Sherlock Holmes House & Museum

London’s most famous fictional detective is the focus of the eponymous Sherlock Holmes Museum, located at 221b Baker Street, the legendary address from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories. According to the stories, this was where Sherlock Holmes and his famous sidekick Doctor Watson lived between 1881 and 1904, and the character’s legacy has become so important to London tourism that the house is now under government protection.

The privately run museum is devoted to the life and times of Sherlock Holmes, with the house interiors faithfully recreated according to the texts. Holmes’ characteristic Victorian-style study is located on the first floor overlooking Baker Street; Doctor Watson’s bedroom is above on the second floor; the lumbar room is full of lodgers’ suitcases; and Holmes’ attic bedroom is found in typical disarray.

Visitors are welcomed to the house by Mrs Watson, esteemed landlady of the enigmatic pair, before embarking on a journey into the fictional world of the celebrated detective. Sink into Holmes’s favorite armchair by the fire and keep an eye out for his treasured calabash pipe and array of wacky disguises, piece together the clues to his recent investigations from the secret notebooks and papers scattered around the house and guess the scenes enacted by a series of waxwork figurines throughout the rooms. If all that’s not enough to satisfy your detective aspirations, head to the gift shop where you can pick up a Holmes-style magnifying glass and deerstalker cap.