Long Live Southbank

The Queen Elizabeth Hall (QEH) is a music venue on the South Bank in London, England, that hosts daily classical, jazz, and avant-garde music and dance performances. It was opened in 1967, with a concert conducted by Benjamin Britten.The QEH was built along with the smaller Purcell Room as part of Southbank Centre arts complex. It stands alongside the Royal Festival Hall, which was built for the Festival of Britain of 1951, and the Hayward Gallery which opened in 1968.

A Room for London is a temporary structure located on the roof of the Queen Elizabeth Hall on London's South Bank. The structure, designed by architect David Kohn is described as "a one-bedroom installation" and is shaped to appear like a boat perched on top of a building. The structure has been in place since 2012 and has acted as a "single-room, boat-shaped hotel", available to be booked for single-night residencies. A Room for London is one of a number of projects by Living Architecture, a not-for-profit holiday home rental company founded by philosopher and writer Alain de Botton.

The Shot Tower at the Lambeth Lead Works was a shot tower that stood on the South Bank of the River Thames in London, England, between Waterloo Bridge and Hungerford Bridge, on the site of what is now the Queen Elizabeth Hall. It was a prominent landmark on the river and featured in a number of paintings, including by J. M. W. Turner.

The Purcell Room is a concert and performance venue which forms part of the Southbank Centre, one of central London's leading cultural complexes. It is named after the 17th century English composer Henry Purcell and has 370 seats. The Purcell Room has hosted a wide range of chamber music, jazz, mime and poetry recitals. In the context of the Southbank Centre it is the smallest of a set of three venues, the other two being the Royal Festival Hall, a large symphony hall, and the QEH, which is used for orchestral, chamber and contemporary amplified music. The Purcell Room was built at the same time as the QEH, with which it shared a common foyer building and architectural features as an example of Brutalist architecture. The focus of the building is its interior space and it makes few concessions to external decoration. From outside, even its position within Southbank Centre is not easy to discern. The QEH and Purcell Room were designed, with The Hayward, as additions to the Southbank Centre arts complex by Hubert Bennett, head of the architects department of the Greater London Council, with Jack Whittle, F.G West and Geoffrey Horsefall. The venue was temporarily closed in September 2015, for major renovations, and re-opened in 2018.

Festival Pier is a stop for river boat services on the River Thames, London, UK. It is immediately in front of the Royal Festival Hall and National Film Theatre, and serves the South Bank complex. The pier is owned and operated by London River Services, part of Transport for London.

BFI Southbank (from 1951 to 2007, known as the National Film Theatre) is the leading repertory cinema in the UK, specialising in seasons of classic, independent and non-English language films. It is operated by the British Film Institute.

BFI Flare: London LGBTIQ+ Film Festival, formerly known as the London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival (LLGFF), is the biggest LGBTIQ+ film festival in Europe. It takes place every spring in London, England. It began in 1986, as a season of gay and lesbian films at the National Film Theatre for two years, under the title "Gay's Own Pictures", curated by Peter Packer of the Tyneside Cinema. It was renamed the 'London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival' in 1988. Having been a two-week festival for many years, the festival was shortened to a week in 2011, then increased to 10 days in 2012. The events name change to BFI Flare occurred in 2014. On its 30th anniversary, screenings attendance at BFI Flare was up 9% and box-office results surpassed the previous, record-breaking year. Audiences at all events and screenings over the eleven-day festival totalled 25,623 in 2016. Additional programming under the BFI Flare tag is available at throughout the year.Organised and run by the British Film Institute, all BFI Flare screenings take place in the BFI Southbank. In 2014 the festival consisted of several sections or categories of films; hearts, bodies, minds. Subsequent years have included additional categories.

The BFI London Film Festival is an annual film festival founded in 1957 and held in the United Kingdom, running for two weeks in October with co-operation from the British Film Institute. It screens more than 300 films, documentaries and shorts from approximately 50 countries.

The Hoffnung Music Festivals were a series of three humorous classical music festivals held in Royal Festival Hall, London in 1956, 1958 and 1961 (and a reprise in 1988). They were created by cartoonist and amateur tuba player Gerard Hoffnung. They included works such as Haydn's Surprise Symphony 'with extra surprises' added by Donald Swann, an 'excerpt from Belshazzar's Feast', with full orchestra and chorus conducted by William Walton himself (with a fly swat), which turned out to consist of just a single chord with the word "Slain!", and humorous works specially commissioned from well-known composers of the day.

The Eurovision Song Contest 1960 was the fifth edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest and took place in London, United Kingdom. It was organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and host broadcaster British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), who agreed to stage the event after the Netherlands, who had won the 1959 contest, declined to host another contest so soon, having also hosted the 1958 edition. The contest was held at the Royal Festival Hall on Tuesday 29 March 1960 and was hosted by British television presenter Catherine Boyle, who would go on to be the host for the contest 3 more times. It was also the first time the contest was held in a capital city, as well as the first one held in the English-speaking world. Thirteen countries participated in the contest this year, the highest number until then. Norway made their début, and Luxembourg returned after their absence from the previous edition. The winner of the contest was France with the song "Tom Pillibi", performed by Jacqueline Boyer, written by Pierre Cour, and composed by André Popp. This was already France's second victory in the contest, following their win in 1958, and their fourth consecutive top three placing. Aged 18, Boyer became the first teenager and the youngest artist yet to win the contest. Following the death of Lys Assia in 2018, Jacqueline Boyer stands as the earliest surviving Eurovision winner, although later winning singers are older in terms of age.

The Royal Festival Hall is a 2,700-seat concert, dance and talks venue within Southbank Centre in London. It is situated on the South Bank of the River Thames, not far from Hungerford Bridge, in the London Borough of Lambeth. It is a Grade I listed building, the first post-war building to become so protected (in 1981). The London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Philharmonia Orchestra and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment are resident in the hall.The hall was built as part of the Festival of Britain for London County Council, and was officially opened on 3 May 1951. When the LCC's successor, the Greater London Council, was abolished in 1986, the Festival Hall was taken over by the Arts Council, and managed together with the Queen Elizabeth Hall and Purcell Room (opened 1967) and the Hayward Gallery (1968), eventually becoming an independent arts organisation, now known as the Southbank Centre, in April 1998.The complex includes several reception rooms, bars and restaurants, and the Clore Ballroom, accommodating up to 440 for a seated dinner. A large head and shoulders bust of Nelson Mandela (by Ian Walters, created in 1985) stands on the walkway between the hall and Hungerford Bridge approach viaduct. Originally made in glass-fibre it was repeatedly vandalised until re-cast in bronze.The complex's variety of open spaces and foyers are popular for social or work-related meetings. The closest tube stations are Waterloo and, across the river via the Jubilee Bridges, Embankment and Charing Cross.

The Aeolian Tower was an art installation on the South Bank of the River Thames in London, consisting of a 15-metre (49 ft) steel tower covered in 1200 wind-powered LEDs. The tower was in place beside the Waterloo Bridge for three days, from November 14–16, 2008. The intent in creating the Aeolian Tower was to prove in a demonstrable and clearly visible to the public fashion how green energy could be used for different purposes such as artistic and design elements.