Where Will Audrey Hepburn’s Blue Plaque Be?

British actress and fashion icon Audrey Hepburn, glam rocker Marc Bolan, ballerina Alicia Markova, Jamaican writer and equality campaigner Una Marson, novelist Barbara Pym and artist Graham Sutherland are the latest cultural icons set to be commended with an esteemed blue plaque thanks to their creative contributions to shaping London as we know it, English Heritage has revealed.

‘[This year] marks an exciting year for the blue plaques scheme as we honour these outstanding individuals who transformed the cultural fabric of London,’ says English Heritage’s curatorial director Matt Thompson. ‘From literature and art to dance and music, these figures helped shape the London we know today. Their contributions not only had a profound impact on their fields but also continue to inspire generations.’

They join recent recipients like singer Adelaide Hall, photographer Christina Broom and architect Thomas Wallis, who were all immortalised in blue plaque form in London in 2024, adding to the 1,000+ informative roundels scattered across the city, a practise which dates back to 1866.

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Audrey Hepburn

This Belgian-born British icon might be best known for her roles in Roman Holiday (1953), Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961) and My Fair Lady (1964), but the foundations of her stardom were laid in London. It is here that she transitioned from ballerina to actress, gained her first film and stage roles, cemented her status as Hollywood icon and cultivated a sartorial spirit that has defied time.

English Heritage hopes to commend the star with a blue plaque on one of her former residences in Mayfair later this year.

Marc Bolan

Inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2020, Bolan is best known for pioneering the glam rock movement in the ‘70s as front man of T. Rex. Fusing rock, folk and theatrics with glittering glamour, English Heritage notes how his ‘iconic look, featuring sequins, feather boas, and platform boots’ helped to define glam rock’s aesthetic, and ‘challenged traditional notions of masculinity’.

Born in Hackney (where a plaque already marks his childhood home in Stoke Newington), raised in Wimbledon and later tragically dying in a car crash in Barnes aged 29, Bolan’s life and career is inextricable from London, and English Heritage plans to recognise this with a blue plaque installed at one of his west London addresses this year.

Alicia Markova

Hepburn isn’t the only ballerina being commended by English Heritage this year. Alicia Markova, co-founder of the English National Ballet and an influential figure in the Royal Ballet, will also be commended with a blue plaque this year, thanks to her influence in shaping London as a ballet capital. Her roundel will adorn her childhood home in Muswell Hill.

Una Marson

This Jamaican-born poet, playwright and broadcaster championed racial and gender equality throughout her life – but she was also the very first Black woman to be employed by the BBC, first as a programme assistant before becoming the broadcaster’s first Black producer. After arriving in London in 1932, Marson lived in Peckham and Camberwell, with a plaque already commending her former home on Brunswick Square, though this one was erected by the Southwark Heritage Association.

Barbara Pym

Famed for her novel Excellent Women, renowned British novelist Barbara Pym drew inspiration from London when writing – specifically her home area of Pimlico, where her blue plaque will be displayed. Excellent Women in particular showcases a snapshot of postwar London society.

Graham Sutherland

Famed for his neo-Romantic landscapes and his 1954 portrait of Sir Winston Churchill, artist Graham Sutherland is also set to be commended with a blue plaque this year. It will adorn his London childhood home, a location which played a formative role in his artistic development, according to English Heritage.