Events at Olympia London

An exhibition centre, sporting venue and conference hall, Olympia London is a multi-purpose venue that occupies a large site in West Kensington. It is served by an Overground railway station and has its own branch of the District Line on the London Underground network. The centre has been holding events for over 130 years and has hosted some of the most prestigious trade shows and exhibitions in the country, since its inauguration. For example, the London International Horse Show was first put on there in 1888, at the time rather grandly referred to as the First Great Horse Show. In 1908, the 170-foot clear span of Olympia's main showroom was used to stage the first Ideal Home Show and, in 1919, the Cycle and Motor Cycle Show made its debut at Olympia.

Since then, the venue has been used for a huge number of events, both those open to the public and those which are by invitation only – usually trade exhibitions. The venue has a capacity of between 4,000 and 10,000 visitors, depending on the layout of the exhibition that happens to be occupying it. There were two expansions to the site, one in 1987 and one in 2011. The latter saw the creation of the modern-looking West Hall, which is a new exhibition space split over two floors. A renovation project was completed at Olympia London in 2013 at a reported cost of £30 million.

Olympia London tickets

There are plenty of ticketed events held at Olympia that are open to the public. Tickets for some extremely noteworthy events have been sold for a wide range of activities and interests. For example, a WBO Middleweight title bout was held there in 1991. Widely-known professional boxers such as Chris Eubank and Naseem Hamed have plied their trade there. The exhibition centre has also been used to host ATP tennis tournaments in the past. More recently, in February 2009, the designer Vivienne Westwood held her catwalk show at Olympia to coincide with London Fashion Week. The BBC also chose it as their preferred venue for the hugely successful Dr Who Experience, a family-friendly exhibition that ran in 2012.

Olympia has been used many times as a live performance venue over the years, and big name touring bands as well as solo artists are regularly booked to perform there. In the past, rock bands such as the Jimi Hendrix Experience, Status Quo and the Cure have all played at Olympia. Primal Scream, Bloc Party and the Chemical Brothers are other acts that have brought their sounds to the venue.

Similar venues to Olympia

At StubHub, you can search for events at similar exhibition venues, such as the Harrogate International Conference Centre and the O2 Arena, also in London.