London with a 12-year-old: suggestions?

[SammyTheDog]

Hi everyone. Heading to London with husband and 12-year-old daughter. Staying in Marble Arch area for 3/4 days. Looking for recommendations for tourist attractions to see, given we've only three full days. Thinking London Eye and The Shard? Anywhere else unmissable, which dd would like? Also where to go shopping? Would really appreciate any suggestions. Thanks!

Would she like the Harry Potter studio tour? Not central London, but easy enough to get a train out to Watford. We're going next month and having a day at Harry Potter and a day in London itself, DD really wants to go to the M&Ms world shop, we will probably go to Hamleys for a look too and maybe do one of those open top bus tours to take in a few of the sights, if the weather is decent.

It depends what your daughter is normally into
The dungeons are really fun for that age- but not if she is very easily scared
Camden markets are good, for the stalls and the food is great there- but probably not if she doesn't like crowds
Same for Covent garden

For shopping it depends what type of 12 year old she is. A combination of what I was like at 12 plus my 14 year old daughter a perfect day in central London would be Lego Store and M+M Store in Leicester Square, Forbidden Planet Store on Shaftesbury Avenue, either the big Waterstones on Piccadilly or Foyles on Charing Cross Rd and the Primark on Tottenham Court Rd.
Hamleys isn't much fun. It's chaotic and overcrowded.
If she is a more into fashion 12 year old then I can't really help you there.

Depends on interests but possible options are:

walk along Southbank, pop into Tate Modern, lots of cafes etc along there and sometimes street entertainers. (Waterloo or London Bridge or Blackfriars tube)

Covent Garden can be a good shopping option as there are clothes shops as well as markets, quirky shops, street entertainers etc

Further afield Greenwich is good fun - observatory/planetarium or Cutty Sark. Also the market, park, boating lake etc. Can get one of the river boats to there from Embankment pier.

And a mooch around Fortnum & Mason and Burlington Arcade for some old fashioned glamour.