8 locations from Netflix’s You season 4 in London and surrounding areas that you can visit – from the city’s oldest church to a street ‘straight out of a Hugh Grant movie’
- Netflix psychological satire returns with Joe in London, where the action occurs in places such as 900-year-old St Bartholomew’s church, and Spitalfields Market
- Trendy pubs also feature, as do idyllic cobbled streets and a high-end hotel with a Michelin-star restaurant. Here are some sights from the show to see
Having taken in New York, Los Angeles and suburban California in seasons one to three, Netflix’s over-the-top psychological satire You saw lead character Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley, Gossip Girl) hotfoot it to Paris at the end of the last series.
But when season four dropped in February, we saw the charming stalker turned serial killer quickly move on to London on his “little European holiday”.
Joe is now masquerading as Jonathan Moore, a lecturer at Darcy College, and becomes the hunted rather than the hunter, embroiled in an Agatha Christie-like murder mystery.
On arriving in London “a city of art, theatre, books and the occasional douchebag” as he describes it in his signature sardonic voice-over, Joe falls in with a young, rich and glamorous crowd that includes Simon Soo (Aidan Cheng) and his sister, Sophie (Niccy Lin), offspring of a Chinese billionaire.
“Darcy College” is in reality Royal Holloway, University of London’s imposing campus in Surrey. Its grand library, though, is really a part of Lincoln’s Inn, in central London, where barristers of England and Wales are called to the Bar.
Public tours of Lincoln’s Inn are sometimes run, but a proper look around the library is not always guaranteed.
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Here are locations from season four you are more easily able to visit.
South Kensington
Joe, posing as Jonathan, lives in South Kensington, an expensive west London neighbourhood typified by white stucco town houses and private garden squares.
Our anti-hero is flat-sitting in real-life Kynance Mews, a cobbled street so picture perfect he quips he’s living in a Hugh Grant film.
Spitalfields
James Bond shooting location is being turned into the new Raffles London
Joe then walks through Artillery Passage, a tiny lane of original Georgian shopfronts now including a number of bars and restaurants.
Commenting on the local hipsters and how drinking starts early, he passes Commercial Tavern, which has a telegenic corner location on Commercial Street and is known for its quirky interior. The pub is expected to reopen in March following a refurbishment.
St Pancras International
This is where Joe intercepts his season three obsession, Marienne, on her way back to Paris. Even if you’re not catching a train, St Pancras is worth a stop for its Victorian architecture and “Europe’s longest champagne bar”, Searcys’.
The station also features several contemporary sculptures and art installations.
Old Billingsgate
Artist Simon Soo’s exhibition opening is held at “The Clotho Gallery” – in reality Old Billingsgate, home of the 19th century fish market.
The building is now an events space, but you can view the Grade II listed exterior next to the River Thames with its distinctive arched glass doors, which are shown in several scenes in You.
The riverside pedestrianised area in front has a great view of Tower Bridge – as depicted in a scene in which Joe sits waiting for Simon with the bridge lit up in the distance behind him.
Four Seasons Hotel London at Ten Trinity Square
Lady Phoebe’s (Tilly Keeper) apartment was filmed at the Four Seasons Hotel London at Ten Trinity Square. She appears to live at one of the Residences, which are bookable for extended stays and some of which, like Phoebe’s, have terraces with views of the Tower of London and Tower Bridge.
The hotel includes the two-Michelin-star restaurant La Dame De Pic by chef Anne-Sophie Pic.
Seething Lane Garden
Next to Ten Trinity Square is this manicured garden where Gemma Graham-Greene (Eve Austin) and Princess Blessing (Ozioma Whenu) drink coffee.
Diarist Samuel Pepys lived on Seething Lane in the 1660s and is said to have buried his collection of cheese and wines under this spot during the Great Fire of London.
There’s a bust of Pepys in the garden, in front of which Gemma poses for a photograph.
St Bartholomew The Great (spoiler alert)
This atmospheric medieval church tucked away on West Smithfield is the setting for Simon’s funeral.
Commemorating its 900th anniversary this year (it’s the oldest surviving church in London), St Bart’s The Great was built by a jester in the court of King Henry I (1068-1135). The church is usually open to the public every day (between services on a Sunday).
Knebworth House
The group escape London for Phoebe’s country house, Hampsie, which in reality is Knebworth House, in Hertfordshire, about an hour from London.
A Gothic mansion with turrets and gargoyles, it looks like a cross between Downton Abbey and a vampire’s castle, remarks Joe. In fact, one previous custodian (Knebworth has been owned by the same family since 1490), Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, penned the words, “It was a dark and stormy night”.
The house and gardens are open to the public on weekends and school holidays from mid-March until the end of September.
Entry includes tours of the many lavish rooms full of heirlooms that feature in You, including the Armoury Staircase, Banqueting Hall, Library (complete with the bookshelf concealed door) and the bedroom in which Joe sleeps.
