Bishopsgate Institute has provided access to its amazing Special Collections and Archives since opening in 1895 and is now home to incredible collections on London, activist, LGBTQ+ and other histories. Join Archives Manager Stef Dickers to hear stories of rampantly collecting Librarians, revolutionary minute books, Suffragettes, a Vicar's naughty scrapbooks and rather revelatory diaries from the 1950s.
Explore the different collections we hold in our Special Collections
Who is this tour for?
This tour is for anyone with an interest in London, activist, LGBTQ+ and other histories.
Access information
This tour goes down into our archive store, and we regret that this tour is not accessible to anyone who uses a wheelchair or who is unable to use stairs.
Need to Know
Meet me
Stefan Dickers
Stef is the Special Collections and Archives Manager at Bishopsgate Institute and has been responsible for the development of the Institute's collections on the history of London, protest and activism, and LGBTQ+ Britain. He qualified as an archivist in 2001 and started at Bishopsgate in 2005.
Previous to this, Stef worked in the archives of the London School of Economics and Senate House Library. He will talk at extraordinary length about the collections whenever asked and regularly entertains groups of students, groups and family/local history societies on the wonders they can find in the Special Collections and Archives at the Institute.
What We Do
