Please see below for a list of our upcoming events, and some recent events.
Click on any event to see more details about it.
To see all events of a given type (e.g. Monthly Meetings), you can select these from the Events menu at the top of the page.
Forthcoming events
Mon 16 Sep 2024
10:00am - 11:30am
We will be holding our annual Open Morning on Monday 16 September at St Margaret's United Reformed Church in Victoria Avenue, Finchley N3 1BD from 10.00-11.30am . Many of our Group Coordinators […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Further Away Day to Waltham Abbey and river cruise
Sat 21 Sep 2024
On Saturday 21 September, Further Away Days are offering a River Lea cruise plus a visit to Waltham Abbey and its busy Saturday market. The coach will be leaving East […]
Cost: £54
Booking Required
Credit: Forest51690CWikimedia Commons
George Gershwin: Music in the heart of noise
Mon 14 Oct 2024
10:00am - 12:00pm
February 2024 marked the centenary of Rhapsody in Blue, the work that earned George Gershwin (1898–1937) the title of ‘the man who made an honest woman out of jazz’. In […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Mon 14 Oct 2024
10:30am - 1:00pm
Our Annual General Meeting will be held in person at St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, Victoria Avenue, London N3 1BD. Details and papers are circulated in advance to NLU3A members. […]
Credit: Simon Inglis/Historic England
Mon 11 Nov 2024
10:00am - 12:00pm
Sports and games have always been played in London. For the Tudors, it was tennis at Hampton Court and jousting at Whitehall. The Victorians established a network of sports clubs across the […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Previous events
© Museum of Domestic Design & Architecture, Middlesex University
From flocks to florals: An illustrated history of wallpaper
Mon 9 Sep 2024
10:00am - 12:00pm
Often dismissed as ephemera, wallpaper is in fact a crucial contributor to the history of design. The growth of the wallpaper industry encompasses fashion, taste, society, technology – and the […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Bayeux Tapestry Museum/Wikimedia Commons
The life and times of Edward the Confessor
Mon 8 Jul 2024
10:00am - 12:00pm
Born in around 1001, Edward the Confessor – England’s penultimate Anglo-Saxon king – also had French heritage: William the Conqueror was a cousin. In this talk, historian Eleanor Levy will […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Summer Tea Party to celebrate North London U3A’s 30th birthday
Mon 1 Jul 2024
2:30pm - 4:30pm
Members are invited to book their place at the NLU3A Summer Tea Party to be held from 2.30pm to 4.30pm at Muswell Hill Methodist Church, 28 Pages Lane, N10 1PP.The […]
Venue: Muswell Hill Methodist Church
Wikimedia Commons
Mon 10 Jun 2024
10:00am - 12:00pm
Anyone who has seen Fiddler on the Roof will have a vivid idea of the shtetl, where the story takes place. On the one hand, the shtetl is remembered sentimentally and with a nostalgic […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Credit: Len Williams/Wikimedia Commons
Mon 3 Jun 2024
9:30am
This Further Away Day outing is on Monday 3 June, when we will visit the Cliveden estate and Cookham village in Berkshire. We will travel by coach, leaving East Finchley […]
Cost: The cost for NLU3A members will be £26 for those who are also members of the National Trust, or £44.50 for those who are not NT members.
Booking Required
Polesden Lacey House and Gardens
Fri 24 May 2024
9:30am
Our planned Further Away Day trip to Polesden Lacey on 8 March unfortunately had to be cancelled at the last minute due to snow. We have now managed to re-book […]
Cost: £42.00 (U3A members)/£45.00 (non-U3A members) National Trust members pay less: £28.00 (U3A members)/£31.00 (non-U3A members)
Booking Required
Where do novelists get their ideas from?
Mon 13 May 2024
10:00am - 12:00pm
Have you ever wondered where fiction writers get their ideas from? In this entertaining and informative talk, Bobbie Darbyshire will explain how the complex world of character, location, plot and […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Mon 22 Apr 2024
On Monday 22 April we will be visiting the Wimpole Hall Estate in Cambridgeshire, a magnificent neo-classical mansion built in the 1640s. The house was remodelled several times in the […]
Photo Diana Clements
Beneath our feet: the geology of London
Mon 15 Apr 2024
10:00am - 12:00pm
We rarely stop to think about the rocks beneath the places where we live and walk, but the science of geology can tell fascinating stories about them – from the […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
National Portrait Gallery/Wikimedia Commons
The life and times of Samuel Pepys
Mon 11 Mar 2024
10:00am - 12:00pm
Samuel Pepys lived in turbulent times – witnessing the restoration of the monarchy, the Great Plague and the Great Fire of London. The lively and honest way in which he […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Alien life – what are the chances?
Mon 12 Feb 2024
10:00am
The concept of alien life, for many years relegated to the realms of Science Fiction, is now mainstream. Rovers on Mars are actively looking for biological signatures, over 5000 planets […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Public domain image (CC0)
Would you like to write your own life story?
Mon 8 Jan 2024
10:00am
Have you ever thought of writing about your life – whether for your children and grandchildren, your own interest, or for posterity – but don’t know where to start? The […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Mon 11 Dec 2023
12:00pm - 2:15pm
Bookings are now open for the popular Festive Lunch, which we are holding again this year for the first time since 2019. Please note change of venue from previous announcement. The menu […]
Venue: St Paul's Church, N3
Safe travels: passport technology and border security
Mon 13 Nov 2023
10:00am
We all want to get through the airport quickly and easily when we travel to another country, but we also expect the authorities to keep the country’s borders secure. So […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
‘Fish got to swim and birds got to fly’: the story of Show Boat
Mon 9 Oct 2023
10:00am
The 1927 musical ‘Show Boat’, with music by Jerome Kern and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, was based on Edna Ferber’s best-selling novel and covered social issues that were ground-breaking […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Mon 9 Oct 2023
10:00am
Our Annual General Meeting will be held in person at St Margaret’s United Reform Church, Victoria Avenue, London N3 1BD. Details and papers have been circulated in advance to NLU3A […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
How did computers get so powerful? (Repeat)
Mon 18 Sep 2023
10:00am
Today, IT is hugely useful – and perhaps even too powerful. However, most of the inventions critical to the success of the computer came about for quite different purposes and […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Mon 11 Sep 2023
10:00am - 11:30am
We will be holding our annual Open Morning on Monday 11 September from 10.00am to 11.30am at St Margaret’s Church, Victoria Avenue, Finchley N3 1BD. Many of the Interest Group Coordinators will […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Tue 1 Aug 2023
We will be visiting Saffron Walden and Audley End (which we last visited 10 years ago, as the very first Far Away Day outing!) Our first stop is at the […]
Cost: £30.00 NLU3A members, 33.00 non-members
Booking Required
Mon 17 Jul 2023
2:30pm - 4:30pm
Members are invited to book their place at the NLU3A Summer Tea Party to be held from 2.30pm to 4.30pm at Muswell Hill Methodist Church, 28 Pages Lane, N10 1PP.The […]
‘Lusty bastards’ or ‘Siamese twins’: some thoughts on semi-detached houses
Mon 10 Jul 2023
10:00am
Our suburban landscape is so full of semi-detached houses that we hardly ever think about how they came about, why there are so many, and the differences between them. This […]
Venue: St Margaret’s United Reformed Church, N3
Fri 30 Jun 2023
11:00am
Gunnersbury as a house and park goes back to the 17th century, and in the 18th century was occupied by Princess Amelia, with landscaping by William Kent. After Amelia’s death […]