Lycee Francais Charles de Gaulle

The Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle — known simply as "the Lycée" or "the French Lycée" — is the largest French-language school in the United Kingdom, educating approximately 3,450 pupils aged 3-19 across its main campus in South Kensington and three London primary feeder sites (Marie d'Orliac in Fulham, André Malraux in Ealing and Wix School in Clapham). The school was founded in 1915 to serve French families in London and is today managed by the Agence pour l'enseignement français à l'étranger (AEFE), the agency of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs that runs the worldwide network of French state schools abroad. Its curriculum is accredited by the French National Ministry of Education.

The school is genuinely bicultural. Most pupils follow the full French national curriculum, sitting the Brevet des collèges at 15 and the Baccalauréat at 18. Alongside this runs a parallel "British Section" for English-speaking pupils in secondary classes, who prepare for IGCSEs and A-Levels and progress to UK universities. This dual offering is unusual: very few schools anywhere allow families to choose between the Baccalauréat and A-Levels under one roof, and the Lycée is the principal route into Oxbridge and the Russell Group for London's Francophone community while remaining a top feeder for Sciences Po, ENS, Polytechnique and HEC.

The main campus sits on Cromwell Road, directly opposite the Natural History Museum and Imperial College — geographic shorthand for the school's academic ambitions. The current Head (Proviseure) is Catherine Bellus-Ferreira. Because the school is part of the French state network, tuition is comparatively modest by London independent standards, and the social mix is broader than at the South Kensington fee-paying day schools.

The Lycée's alumni reflect its bicultural character. From cinema: Jacqueline Bisset (Bullitt), Natasha Richardson (Cabaret on Broadway), the Oscar-nominated director Roland Joffé (The Killing Fields), Frances de la Tour (Harry Potter, Rising Damp) and Oliver Jackson-Cohen (The Haunting of Hill House). From the arts: Paloma Picasso, the designer and daughter of Pablo Picasso; Sir Quentin Blake, the illustrator of Roald Dahl's books, who was also formerly an English teacher at the Lycée. From public life: Dominic Grieve, former Attorney-General; Gyles Brandreth, broadcaster and former MP; and Dame Vivien Duffield, the philanthropist. From science: the CERN physicist Gavin Salam FRS and the molecular biophysicist Marius Clore FRS at the US National Institutes of Health.