A First Look at the V&A East Museum—London's Most Exciting New Cultural Addition

“It wasn't that difficult to convince people to lend us objects because it's the V&A,” curator Jacqueline Springer tells me as we stand in the brand-new V&A East Museum. After all, people's willingness to loan—and even donate—personal objects has made the V&A one of the most influential collections in the world. Now, London's most exciting new museum in recent memory has finally opened. It's the latest V&A space in the capital, part of a lineage that began with the Victoria and Albert Museum, which opened in 1857 as the South Kensington Museum. Since then, the V&A’s collection has expanded into something many directors could only dream of, with artifacts spanning centuries on rotation behind sparkling cabinets. Naturally, a plethora of treasures requires adequate space. The opening of the East London site comes after recent and considerable expansions: Young V&A in Bethnal Green, the just-opened V&A Storehouse, and the V&A Dundee in Scotland. V&A East comprises two permanent spaces: the V&A Storehouse, which opened in 2025, and the V&A East Museum, which opens on April 18, 2026. The Storehouse allows visitors to request to view its masses of artifacts. The V&A East Museu