For info, see our London’s Pride listing.

1. The lost billboard
To celebrate the British Library’s upcoming ‘Propaganda: Power and Persuasion‘  exhibition we picked ten London locations that feature in the long history of often unsuccessful attempts to control our thoughts. Appropriate then that the first location has gone missing, forgotten in the mists of time. All we know is that somewhere in London this smiling workman with a ladder (see above) has just pasted up the very first poster of the Conservatives’ 1987 ‘AIDS don’t die of ignorance’ campaign created by London agency TBWA. He should look happy – the put-on-a-condom campaign saved thousands of lives.

2. Senate House, University of London
Opened in 1937, the University of London’s Senate House immediately became a modernist icon, attacked by future ‘Brideshead’ author Evelyn Waugh as an insult to the ‘autumn sky’. Home to the Ministry of Information propaganda operations during Word War II – the department responsible for such famous slogans as ‘Walls have ears’, ‘Loose talk costs lives’ – along with Ducane Court in Balham, Senate House was believed to be the prospective HQ of a Nazi occupation and was later used as Winston Smith’s block of flats in the 1984 film version of George Orwell’s propaganda nightmare ‘Nineteen Eighty Four’.

3. Trafalgar Square
This spacious pigeon corral and contemporary art space was actually designed as a giant two fingers to fancy French ideas of political freedom and a government warning to London’s radical working classes. Completed in 1845 at the height of Chartist agitation for the popular vote, the square and its dominating centerpiece Nelson’s column commemorates the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805 when Napoleon Bonaparte’s plans to introduce republican government and beer served by the litres to the capital were effectively ended.

4. Edith Cavell statue, St Martins Place
Edith Cavell was a World War One British nurse who helped Allied servicemen escape from German-occupied Belgium. A wiser occupying power would have sent Cavell home after a telling off but the Germans put her before a firing squad. Her last words were ‘Patriotism is not enough’, which handily was just the right length to fit on this 1920 monument designed to illustrate ‘Hun’ beastliness as the UK set about asset-stripping the German economy.

5. 2012 Olympic site
This still astounding collection of buildings was home to an astonishingly successful Olympic games that was meant to tell the world that the UK was a multi-ethnic, forward thinking and exciting modern country that, despite all other evidence, was on the cusp of a greatness. And it worked. A supreme example of how to get propaganda right.

6. The O2
Which leads naturally to a supreme example of how to get propaganda wrong. First conceived by the Tories as a simple celebration of British ingenuity and the third millennium, incoming PM Tony Blair decided it should be a ‘triumph of confidence over cynicism’ with added elements like a body zone for awestruck Londoners to walk around. Sadly contractors failed to correctly install the entry gates and pictures of opening night chaos strongly suggested a triumph for cynicism to a watching world.

7. St Paul’s
Built in the 1670s to celebrate, in part, the restoration of the monarchy St Paul’s has been the establishment’s favoured site for PR-event funerals and weddings ever since. This made it an obvious target for Occupy protesters – including the four females clad entirely in white that chained themselves to the pulpit 2012. But the cathedral’s greatest propaganda success came during the Blitz in 1940 when images of Sir Christopher Wren’s smoke and flame threatened dome were shown across still neutral America as a symbol of British resistance to Nazi tyranny.

8. Royal Festival Hall
Post-war, with Nazi tyranny finally defeated, it was time for a Festival of Britain to encourage national rebuilding with a celebration of British achievements in science, technology, industry and the arts. The Royal Festival Hall, restored to former greatness in 2007, was at the heart of a propaganda stunt that attracted over ten million visitors in 1951. Now new plans to redevelop the area see tyranny thwarted once more with the eviction of the hated south bank skateboarders.

9. Bush House
Orwell – again! – was inspired to create both ‘Nineteen Eighty Four’s Ministry of Truth canteen and the terrifying Room 101 when working at for the BBC at Bush House in the 1940s. Home to the World Service throughout the cold war, the Aldwych block went on to achieve many anti-Soviet propaganda triumphs including successfully broadcasting details of the Chelsea Flower show into the USSR’s tyrannical political prison camps in 1948 and a 1988 radio phone-in to Russia featuring PM Margaret Thatcher that proved so popular it blew the fuses at Covent Garden telephone exchange.

10. BT tower
Opened by Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson in 1965, the then Post Office tower was meant to symbolize the UK’S commitment to a new age of innovation and technology. Sadly the distinctive tower’s image was fatally dented; not by the IRA bomb that closed the top-floor revolving restaurant in 1971 but by an episode of BBC television’s The Goodies in the same year which showed the building being attacked by a giant kitten.

‘Propaganda: Power and Persuasion’ is at the British Library from May 17 to Sept 17. For info, see bl.uk.

Ever felt like you’re being manipulated? As if the powers that be are using you to further their sinister agenda? Well, on the Underground, it turns out you sometimes are – although admittedly, the agenda is usually ‘map legibility’ or’crowd flow control.’

Above, Tom Scott and Matt Parker bust some myths and discover how Evil Tube Chiefs Steal Three Minutes Of Your Life Daily.* You’ll never go the long way around again.

*if you travel via Kings’ Cross. 

Head further down the rabbit hole with the radical tube map re-design based on circles or a guide to the tube journeys where it’s quicker to walk.

After a false start when the first few nights were cancelled, we finally made it to the new production of Secret Cinema this weekend. And yes, it was worth the wait. As always, we are sworn to secrecy on pretty much everything (hence the ‘official’ press photos here, and the lack of silly Vines of me dicking around – sorry!). But we can share our few cryptic clues to ensure you have an awesome night.

Prepare to travel
Unlike the past few fairly central locations, this time Secret Cinema have ventured further into the outer regions of London. Top up your oyster card and buy a magazine for the journey.

Explore
As any SC veterans will know, you have the most fun when you really have a good old nose around. Go through every door, chat to everyone you meet, embrace all silliness and fun is guaranteed.

Keep going higher
Just when you think you’ve reached the top, there is more fun to be had even higher up. My favourite floor was the penthouse and the view was rather special at sunset.

Follow your dreams not the screens
This mantra is repeated as you walk around. However, we would recommend that you do actually pay some attention to the screens as the night progresses. This isn’t your traditional cinema-going experience, so be prepared to watch the film in different ways than you’re used to, and be warned that you may not actually see the entire film if you’re easily distracted…

Take lots of cash
You can’t bring anything in with you and food and booze isn’t cheap so have a tipple before you come and bring some cash for tasty cocktails.

This Secret Cinema production is going on until June 9. Find out more and buy tickets to Secret Cinema now. 

Can you keep a secret? Well we sure as heck can, because we’re not going to tell you what ‘UGC London’ is. Or actually, we can tell you a couple of things. It’s a musical. It was a hit on Broadway, where it ran for several years. Time Out New York’s theatre editor David Cote says: ‘It was terrific, hilarious, great. One of the best shows of the year.’ And it’s making its UK premiere at Victoria’s swish new St James Theatre in 2014. That’s yer lot for now, but if you’re willing to take a punt, Time Out will be exclusively selling advance tickets at almost half price (ie, £25), rising in cost by £2.50 a fortnight until the announcement of what the show is. So go on! What have you possibly got to lose? Well, £25, but think of it as an investment.

Book UGC London tickets now.

1. The Rake

This Borough Market gem claims to be the smallest pub in London, but it’s a fiercely contested title – the Swan & Edgar in Marylebone and the Cask & Glass in Victoria are among the others vying for the honour. The Rake is a hophead’s idea of heaven: this is a pub that has more beers than people (its capacity is about 40, but it has 130 bottled beers in the fridge). 14a Winchester Walk, SE1 9AG.London Bridge.

2. The Dove

‘Guinness World Records’ says The Dove has the smallest bar room in the world, though there is a patio and another larger room. A few famous patrons have squeezed in here: the riverside alehouse was a favourite of literary heroes like Graham Greene and Ernest Hemingway. And further back, Charles II explored its nooks and crannies with mistress Nell Gwynn. Bottoms up! 19 Upper Mall, W6 9TA. Hammersmith.

3. Big Red

Deptford’s Big Red is snug. Well, it is a bus. The owner, local sculptor John Cierach, has turned the vintage Bristol VR double decker into a chic cocktail bar and pizza restaurant, with a large outdoor space for films and comedy nights in warmer weather. Enjoy a vanilla martini or Lynchburg lemonade for a very reasonable fiver, then sit and watch the city not rolling past. 30 Deptford Church St, SE8 4RZ. Deptford Bridge DLR.

4. Bourne & Hollingsworth

Why slum it with a pedestrian pint when you could be sipping gin from a teacup? And in a basement bar that’s as wee and twee as your granny’s living room – although it’s doubtful she could knock you up a perfectly blended Cherry Sidecar. This chintzy nook is unlike anything else in the Charlotte Street area – floral wallpaper, a fireplace and trimmings of lace and china. On weekends B&H is madly popular – so it makes good sense to revive the quaint old-fashioned practice of reserving a table. 28 Rathbone Place, W1T 1JF. Tottenham Court Rd.

5. CellarDoor

London has a knack for converting its Victorian loos into teensy bars, but Cellar Door has a particularly edgy USP: drag queens and alternative performers on stage every night. With a capacity of 60, it’s a cabaret cave fit for the vampiest creatures of the night. The fun and tonguein- cheek frolics extend to CellarDoor’s cocktail list too: try some of its most seductive potions such as a Simone de Beauvoir and the less subtle Starbucks Must Die. Zero Aldwych, WC2E 7DN.Holborn.

6. Lounge Bohemia

Lying low under a kebab shop in Shoreditch, this Iron Curtain-style speakeasy doesn’t let any old trilby in off the street: you have to book an ‘appointment’. It pays homage to 1960s Czechoslovakia, with menus in old Eastern Bloc-era books and an entrance papered with news cuttings. It’s not as bleak as it sounds though. The mixology is creative, from the Bubble Bath Martini to concoctions like the Holy Smoke, made from frankincense and myrrh and served in a carved-out Bible. Sacrilegious but sweet. 1e Great Eastern St, EC2A 3EJ. Shoreditch High St Overground.

7. Jerusalem Tavern

Rustic pork sandwiches and ale served out of wooden casks are all highlights of this Dickensian tavern. After work, it can feel as tight as Ebeneezer Scrooge’s pocket. While the vibe is uncannily like being in a BBC costume drama and the premises date from the eighteenth century, it didn’t open as a pub until the 1990s. Still, its cosy olde-worlde decor is almost as intoxicating as the St Peter’s Brewery cask ales on offer. 55 Britton St, EC1M 5UQ. Farringdon.

8. The Miniscule of Sound

Despite the punning name, it’s nothing to do with the mega dance brand based near Borough. This is the world’s smallest club. Conceived in a London Fields Lido changing room, it now has a portable boothlike festival version, in which 14 people max at any one time can ‘have it tiny’ on its two-square-metre dancefloor. Lily Allen and Ian Brown have partied here, and it can be hired.

9. Arts Theatre Club

This speakeasy-style members’ club has a genuine history rooted in the gangster underworld. It was once an illegal bar for real, where you could spot notorious crims like The Krays. These days, though, it’s all about period lighting, sumptuous red sofas, dirty martinis served in china cups and a vintage piano that doubles up as a DJ booth. And not a shady character in sight. 50 Frith St, W1D 4SQ. Tottenham Court Rd.

10. Concrete at the Hayward Gallery

Craftily hidden inside a cultural institution, Concrete dupes amateur drinkers by being a sandwich bar by day. Any serious sipper knows that, come evening, these four stools and a bartop morph into the Hayward’s secret drinking den, serving chilled absinthe to the artistically minded. Belvedere Rd, SE1 8XX. Waterloo.

Compiled by Laura Lee Davies, Euan Ferguson, Michael Hodges, Kate Hutchinson, Daisy Stenham

Do your friends ever call you a killjoy? Pah. Don’t let your love of apocalypses get you down: celebrate your morbid fantasies with Apocalypse London, the end of the world treasure hunt you’ve surely been hankering after.

Apocalypse London has been floating around for a while now. What with all those unruly Mayan predictions, who fully knows when exactly the big day is actually going to come? But it’s important to be prepared, so why not rock up to London Metropolitan Archives on Saturday May 11 and indulge in some chatter about the history of London’s pitfalls. Once all the learning is done, you are then invited to explore London on a treasure hunt through the city to explore horrific events, such as plagues, (WOO!) fires, (AWESOME!) devastating invasions (POW!) and much, much more.

The event is a humble £10 and you are encouraged to bring a picnic. Can’t face all that end of the universe despair on an empty stomach now, can we?

See apocalypselondon.eventbrite.co.uk for tickets.

‘I find London an inspirational place to write. When I wrote the track “London” (on the new She & Him album, ‘Volume 3’, out Monday May 13) I was on tour, in a hotel room looking out the window. It was kind of grey. It’s sunny and pretty in LA, where I’m from, but there’s something moody about the greyness in London that I love. We needed to capture that happy-sad feeling. It’s a cool place, with a distinct feeling, and I’ve spent a lot of time there.’

Hampstead Heath
‘My family lived in Hampstead when I was eight. I always wished that I’d lived in the past, and when you walk through Hampstead Heath it has a very timeless feeling. It’s beautiful year-round.’

Natural History Museum
‘I remember taking a trip here when I was young. Mainly I remember getting a pencil case. I actually still have it!’

Koko, Camden
‘The last time I was in London with She & Him we played a gig here, and I thought the venue looked like a big wedding cake. Camden’s always so lively and busy.’

Oxfam, Covent Garden
‘I’ve definitely done my fair share of shopping in London. I’d always shop here as a teenager because I like that it’s a proper, big thrift store.’

Everyman Cinema, Hampstead
‘I filmed in London for five months when I was 24. I’d walk around on my own, or shop at Marks & Spencer. But what I really loved was going to the cinema. The Everyman’s good because you can drink wine.’ Harriet Gibsone

Nick Barron runs Brockley Central and its sister forum South East Central, with the aim of tipping the capital away from its north London bias. He won’t stop until people stop asking him ‘is that in Kent?’. He’s picked five secret London spots which he thinks you should know about.

The New Cross (Tree) House (pictured above)
‘New Cross is spoilt for choice with great pubs, including The New Cross Inn, the Amersham Arms and the Royal Albert, but none of these have a tree-house in their back garden. The New Cross House’s courtyard contains an old barn, overgrown with foliage and converted in to an open-air mini-pub.’

The Laban Centre Outdoor Theatre
‘The dance school might be world famous but its ziggurated front garden is a secret wonder. It’s been landscaped to create an outdoor theatre and on sunny days there are few nicer places to lie in London. Daisies dot the grass steps, kids scamper up and down the impossibly-angled hills, the DLR trundles along across the water and the walls of the Laban Centre shine rainbows upon you. Like a scene from Oz (not the harrowing prison drama one).’

Homemade London
‘Nuzzled between Marble Arch and Marylebone is something called Portman Village, a collection of pretty streets, which are drowsy by day, twinkly and buzzy by night. In amongst the Grazing Goats and Vinotecas is my wife’s business, Homemade London, a beautiful craft salon and party venue that’s secretly taught thousands of people how to do everything from perfume-blending to garter-making.’

Ladywell Fields
‘Nearby Hilly Fields is Lewisham’s finest park. The Ladywell Fields waterway restoration project has succeeded in creating a secluded Wind in the Willows riverbank a few hundred metres from the Mr Toads of the South Circular.’

The Gantry
‘One of Brockley’s two outstanding bar/restaurants (the other being The Orchard, just opposite), The Gantry’s secret is that the small roadside bar – a living room grafted on to Brockley Road – conceals a warren of beautiful dining rooms that lead out to a hidden garden.’

Read more from Nick at brockleycentral.blogspot.co.uk

Fancy spending a night washed up on the South Bank? There’s another chance to land yourself tickets for an evening aboard the Room for London (aka the landlocked boat perched on the top of the Queen Elizabeth Hall). It doesn’t come cheap though (tickets are £300) but it’s worth it for the sparkly river views and general kudos of being able to say you spent a night on this exclusive little ship.

The ballot closes at midnight TONIGHT (april 24) so dig deep and enter at living-architecture.co.uk. Good luck!