University College London

About University College London

Public research university in London, England, United Kingdom

University College London (UCL) is a public research university in Bloomsbury, central London, and the first university institution founded in the British capital. Established in 1826 as London University on the radical ideas of the philosopher Jeremy Bentham, it was the first university in England to be entirely secular and to admit students regardless of religion, at a time when Oxford and Cambridge required membership of the Church of England, and in 1878 the second college in Britain to admit women alongside men. It received a royal charter in 1836 as one of the two founding colleges of the federal University of London and gained formal university status in 2023. Today it is the second-largest university in the United Kingdom by total enrolment and the largest for postgraduates, a member of the Russell Group of research universities, grown through mergers with institutes of ophthalmology, neurology, dentistry, pharmacy, education and Slavonic studies, and home to thousands of Arab and Muslim students. It also keeps libraries and museums open to the public, including the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology with its vast collection from Egypt and Sudan, the Grant Museum of Zoology and an art collection on campus. The main campus on Gower Street centres on the Wilkins Building, with its neoclassical facade, Corinthian portico and dome fronting a small, handsome quad, an architectural landmark of Bloomsbury close to the British Museum.

Where:

London, United Kingdom