Queen's Gate School

If your daughter does her best when she's treated as an individual rather than a number, Queen's Gate sets out to be exactly that kind of school. Its ethos rests on the belief that every child is her own person, and it works to create an atmosphere where freedom of thought and ideas can develop. Pupils are placed at the heart of decisions and report feeling valued and safe, with strong pastoral care and an ambitious, varied curriculum behind them. It is a smaller, less regimented setting than many, and that is part of the point.

The school sits in the heart of South Kensington, a few minutes from the museums of Exhibition Road, across a cluster of townhouses on Queen's Gate. Eleanor Beatrice Wyatt founded it in 1891, a young schoolmistress who started it in her parents' home and grew it into one of the early independent schools for girls. Today it teaches girls from 4 to 18. The location is a real gift, with the city's museums, concert halls and galleries close at hand and woven into school life. One unusual touch: there is no prescribed uniform, though girls follow a clear dress code.

Queen's Gate suits a girl who will respond to being known and trusted, who enjoys a smaller school in the middle of London, and whose parents value independent thinking and close attention over a more uniform institutional feel. For a family drawn to a long-established central London girls' school with the cultural riches of South Kensington on the doorstep, it is worth visiting to see whether the atmosphere fits their daughter.