Woolf 2025

Travel

Getting here 

Important information for international travellers:

If you are travelling from overseas, please note that there is a new requirement for an Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) for many international visitors to the UK, including those from the USA. To apply for an ETA or Visa to travel to the UK please see the UK government website.

If you are travelling by train, we’d recommend checking the National Rail website’s Status and Disruptions page for any planned/anticipated disruptions, per rail provider (the most relevant for London-Brighton travel are Southern and Gatwick Express). You can use their Journey Planner to check specific routes for issues.

To help you understand where the conference’s various sites and activities are located, we have created a Google Map – see the end of this page.

Getting to King’s College London

If you are attending the pre-conference events at King’s College London, please note that you will need to make your own way to KCL’s Strand campus (see these webpages for guidance on finding the campus via train, tube, bus or car).

Getting from King’s to Brighton / Falmer

The pre-arranged coaches from KCL to Sussex are now fully booked. These will depart at 20:00 from the bus stop right outside the main entrance to King’s College on The Strand (The Strand Building). Their first drop-off will be the Fleet Street Bus Stop in Brighton (near Brighton railway station), followed by a second drop-off in the Science Car Park 1 on the University of Sussex Falmer Campus (near Bodiam/East Slope residences).  

Alternatively, there will be plenty of delegates taking the train from London down to Brighton, and travelling onward to the University of Sussex campus in Falmer. There are different routes that you can take. We recommend either:

  • The District and Circle line on the London Underground from Temple to London Victoria (c. 10 minutes; or a taxi)
  • Train from London Victoria to Brighton (under 1 hour)
  • Train from Brighton to Falmer (under 10 minutes), or a taxi from the taxi rank at the rear of the station.
  • Walk to the campus accommodation check-in at Bodiam in the East Slope Residences (see campus map and East Slope accommodation map)

Or:

  • Walk or take a taxi to Blackfriars (c. 15 minutes)
  • Train from Blackfriars to Brighton (c. 1 hour)
  • Train from Brighton to Falmer (under 10 minutes; or a taxi from the taxi rank outside the station)
  • Walk to the campus accommodation check-in at Bodiam in the East Slope Residences (see campus map and East Slope accommodation map)

See National Rail Enquiries to plan your train journeys. Advance tickets can be purchased up to 12 weeks in advance (no sooner), but pre-booking is not necessary – tickets can be purchased on the day, either at the station or using a ticket app like Trainline.

For help with transport in and around London, see the Transport for London website.  

Getting from Brighton to Falmer campus

For information about how to get to the University of Sussex (Falmer), please see here.  For delegates arriving in the UK by air, Gatwick Airport is the most convenient for onward travel to Brighton (approx. 30 minutes’ train or 40 minutes’ taxi).

Trains from Brighton to Falmer take 10 minutes, and run approx. three times per hour – see National Rail.

Buses between Brighton city centre and Falmer campus (25 / 25X) take approx. 20-30 minutes (depending on traffic), and run approx. every 10 minutes – see Brighton & Hove Buses.

Parking. If you are driving to the University of Sussex and will need to park on campus between Thurs 3rd and Wed 9th July, please indicate this at registration and register for event parking using this booking link. The closest car park to the main conference building (Jubilee) is Car Park 7 (multi-storey) – see campus map. Those staying on campus will also be able to book parking during with the accommodation reception team during check-in.

Getting around Sussex

While there are good train and bus networks (see links above) between Sussex’s main towns and cities, some places are harder to reach with public transport.

Uber operates in Brighton, but you may also wish to arrange a taxi, e.g. from one of the following local taxi companies:

NB. You may need to replace the first 0 with area code +44 or 0044, when using an international phone in the UK.

Conference activity map 

Get ready to travel one of Virginia Woolf’s regular train journeys (Brighton-London), and get your bearings ahead of the conference’s core and optional activities.

How to use: Click the ‘slider’ icon in the top-left corner of the map for location names, or the ‘expander’ icon in the top-right corner for a larger view.

Suzanne Bellamy Travel Fund 

The Suzanne Bellamy Travel Fund, established by the IVWS members in 2022, supports the travel of IVWS members to the Annual International Conference on Virginia Woolf: an affiliated but independent event that the IVWS has supported since 1991. Each year, the IVWS will match up to $1500.00 in donations to the fund, which it hopes will grow well beyond the $3000.00 goal we project. The fund is named in honour of Suzanne Bellamy (1948–2022), an artist and Woolf scholar, who passed away on June 21st, 2022—a little over a week after the 2022 Annual Conference on Virginia Woolf. 

Please find details about the fund here.

Applications closed February 28th, 2025.