BT Tower

The West End


Visible from virtually everywhere in central London, the 189m-tall BT Tower was the highest structure in the city when it opened in 1966 (St Paul's Cathedral was the second-highest at the time). It was closed to the public in the early 1980s because of terrorist threats. Incongruously for such a conspicuous structure, the building was officially a ‘secret’ and didn’t appear on official maps until 1993, when Member of Parliament Kate Hoey used her parliamentary privilege to ‘confirm’ its existence.

The tower is still a major communications hub and doubles as an air-pollution monitor. It is also a listed building, which meant getting special permission to remove the defunct circular antennas in 2011. It is occasionally opened to the public for one day as part of the Open House London, when lucky ballot winners can secure tickets for a guided tour.

Transportation

  • underground: Goodge St

Lonely Planet's must-see attractions

Nearby The West End attractions

1. Fitzroy House

0.07 MILES

Fitzroy House is the former home of science fiction writer and founder of the Church of Scientology L. Ron Hubbard (and George Bernard Shaw before him)…

2. Pollock’s Toy Museum

0.18 MILES

Aimed at adults as much as (older) kids, this museum is simultaneously creepy and mesmerising. You walk in through its shop, laden with excellent wooden…

3. Grant Museum of Zoology

0.25 MILES

This fascinating and little-known museum contains 68,000 specimens from the animal kingdom, including many that are extinct or critically endangered…

4. Broadcasting House

0.28 MILES

The iconic building from which the BBC began radio broadcasting in 1932 and from where all TV and radio broadcasting in London has taken place. Since 2013…

5. All Saints Margaret Street

0.29 MILES

In 1859, architect William Butterfield completed one of the country's most supreme examples of High Victorian Gothic architecture, with extraordinary…

6. All Souls Church

0.3 MILES

Designed by John Nash in golden-hued Bath stone as an eye-catching monument for Regent Street, All Souls features a circular columned porch and a…

7. Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology

0.3 MILES

With some 80,000 artefacts, this is one of the most impressive collections of Egyptian and Sudanese archaeology in the world. The old-fashioned displays…

8. New London Architecture

0.34 MILES

A large, constantly updated 1:2000-scale model of the capital highlights planned and new buildings, as well as various neighbourhood regeneration…

  • placement: superzone
  • path: Destinations/POIs/superzone
  • possible size: [970, 250], [970, 90], [728, 90], [1, 1],
  • targeting:
    {
      "url": "england/london/the-west-end/attractions/bt-tower/a/poi-sig/1092989/1321927",
      "destination": "The-West-End",
      "continent": "Europe",
      "country": "England",
      "city": "London",
      "neighborhood": "The-West-End",
      "position": "superzone"
    }