Just a short walk from Hampstead High Street, there is a place quite unlike anywhere else in London. The Well Walk Theatre is a 50-seat independent theatre, bookshop and café and for those who know it, something of a little French corner of North London.
Inspired by the legendary Théâtre Robert-Houdin in Paris, the Well Walk Theatre has made French culture central to its identity from the very beginning. Come for a show and you will find a bookshop stocked with carefully chosen titles and a café serving homemade French bistro food: the kind of honest, generous cooking that feels comme à la maison. Quiches, pâtisseries, tarts and more. The smell of something good just out of the oven!
This summer, the theatre presents Petit Pierre from Paris: a hand-puppet show rooted in the great French guignol tradition, created and performed entirely by Zina Drouche. Petit Pierre is a Parisian grocer with grand ambitions. He has set off for London with a single, important mission: to deliver a Normandy Camembert cheese to the King. Things do not go smoothly. What follows is funny, tender and packed with the kind of detail that keeps adults just as riveted as the three-year-olds — the rare show that genuinely works for everyone in the room.
Petit Pierre from Paris is already the show that has put The Well Walk Theatre on the map for families across north London.
For French and francophone families in particular, it offers something truly special: theatre rooted in a tradition you grew up with, performed with real craft, in an intimate 50-seat house, steps from the Heath — with a bookshop to browse and a proper French café waiting on the other side.
Pour les petits et les grands. No age required. Just a willingness to be delighted.
📅 Every Saturday and Sunday at 11am and 3pm, from 13th June until 12th July 2026
📍 The Well Walk Theatre · 49 Willow Road, Hampstead, London NW3 1TS
🎟️ Book at wellwalktheatre.com
