representative from Somerset House, who unfortunately could not resolve the matter and referred us back to Mr. Bhagan. The entire incident has left a lasting negative impression on our daughter who, at the age of 8, should not have had to endure such distress during what was supposed to be a joyous...

I went yesterday and had a pleasant enough time. Much like the exhibition, I'm going to try and keep this short and sweet. First off, as someone not familiar with the area the second entrance to the musuem wasn't brilliantly easy to find. The signposting needed some serious work, at one point I found myself in an area with 0 signage and I had to ask a passerby.

The building itself is beautiful and I can see myself coming back for a tour as I'd love to know more about it.

My first gripe with the exhibition was the use of AI art, I thought given the push back it receives from artists online that it was a bizarre choice. I enjoyed the exhibition, but honestly didn't get much out of it. I didn't leave feeling like I'd learned anything new or that I wanted to know more about what was displayed. Going through the exhibit, I couldn't help but wonder how much different it would've been if people who were actually passionate about the topic had worked on it. And if they had, that interest didn't come through at all. Some of the displays felt haphazard and flung together with little care shown for the theme of the section. Not to mention the gaps in pop culture knowledge.

The accessibility wasn't great either, trying to walk a spiral staircase in low lighting with stuff strobing in the background isn't great.There was also a lot of going up and down stairs, which I can't imagine is that handy for wheelchair users or people with buggies.

The cafe was fine, it was a regular coffee shop with Hello Kitty decals. Oh yeah, it was the 50th anniversary, I actually forgot to mention that as it was such an afterthought. Honestly,the most memorable thing about the cafe was the poor girl who actually collapsed waiting in line to get in. So there's that.

I can't really remember the gift shop, just that there was a very poor selection and range of items.

I was hoping to keep this brief, but the more I thought about it the more stuff kept bubbling to the surface.

I'm glad it was successful and I hope that the exhibitions continue...

I visited on a Saturday morning for the 10am slot for the CUTE exhibition. I personally bought pre-booked tickets which came at a reduced price for students at £14 but there was not a long queue for buying in-person, at that moment.

The exhibition itself was well organised and took about an hour to get through. Lots of staff around to help which was nice and the creative pieces themselves were thoroughly enjoyable, ranging from a wide variety of activities, artwork and media.

The artbox cafe was a disappointment however. We began waiting at 11:15am and ended up getting into the cafe after 12. Customers who were only getting drinks were quickly getting sent to get them and go out, perhaps to come back another day to sit in and have the food. I opted to stay in thus the hour long queue with my friends. For an hour’s wait, the cafe turned out to be small and rather crowded. Cramped seating which was more akin to a high school lunch room layout rather than a cafe pop up in a building as popular, refined and reputable as Somerset House.

The food probably tasted good because of how hungry we were. The strawberry cream hot chocolate was definitely well worth it though, the total for a cake slice (3 layers) and the drink (mine automatically came with squirty cream, sprinkles and mini marshmallows but for some it was 50p per add-on) came to £12.90. The drink did get cold pretty quick and the cake, although tasty, wasn’t anything innovative and I could probably get the same quality for a whole cake, much cheaper at my local sainsbury’s or asda. But this is London, so stuff like this is expected I suppose.

If you do want to visit the cafe badly, I’d suggest going before your exhibition time as it can be accessed anytime and preferably on a weekday. They’ve further reduced the days and times they’re open so that’s more of a hindrance to their already subpar business I suppose. Very close to giving it a 2 star rating but the exhibition was lots of fun and so made up for the mediocre, overpriced...