Including wellbeing, retail, cultural venues and creative production spaces
With our globally renown theatres, music venues, museums and galleries and our vibrant creative industries working across hundreds of recording studios, rehearsal spaces, artists' workspaces, this sector is responsible for generating £52 billion per year (London Cultural Infrastructure Plan) and accounts for 1 in 4 jobs across London (leisure and retail).
London remains a priority destination for many travellers. Tourism contributes over £27 billion in spend to London’s economy each year, which was shown in 2022 when combining spend from international and domestic visitors.
Tourism in the capital has rebounded successfully since the Covid-19 Pandemic, with visitor spend at a record high. For the first three quarters of 2023, London welcomed 14.9 million international visits to London, with an inbound spend generated accounting for 57% of the total inbound spend for England, reaching £4.7bn in Q3 2023, 5% above Q3 2019 (International Passenger Survey). Domestic visitors also bring great value to London’s tourism economy, with 15.4million overnight trips to London from GB residents in 2022, accumulating a spend of £5bn.
London is one of the world’s most renowned locations for film and television show production. Large international studios like Netflix have invested in the city by expanding their headquarters, having invested almost £6bn in UK content over the last four years. In 2022, British films contributed to 1/3 of global box office revenues.
In general, the UK capital's creative economy is thriving, having experienced higher than average growth in the last few years and with one out of five jobs in London (1.1m) being within the creative sector (London City Hall). A new generation of production facilities is emerging, leveraging the deep talent and expertise of London’s creative industries. This includes new studio facilities that can host any size production, skilled technicians, world-class actors and leading companies in post-production, virtual production and VFX.
This access to skill, technology and creative space has helped cement London as a key destination for film and TV production on an international stage. Five of the world's largest studios - Sony Pictures, Warner Bros, United International Pictures, Disney Studios and Paramount - have offices in London.
London is the gateway to the Thames Estuary Production Corridor, a world-class centre for creative and cultural production with the potential to create 50,000 jobs across London, North Kent and South Essex. The Corridor has already unlocked over £4.6mn of Government investment and is projected to generate £3.7bn economic output.
“Our vision for the world’s largest creative production corridor is bold. It will position London and the South East as a world leader for the creative industries on a scale never seen before, creating a landmark corridor along the Estuary, powering skills opportunities and new jobs.” - Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London.
Yoo Capital acquired Olympia London in 2017, the only major exhibition centre in Central London. Less than six years later and with £1.3bn investment, Olympia is emerging as a transformed 2.25 million sq ft arts, entertainment and exhibition district spread across 14 acres.
On completion, Olympia will be home to:
Hackman Capital Partners is building London’s largest film and television production centre in Dagenham, East London. Construction underway, the studios will include up to 12 sound stages, 3 acres of backlot, offices and ancillary space, totalling over half a million square feet.
Eastbrook Studios London will be a major boost for the London Borough of Barking & Dagenham, the City of London and the UK entertainment industry at large, creating an estimated 1,200 jobs, contributing £35m per year to the local economy and inspiring more development into thriving East London. Eastbrook Studios will open by Summer 2024.
