As part of providing radical access to the national collections held by the V&A, Storehouse is home to part of the revolutionary Order an Object experience. You can book in advance to see any object on site up close, and experienced handling staff will be on hand to help you. Storehouse is also the meeting point for daily drop-in Object Encounters, a series of serendipitous sessions spotlighting different aspects of the collection.
Storehouse’s Study Centre also opens up over 1000 archive collections from the Archive of Art and Design, Theatre and Performance Archive and Young V&A Archive, giving insight into the way artists, designers and performers work. Archives include Arts Council of Great Britain, Talawa Theatre Company, designers Antoni & Alison and pioneer playworker Donne Buck as well as the National Video Archive of Performance, which holds over 400 live performance recordings. Storehouse is also home to over 350,000 library books on subjects including performance history and children’s literature.
Order an Object will launch with the opening of Storehouse in May 2025.
The David Bowie Centre
Opening in September 2025, and as part of V&A East Storehouse Study Centre, the David Bowie Centre is the new home of David Bowie’s archive, recently acquired by the V&A through the generosity of the David Bowie Estate, the Blavatnik Family Foundation and Warner Music Group. For the first time, the Archive of 80,000+ items, which traces Bowie’s creative processes as a musical innovator, cultural icon, and advocate for self-expression and reinvention across his career, will be accessible to everyone.
To prepare for the David Bowie Centre, a major cataloguing project is underway, cataloguing all aspects of of the David Bowie archive, from Bowie’s iconic costumes and musical instruments to make-up charts, stage models, personal notes and more.
Split into three separate zones, the David Bowie Centre will have a mix of atmospheric curated displays, audio visual installations and a media booth to view archive footage of Bowie. There will also be quieter study areas, for visitors who have booked in advance to view and encounter objects from the archive
To develop the inaugural changing displays, curators consulted with 18–25-year-olds from the four Olympic Boroughs of Hackney, Newham, Tower Hamlets and Waltham Forest through Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park’s Elevate Legacy Youth Board. A series of rotating guest curators – including Bowie’s collaborators, experts and contemporary creatives – will also be invited to share their insights and perspectives on the Archive.
The David Bowie Centre opens in September 2025
