Talkaoke is a pop-up talk show unlike anything else – a glowing round table, a host in the middle, and people sitting around the outside edge. It’s up to you to decide on the direction of the chat: grab the mic and take the conversation somewhere nobody expected. It can get funny, philosophical, political, surreal or all of the above. Every voice matters. Every idea is welcome. You are welcome to join our glowing ‘doughnut of chat’ for 5 mins or longer, you can listen or take the mic and offer a new subject.

This is our third year bringing Talkaoke to Emma Cons Gardens, named for the Victorian social reformer who fought for affordable housing, education, and joyful, respectable entertainment for London’s working class – and who founded the Old Vic across the street.

This time, we’re time-travelling. Guests arrive and first raid the hat box: bonnets, top hats, flat caps… to get properly Victorian before they sit down. Then we open the envelopes. Inside are alleged statements attributed to Emma Cons herself, drawn at random and read aloud around the table. Together, we unpick what each one might mean today, and what it has to do with the ground we’re sitting on.

One envelope might read: “Wealthy people have a duty to help the working class.” So… whose job is that now? Are there millionaires in Waterloo today? Working-class people? And could it ever run the other way – working people helping millionaires with something?

Part séance, part talk show, part local history tour. Come as you are, leave in a bonnet (accessories not included)

Photo in the background: 1911, London flower sellers near Waterloo station. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)