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Wednesday 10:30am - 5pm Thursday 10:30am - 5pm Friday 10:30am - 5pm Saturday 10:30am - 5pm Sunday 10:30am - 5pm

Freud Museum London

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Freud Museum London

The extraordinary final home of Sigmund Freud and his daughter Anna, pioneers of psychoanalysis.
(1253)

The Freud family settled here after fleeing Nazi persecution in Austria in 1938. The centrepiece of the Museum is Freud’s extraordinary study, containing his iconic psychoanalytic couch, countless books and antiquities. The Museum opened in 1986, since when it has developed an international reputation for its collections, research, conferences and contemporary art exhibitions.

05/10/2026

Next month we're delighted to welcome acclaimed writer and critic, Jacqueline Rose, to the Museum to mark the publication of her new novel 'Two Women' 📚

'Two Women' is a fictional account tracing the lives and imagined interconnections of Edith Stein and Gillian Rose. Jacqueline Rose will be joined in conversation by fellow writer and critic Devorah Baum, exploring the influence of psychoanalysis in the creative process, the relationship between biography and fiction, and how fiction can offer new ways of engaging with history and identity.

📆 Friday 6 November, 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm
📍 Hybrid talk with Jacqueline Rose and Devorah Baum
🎫 All ticket proceeds support our vital work to secure the legacy of Sigmund and Anna Freud

Secure your tickets:
In-house: freud.org.uk/event/in-house-two-women-book-launch-with-jacqueline-rose/
Online: freud.org.uk/event/online-two-women-book-launch-with-jacqueline-rose

01/10/2026

Sigmund Freud's relationship with Judaism and his Jewish identity is complex - he described himself as a "godless Jew" and yet made the decision to bring a rare family hanukkiah when the family fled the Anschluss in Vienna. In this online talk, psychoanalyst Renato Mezan will address Freud's relationship with Judaism, its importance to the constitution of psychoanalysis, and the significance of his decision to bring the hanukkiah with him. Currently featured in 40 Objects, 40 Years, the piece will be the starting point for a reflection on Freud's relationship with Judaism.

📆 Wednesday 14 October, 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm (UK time)
📍 Online talk with Renato Mezan
🎫 Please note, this talk is in Portuguese and English translation is unfortunately not available

Pick up your tickets for this insightful talk and discover the rest of our programme: freud.org.uk/event/a-hanukia-de-freud-freud-judaismo-e-a-psicanalise

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A relação de Sigmund Freud com o judaísmo e com sua identidade judaica era complexa. Embora tenha se descrito célebremente como um “judeu sem Deus”, sua herança judaica permaneceu uma parte importante de sua identidade e de seu contexto cultural. Quando sua família deixou Viena após o Anschluss, em 1938, Freud decidiu levar consigo para Londres uma rara hanukkiah de sua família.

Nesta palestra online, o psicanalista Renato Mezan explorará a relação de Freud com o judaísmo, sua importância para o desenvolvimento da psicanálise e o significado de sua decisão de levar consigo a hanukkiah. Atualmente apresentada na exposição 40 Objects, 40 Years, essa peça excepcional será o ponto de partida para uma reflexão sobre Freud, o judaísmo e a identidade judaica.

📆 Quarta-feira, 14 de outubro, das 18h30 às 20h30 (horário do Reino Unido)
📍 Palestra online com Renato Mezan
🎫 A palestra será realizada em português. Infelizmente, não haverá tradução para o inglês.

Adquira seus ingressos e confira a nossa programação completa em nosso site.

29/09/2026

What does it mean to work with fragments in psychoanalysis? What is the psychic life of fragments? And what can a fragment do? Raluca Soreanu writes about trauma, fragmentation and the radical plasticity of the psyche in 'The Psychic Life of Fragments' - celebrate the monograph's publication with an exclusive hybrid symposium here at Freud Museum London.

During the symposium, introduced and moderated by Lizaveta van Munsteren, we will hear from the author, Raluca Soreanu, and from guest speakers G Lori Millon, Patricia Gherovici, Matt ffytche, Lisa Baraitser, Jakob Staberg, Laura Salisbury & Julianna Pusztai.

📆 Friday 30 October, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm
📍 Hybrid symposium
🎫 Pay-what-you-can

Book your place and explore our events programme on our website.
In-house: freud.org.uk/event/in-person-the-psychic-life-of-fragments-with-raluca-soreanu
Online: freud.org.uk/event/online-the-psychic-life-of-fragments-with-raluca-soreanu

27/09/2026

"Lovely, free, magnanimous England". That was how Sigmund Freud described England - and on this day in 1938, the Freud family moved to their permanent England home at 20 Maresfield Gardens.

After three months of preparations, extortionate taxes and fees to secure safe passage for the family, their housekeeper, their doctor, and their dogs, and packing their belongings until they were eventually cleared for export, most of the Freud family fled Vienna and arrived in England in June 1938. They lived in a smaller property, 39 Elsworthy Road, while preparations at their final home concluded. Freud's son Ernst, an architect, had already lived in England for five years, and completed work on the property to make it suitable for the family's needs. They moved into their home at 20 Maresfield Gardens on 27 September 1938.

Sigmund Freud died a year after the family moved into the home, and after his death, it remained a thriving family home until Anna Freud's death in 1982. It was a condition of her will that the family home be transformed into a museum to honour her father's life and work, and Freud Museum London opened its doors in 1986. Forty years on, we still work to cement the legacies of both Sigmund Freud and Anna Freud.

Photo 1: Sigmund and Martha Freud in the garden at 20 Maresfield Gardens, 1939
Photo 2: Sigmund and Anna Freud in the garden at 20 Maresfield Gardens, 1938
Photo 3: Freud's desk in his study, c.1970
Photo 4: Paula Fichtl in the doorway of 20 Maresfield Gardens, c. 1978
Photo 5: 20 Maresfield Gardens, 1979

23/09/2026

On this day in 1939, Sigmund Freud died peacefully in his final home at 20 Maresfield Gardens, London. He was 83 years of age.

Rather than on a bed, Freud died on a specially made "invalid couch", installed in his study downstairs. He told his physician, Max Schur: “My dear, you promised you would help me when I could no longer carry on. Now it is only torture, and it makes no sense.” He was administered substantial doses of morphine and passed peacefully on 23rd September 1939.

By his bedside Freud kept this book, "La Peau de Chagrin", by Honore de Balzac - the last book he would ever read. It tells the story of a young man and his conflict between longevity and desire, and Freud remarked to his doctor, “This was the proper book for me to read; it deals with shrinking and starvation.” Freud's very own copy of "La Peau de Chagrin" is a key object in our current exhibition, "40 Objects, 40 Years", allowing you to see the book up close.

Freud, a refugee from N**i-occupied Vienna, arrived in London in June 1938 and settled into his final home in September of that year. Despite the progression of his jaw cancer effectively confining him to the downstairs rooms and garden of the house, Freud remained busy, seeing patients, friends, writers, and colleagues, completing "Moses and Monotheism", and working on "An Outline of Psychoanalysis".

At his funeral, his lifelong friend and colleague, Ernest Jones, said:

“A great spirit has left the world… Freud inspired us with his personality, character and ideas, and his creative spirit infused us all… Thus we bid farewell to a man of whom we shall never know the like again.”

Photo 1: Freud at his desk.
Photo 2: Freud's copy of "La Peau de Chagrin".
Photo 3: Freud's "invalid couch", where it likely stood in the last weeks of his life.
Photo 4: Freud with his daughter Anna.

21/09/2026

Today is International Day of Peace, a day dedicated to the aim for world peace and the absence of war. 🕊️

In Sigmund Freud's final years, he and his family were forced to flee N**i-occupied Vienna, having no choice but to escape to England in the hopes of finding safety and even peace. Speaking to the BBC in 1938, Freud said: "At the age of 82 and as a result of the German invasion, I left my home in Vienna and came to England, where I hope to end my life in freedom."

However, unlike most of the family, four of Sigmund Freud's elderly sisters did not make the journey to London: Rosa, Mitzi, Dolfi, and Pauli all stayed behind in Vienna. Like millions of others, the sisters faced extremely repressive taxation measures and living conditions from the N**is, before they were transported to Theresienstadt concentration camp in 1942, where Dolfi was murdered. Rosa, Mitzi, and Pauli were further transported to Treblinka concentration camp, where they were murdered.

The Freud family only discovered the sisters' fate in 1946 through a letter from the Red Cross, and when Sigmund died in 1939, just weeks after the outbreak of the Second World War, he still hoped the sisters might be saved.

Both peace and war were instrumental themes throughout the lives and stories of the Freud family, and we're honoured to be able to share some of those stories.

Photo 1: Sigmund Freud's sisters in Vienna.
Photo 2: Sigmund Freud and Anna Freud photographed in Gare de L'est train station in Paris, France.
Photo 3: Newspaper clipping from The Daily Herald about the family's arrival in London, 6 June 1938.
All photos courtesy of Freud Museum London.

19/09/2026

Following the Booker Prize longlisting of her latest novel, 'The Shadow of the Object', we're delighted to welcome Chloe Aridjis to the Museum next month 👤

Drawing on questions of memory, desire, loss and the mysterious lives of things, 'The Shadow of the Object' explores the emotional and psychological traces that objects leave behind. In a conversation following the novel’s preoccupations, Aridjis and writer and critic Devorah Baum will discuss the novel’s engagement with memory, fantasy and the unconscious, considering how objects, images and acts of looking become charged with emotional significance. Together, they will also reflect on the relationship between psychoanalysis and fiction, and how they inform each other.

📆 Wednesday 28 October, 6:00 pm - 7:30 pm
📍 Online talk with Chloe Aridjis and Devorah Baum
🎫 Pay-what-you-can

Book your place and explore our events programme on our website: freud.org.uk/event/the-shadow-of-the-object-chloe-aridjis-and-devorah-baum-in-conversation/

18/09/2026

Hmm... sounds like a good reason to book your next visit, if you ask us.

Book online today on our website: freud.org.uk/visit

17/09/2026

Following its presentation at the Freud Museum London, the acclaimed exhibition 'Leonora Carrington: The Symptomatic Surreal' is now officially open at Faro Santander!

'The Symptomatic Surreal' is the first exhibition dedicated to the paintings, drawings and texts created by Carrington during the Second World War (1939 - 1944). Despite having limited access to artistic material during the war, Carrington continued to work in her sketchbooks, creating a visual record of a period of deep crisis. Told through her Santander sketchbook drawings and letters, prior to her permanent emigration to Mexico, this exhibition follows Carrington’s flight from N**i-occupied France, her hospitalisation in Peñacastillo Sanatorium, Santander, and her subsequent journey to New York, where she was reunited with the Surrealists in exile. The iconic painting 'Down Below' is on display alongside Carrington's recently rediscovered 'Villa Pilar', marking the first time these paintings have ever been shown together, reunited in the city she painted them.

It also marks the first time that objects from Sigmund Freud's own collection housed at Freud Museum London have travelled for an exhibition, with ancient Egyptian figures drawing parallels with Carrington's own representation of death and the underworld.

'The Symptomatic Surreal' is curated by Vanessa Boni, Curator of Special Projects, Freud Museum London.

The exhibition is on view at Faro Santander until 30 January 2027.

Image 2: with thanks to Faro Santander. Photo credit: Belén de Benito

15/09/2026

Our book launch season continues with a celebration of 'Lean on Me' and a conversation between Lynne Segal and Akshi Singh 📖

Have you ever relied on the kindness of strangers? In 'Lean On Me', feminist thinker Lynne Segal goes in search of hope in her own life and in the world around her. She finds it entwined in our intimate commitments to each other and our shared collective endeavours. In this exclusive talk, Lynne and Akshi will discuss what it means to depend on one another in an age of social fragmentation, inequality and climate crisis, and consider how practices of radical care can help us imagine a more hopeful future.

📆 Thursday 22 October, 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm
📍 In-house event
🎫 Solidarity tickets available

Book your place and explore our events programme on our website: freud.org.uk/event/lean-on-me-book-launch-with-lynne-segal

Address

20 Maresfield Gardens
London
NW35SX

Opening Hours

Wednesday	10:30am - 5pm
Thursday	10:30am - 5pm
Friday	10:30am - 5pm
Saturday	10:30am - 5pm
Sunday	10:30am - 5pm

Telephone

+442074352002

Website

https://www.freud.org.uk/

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