Daunt Books Marylebone
the prettiest bookshop in london
The most beautiful bookshop in London, free to wander, an Edwardian gallery of oak balconies and a long stained-glass skylight where the travel books are shelved by country.
Free to visit · Marylebone · Baker Street · W1U 4QW
Opening: Mon–Sat 9am–7:30pm · Sun 11am–6pm
Daunt Books on Marylebone High Street is often called the most beautiful bookshop in the world, and walking in costs nothing. Built in 1910 as one of the first purpose-built bookshops, its long back room is a galleried hall of oak shelves and balconies under a graceful arched skylight.
Its signature is the travel section that fills that back room, where the books are arranged by country rather than by type, so guidebooks, novels, history and maps for a place all sit together. It turns browsing into a kind of armchair journey, and you are welcome to linger as long as you like.
It is a working independent bookshop, not a museum, so there is no charge and no fuss, just one of the loveliest rooms in London that happens to be full of books. A free and quietly civilised half hour off the Marylebone shopping streets.
Getting there: On Marylebone High Street, a few minutes from Baker Street or Bond Street.
Best time to go: A weekday morning for the light pouring down the back skylight before the crowds and the photographers arrive.
Insider tip: Walk straight through to the long galleried room at the back, the bit everyone photographs, and go up to the balcony for the view down the hall. Come on a bright morning when the skylight does its best work.
Official site: https://dauntbooks.co.uk
Free things to do in London · London Free Guide