Heartstopper Filming Locations: Herne Bay & Kent

Alice Oseman set Heartstopper in an unnamed English seaside town, and Netflix found it on the Kent coast. If you have watched Nick and Charlie walk along a pebbly beach with a Victorian pier behind them and wondered where that actually is, the answer is Herne Bay, about an hour and a half from London.

Contents

This is one of the easiest and cheapest film-location trips in the UK: a train from St Pancras, a walk along a seafront, and a fish and chip lunch. Here is where everything is, and the honest note about which locations you can and cannot get near.

Before You Go: How This Works

Getting there: Southeastern high-speed runs from London St Pancras to Herne Bay in about 90 minutes. It is a walkable town and you will not need a car.
Time needed: half a day for Herne Bay itself. A full day if you add Whitstable, which is four miles west and worth it.
The catch: the school buildings are the heart of the show and they are the one thing you cannot visit. More on that below.

The Herne Bay Locations

Herne Bay Seafront and Beach

Address: Central Parade, Herne Bay, Kent CT6 5JN.
The scene: the beach walks, the pebbles, and the seafront that gives the whole series its look.
Today: a proper English seaside town, unpretentious and completely free to enjoy. The beach is shingle rather than sand, so bring something to sit on.

Herne Bay Pier

Address: Central Parade, Herne Bay, Kent CT6 5JN.
The scene: the pier appears throughout, and it is the most photographed backdrop in the series.
Today: here is a piece of trivia that improves the visit. Herne Bay pier was once one of the longest in Britain, but a storm severed it. The old pier head is still out there, stranded in the sea, visible from the shore and unreachable. There is now a shortened pier at the land end. That marooned fragment on the horizon is genuinely striking and nobody photographs it.

Herne Bay Town Centre

Address: around Mortimer Street and the High Street, Herne Bay, Kent CT6.
The scene: the shops and streets the characters drift through between school and the beach.
Today: a small, ordinary high street, which is exactly the point. The show’s aesthetic is built on the fact that this is a normal town rather than a picturesque one.

The Schools: What You Can and Cannot See

Truham Grammar is not one building, it is three, and this trips people up constantly.

Truham interiors: Herne Bay High School, Bullockstone Road, Herne Bay, Kent CT6 7NS. A working secondary school. Do not visit. There is nothing to see from the road and turning up at a school to photograph it is not acceptable, however much you love the show.
Truham exteriors: the former E-ACT Burnham Park Academy in Buckinghamshire, which closed in 2019. Not in Kent at all, and not accessible.
Higgs School for Girls: Upton Court Grammar School in Slough. Also a working school, also not a visit.

We are being blunt about this because Heartstopper has a young audience and these are real schools with real pupils in them. The seafront is yours to enjoy. The schools are not.

Whitstable: The Obvious Add-On

Four miles west of Herne Bay and a short bus or train hop, Whitstable is the prettier of the two towns: working oyster harbour, coloured beach huts, weatherboard cottages, and a genuinely good food scene. Kent’s coastal towns supplied much of the series’ general seaside atmosphere, and Whitstable is the one you will actually want to spend an afternoon in.

Stay for sunset. Whitstable faces roughly northwest across the Thames Estuary, which is unusual for an English coastal town and gives it a spectacular evening light.

The Paris Episodes

The school trip to Paris comes in season two, and it is a proper location shoot rather than a studio fudge. The itinerary the characters follow is largely the classic one, and you can retrace it in a day:

The Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomphe, both unavoidable and both exactly as you would expect.
The Louvre, Rue de Rivoli, 75001.
Sacré-Cœur, 35 rue du Chevalier de la Barre, 75018, up in Montmartre.
Shakespeare and Company, 37 rue de la Bûcherie, 75005. The English-language bookshop opposite Notre-Dame, and the best of the deeper cuts.
Pont des Arts, the pedestrian bridge over the Seine between the Louvre and the Institut de France.

If you are doing the Paris leg, our Paris guide covers the Marais and the bars, and the Montmartre stops overlap almost exactly with our Amélie walking route, so the two combine into one very good day.

Heartstopper Filming Locations: Your Questions Answered

Where was Heartstopper filmed?

Mainly in Herne Bay on the Kent coast, with the seafront, pier and town centre used throughout. School interiors were shot at Herne Bay High School and exteriors at a closed academy in Buckinghamshire. Season two also filmed on location in Paris.

Can you visit the Heartstopper school?

No, and please do not try. The interior location is a working secondary school, the exterior is a closed and inaccessible site in another county, and Higgs is a working grammar school in Slough. The beach and pier are the locations to visit.

Is Heartstopper set in Herne Bay?

The town in the show is unnamed, but it is filmed in and looks exactly like Herne Bay. Alice Oseman is from Kent, which is why the setting rings so true.

How do you get to Herne Bay from London?

Southeastern trains from St Pancras International take about 90 minutes. The station is a short walk from the seafront and you will not need a car once you are there.

Which season is the Paris trip?

Season two. It was filmed on location and takes in the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, the Arc de Triomphe, Sacré-Cœur, Shakespeare and Company and the Pont des Arts.

Where to Stay

Most people do Herne Bay as a day trip from London and that works perfectly well. If you want to stay, Whitstable has far more character and better food, and it is a ten-minute train ride away. Canterbury is six miles south, has the cathedral and a proper night out, and makes the best base if you are turning this into a weekend in Kent.

More film trails from us: Ocean’s Twelve in Amsterdam, Ferris Bueller in Chicago and Home Alone in Winnetka.

🏳️‍🌈 About Cramberts

From our home base in Amsterdam, we frequently explore some of Europe’s most vibrant cities, and we’ve compiled detailed guides to share our insider knowledge. Whether you’re seeking the canals and culture of Amsterdam itself, the sunny beaches of Gran Canaria, the historic charm of Lisbon and Porto, the bustling energy of Barcelona and Madrid, the refined elegance of Paris and Munich, the unique character of Sitges, or the diverse landscapes of the Randstad region, you’ll find comprehensive information and recommendations in the links below.

_{Note: Some of these links are affiliates which means using them won’t cost you any extra but we do receive a small commission for each referral. You’re not obligated to use them but we appreciate it if you do. Thanks in advance for supporting our site if you choose to use our links.}