Brixton · Beckenham · Soho · Berlin · New York · 1947–2016
Lit: July 1974, Tower Theater, Upper Darby.
The phone box · ten holes, ten places
The back of the Ziggy Stardust sleeve is a shot of him in a telephone box. Pull a hole round to the stop and let go: the dial counts its pulses back, and the number connects.
Pull a hole round to the stop, or press a number.
4 January 1972 · Heddon Street, off Regent Street, Mayfair
Brian Ward photographs him under the K. West sign for the Ziggy Stardust cover.
Brian Ward photographed Bowie in this doorway in January 1972 for the cover of Ziggy Stardust.
The photograph was black and white; Terry Pastor coloured it in his Covent Garden studio.
A pedestrian street off Regent Street; the doorway and plaque are free to see.
Brixton and Beckenham · 1947–1973
Bowie was born at 40 Stansfield Road, Brixton, in 1947. The house is a private home; this World names it but leaves it off the map.
Jimmy C, the Australian artist James Cochran, painted the mural on the side of Morleys in 2013, opposite Brixton Tube station. It is based on the cover of Aladdin Sane, from 1973.
The wall in 2013. Lay a flower to see it in January 2016.
It has since been cleaned and given a stronger protective cover.
On the wall of Morleys, seen from Tunstall Road, opposite Brixton Tube station.
16.8.1969Growth Summer Festival · admit all
On 16 August 1969 Bowie played the Growth Summer Festival here, which he organised with the Beckenham Arts Lab. The day inspired his song Memory of a Free Festival.
The bandstand was built around 1905 by McCallum & Hope of Glasgow. It was listed Grade II on the festival’s 50th anniversary, restored from July 2023 to March 2024 and reopened on 17 May 2024.
A public park, free to walk in. Beckenham Junction is the nearest station.
1969–73Arts Lab · folk night upstairs
Bowie co-founded the Arts Lab folk night at the Three Tuns and was a regular guest. A plaque on the old pub marks him performing here between 1969 and 1973.
The Copers Cope Residents Association and Noble House Pub Company put it up; the building is a Zizzi now.
Now a Zizzi restaurant: the plaque is on the front.
23 Heddon Street · January 1972
Black and white, as Brian Ward shot it.
Brian Ward photographed Bowie in this doorway in January 1972 for the cover of Ziggy Stardust. The photograph was black and white; Terry Pastor coloured it in his Covent Garden studio.
The K. West sign over the door was a furrier’s. The back of the sleeve is a shot of him in a telephone box.
Gary Kemp unveiled the Ziggy Stardust plaque on 27 March 2012, only the second London plaque to a fictional character after Sherlock Holmes.
A pedestrian street off Regent Street; the doorway and plaque are free to see.
Round the corner · 17 St Anne’s Court, Soho
Bowie recorded Hunky Dory and The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars here.
Billy Bragg and Bowie’s lifelong friend George Underwood unveiled a blue plaque here on 15 June 2017, for BBC Music Day.
No longer a studio: see the blue plaque from St Anne’s Court, a Soho alley.
Regent Street, London
Where Bowie held his farewell dinner for Ziggy on 3 July 1973, after Hammersmith. Heddon Street is a few minutes up Regent Street.
Check roomsLondon
Live marketplace results for Bowie and rock walking tours of Soho and the West End. Check each itinerary.
Live marketplace results · itineraries change
Compare toursSchöneberg · 1976–1978
From 1976 to 1978 Bowie lived in a seven-room flat on the first floor; Iggy Pop lived here too.
A white porcelain plaque went up at the end of August 2016, naming the three albums he made at Hansa. In mid-September it fell and shattered; a new one was fixed on 5 October 2016.
Flats, privately owned: see the plaque from the pavement.
Mid-September 2016: the porcelain plaque is on the pavement. Tap each piece back into place.
Hauptstraße 157 · next door
It opened in 1977 as the Anderes Ufer, the first gay and lesbian café in Europe with windows open to the street. Bowie was a regular, a few metres from his front door.
A café-bar a few doors from his flat.
Köthener Straße 38 · Kreuzberg
Built in 1910–13 as a hall for presenting master craftsmen’s certificates, it became Hansa Studio 2 in 1976. Bowie called it the Big Hall by the Wall; the Heroes title track was made here.
The studio closed in 1993; since 1994 it has been an event venue that still takes some recordings.
An event hall now; the Hansa tour goes inside on selected dates.
Platz der Republik · June 1987
In June 1987 Bowie played an open-air concert at the Reichstag in West Berlin. Thousands of East Germans gathered on the other side of the Wall to listen.
After his death in January 2016 the German Foreign Office thanked him for helping to bring the Wall down.
Public lawns in front of the Reichstag; the Wall line runs behind it.
Köthener Straße, Berlin · Public tours €40–50 a person
Three to four hours through Hansa’s studios with Thilo Schmied, ending in the Meistersaal. Public tours on selected dates; groups on request.
See the datesBerlin
Live marketplace results for Bowie walking and city tours of Schöneberg and Kreuzberg. Check each itinerary.
Live marketplace results · itineraries change
Compare toursTwo last nights, 42 years apart
On 3 July 1973, at the last show of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, Bowie told the crowd it was the last show they would ever do.
He meant the band, not himself: he was touring again within a year. The audience left stunned. The building opened in 1932 as the Gaumont Palace, designed by Robert Cromie, and is listed Grade II*.
That night Bowie held a farewell dinner for Ziggy at the Café Royal on Regent Street.
A working concert hall, now the Eventim Apollo: the foyer opens for shows.
52 West 8th Street · 1975
After sessions in Philadelphia, Young Americans was finished at Electric Lady and the Record Plant in New York. Bowie recorded Fame, written with John Lennon, and the Beatles’ Across the Universe in those New York sessions.
A working studio, not open to visitors: see the front from West 8th Street.
V&A East Storehouse · Hackney Wick
The free Order an Object service lets you book time with a single piece.
Daily 10am–6pm, Thursday and Saturday until 10pm. £5, concessions available; book ahead.
Hackney Wick, London · Daily 10am–6pm, Thu & Sat to 10pm · £5
About 200 pieces from his archive on show, and a free service to book time with a single object.
Book a visit16 places you can visit. His birthplace on Stansfield Road, the site of Haddon Hall and 285 Lafayette Street are private and not on the map.
Pins mark public places; private homes are named but not pinned.
General reference · Public access · Coordinate precision: building · Not an exact scene or camera position; not a visitor route. On the wall of Morleys, seen from Tunstall Road, opposite Brixton Tube station.
General reference · Public access · Coordinate precision: site · Not an exact scene or camera position; not a visitor route. A public park, free to walk in. Beckenham Junction is the nearest station.
General reference · Public access · Coordinate precision: building · Not an exact scene or camera position; not a visitor route. Now a Zizzi restaurant: the plaque is on the front.
Tunstall Road, on the side of Morleys, Brixton
Jimmy C, the Australian artist James Cochran, painted the mural on the side of Morleys in 2013, opposite Brixton Tube station.
On the wall of Morleys, seen from Tunstall Road, opposite Brixton Tube station.
Croydon Road Recreation Ground, Beckenham
The bandstand was built around 1905 by McCallum & Hope of Glasgow.
A public park, free to walk in. Beckenham Junction is the nearest station.
157 High Street, Beckenham
Bowie co-founded the Arts Lab folk night at the Three Tuns and was a regular guest.
Now a Zizzi restaurant: the plaque is on the front.
Stay
Hotel Café Royal, where he held the farewell dinner in July 1973, a few minutes from Heddon Street.
Regent Street, London
Where Bowie held his farewell dinner for Ziggy on 3 July 1973, after Hammersmith. Heddon Street is a few minutes up Regent Street.
Check roomsGo there
The David Bowie Centre in Hackney Wick, Hansa’s studio tour in Berlin, and walking tours in both cities.
Hackney Wick, London · Daily 10am–6pm, Thu & Sat to 10pm · £5
About 200 pieces from his archive on show, and a free service to book time with a single object.
Book a visitKöthener Straße, Berlin · Public tours €40–50 a person
Three to four hours through Hansa’s studios with Thilo Schmied, ending in the Meistersaal. Public tours on selected dates; groups on request.
See the datesBerlin
Live marketplace results for Bowie walking and city tours of Schöneberg and Kreuzberg. Check each itinerary.
Live marketplace results · itineraries change
Compare toursLondon
Live marketplace results for Bowie and rock walking tours of Soho and the West End. Check each itinerary.
Live marketplace results · itineraries change
Compare toursWhat’s on
You’re Not Alone in London and Manchester, and the V&A’s On Tour exhibition opening in Dundee.
Checking current event dates…
Take it home
Original posters from our store, three books and the four albums tied to these places.
An original 1978 poster with Masayoshi Sukita’s photograph, for the album whose title track was made in the Meistersaal; near mint.
In stock
View posterAn original 1973 poster with Brian Duffy’s photograph. The Brixton mural is based on the album’s cover; near mint.
In stock
View posterAn original poster for a 1972 Bowie concert at Plymouth Guildhall, the year of Heddon Street; near mint.
In stock
View posterAn original Italian two-sheet for the Ziggy Stardust film; near mint.
In stock
View posterVictoria Broackes and Geoffrey Marsh (eds), V&A
The V&A’s book of its 2013 exhibition, from the archive now in Hackney Wick.
Find the bookPaul Trynka
A full biography, Brixton to New York.
Find the bookDylan Jones
An oral history told by the people around him.
Find the bookDavid Bowie · LP, RCA Victor SF 8244, 1971
Written partly at Haddon Hall, recorded at Trident.
Live marketplace search · listings and condition change
Find a copyDavid Bowie · LP, RCA Victor SF 8287, 1972
Recorded at Trident; the cover is Heddon Street.
Live marketplace search · listings and condition change
Find a copyDavid Bowie · LP, RCA Victor RS 1006, 1975
Philadelphia, then Electric Lady, where Fame was made with John Lennon.
Live marketplace search · listings and condition change
Find a copyDavid Bowie · LP, RCA Victor PL 12522, 1977
The title track was made in the Meistersaal.
Live marketplace search · listings and condition change
Find a copyDates, prices, rooms and stock change: confirm with the provider before you travel or buy. A stay or tour is described as a filming location only where the card says so.
Every place and moment behind this page, with sources.
19 of 19 places · 19 of 19 Moments
Tunstall Road, on the side of Morleys, Brixton
Brixton covers the mural in flowers and notes.
Brixton
David Jones is born at 40 Stansfield Road, Brixton.
Croydon Road Recreation Ground, Beckenham
He plays the Growth Summer Festival at the Croydon Road bandstand.
157 High Street, Beckenham
He co-founds the Arts Lab folk night at the Three Tuns, Beckenham.
Beckenham
He writes songs for Hunky Dory in a first-floor flat in Beckenham.
Heddon Street, off Regent Street, Mayfair
Brian Ward photographs him under the K. West sign for the Ziggy Stardust cover.
17 St Anne’s Court, Soho
Hunky Dory and Ziggy Stardust are recorded in St Anne’s Court, Soho.
Eventim Apollo, 45 Queen Caroline Street, Hammersmith
He tells the Hammersmith Odeon it is the last show the band will ever do.
117 Church Road, Barnes
Diamond Dogs is recorded, mostly at Olympic Studios in Barnes.
Victoria Station, Westminster
He arrives at Victoria Station and stands up in an open-top car to wave to the fans.
Parkes Street, Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Hackney Wick
The David Bowie Centre opens at V&A East Storehouse.
Hauptstraße 155, Schöneberg
He moves into a first-floor flat at Hauptstraße 155, with Iggy Pop.
Berlin’s porcelain plaque shatters weeks after it goes up and is replaced.
Hauptstraße 157, Schöneberg
Köthener Straße 38, Kreuzberg
The Heroes title track is made in the hall he called the Big Hall by the Wall.
Bussardsteig 9, Dahlem
Living in Berlin, he makes regular visits to the Brücke-Museum in Dahlem.
Platz der Republik, Tiergarten
He plays the Reichstag; East Germans listen from the other side of the Wall.
52 West 8th Street, Greenwich Village
Fame, with John Lennon, is recorded in the New York sessions for Young Americans.
SoHo
He and Iman live at 285 Lafayette Street.
79 East 4th Street, East Village
He takes a bow with the cast on the opening night of Lazarus.
