Phillibrook Stream - Leytonstone

Phillibrook Stream
The Phillibrook, or Fillebrook, comes through this area and flows south west

Post to the west Leyton
Post to the south Leytonstone
Post to the east Wanstead - Golf course and basin

A12
Section through Leytonstone opened in 1999 as the Hackney-M11 link road

Aylmer Road.
London City Mission. Building dates from 1885. It was later a clothing factory

Browning Road
This was Back Lane which went from the High Road to the Forest. Also known as Green Man Lane and in 1893 as Park Road. It became Browning Road in 1900
Cottages built by Lord Wellesley, probably in the 1840’s, to house the workforce which serviced local big houses.
24 North Star. Built as a 'beer house by Lord Wellesley. It was originally two cottages knocked together and first referred to in 1858. There was an off-sales serving hatch. It is either named after a famous steamship or famous train or a ship which an early landlord sailed on.
Henry Reynolds Gardens. This is a small park named after Alderman Harry Reynolds. The site was previously the Green Man Pond, a former gravel pit, later drained. The park was laid out in the 1960s with a sunken garden with central circular bed surrounded by circular paths. Planting includes shrubs and hedges, with Lombardy poplars.
Green Man Pond – adjacent to the pond was Ivy Bank – which was the home of the editor of the Boys' Own Paper as well as Bushwood and Tylney Houses

Bush Road
Mural. This is by the Green Man Roundabout. It shows a green man holding the sun and moon near a stone obelisk.

Bushwood
Vicarage. In 1894 St. John’s church decided to build a new Vicarage on the corner of Hartley Road on a new housing estate then being erected. It had nine bedrooms and no central heating and was sold to a Housing Trust. A new vicarage was built in the garden to the rear.

Church Lane
Leytonstone Station. Opened as a main line station in 1856. Between Leyton to the south and either Wanstead or Snaresbrook to the north and north east. The original station was opened by the Loughton Railway, a scheme fog the Eastern Co unties Railway, but no trace of this station remains. In 1888 the station was rebuilt to a design by Ashbee, the staggered platform removed and a subway included. In 1923 it became part of the London and North Eastern Railway. During the Second Wrold War there was a crush in the subway in a 1944 air raid. In 1947 was transferred to London Transport and became part of the electrified Central Line under the New Works scheme. This involved a complete reconstruction of the station and removal of a level crossing – with provision an underground booking office, subways under the line and an island platform.  It became for a while the junction of the electrified Epping branch. In 2001 murals were unveiled about the life of locally born Alfred Hitchcock to commemorate his centenary.
Goods Yard closed 1955 and now covered by the bus station. A stable block survived until reconfiguration in the 1990s.
St John the Baptist. This church of 1832 by Edward Blore replaced an older chapel of ease. It was partly financed by William Cotton of Wallwood House. The Chapel and burial ground were consecrated in 1833 and a parish assigned to it. With additions by Caroe Passmore in 1909-1, and further work undertaken Kay Pilsbury Architects, 2002-3. Stained glass window of Majesty by Clayton & Bell, 1935. In the tower is a Bellringers' Board and a clock of 1898. The church has had a band of bellringers from the time that the old six were hung in 1833 as is recorded on the peal board.
Churchyard.  This lost many graves in a Second World War bombing raid. There are information boards which describe the damage and casualties of the Second World War in Leytonstone while others are about the wild life. In the churchyard is the family grave of Thomas Fowell Buxton social reformer and anti-slavery campaigner
Library. Library and lecture hall originally above shops.  Built in 1934 by J. Ambrose Dartnall. It is set within a Neo-Georgian commercial frontage which also incorporated the municipal electricity showrooms. The library has a serious classical frontispiece and inside is an Art Deco period piece recently restored to its original austere design standards. There is a date plaque for 1934 and the borough crest on the High Road frontage
Independent Buildings – comer tower with a public clock. This was built for the local independent newspaper in 1934.  It replaced the Gaiety Cinema
Gaiety Cinema. This was a converted post office. It opened in 1913 with 400 seats. It had a stage and facilities and variety acts performed. It closed in 1928 and was demolished
Seascape House --- no sign of the sea here.
Bus station. This is divided into two with a section on either side of the station. Sculpture made of bricks with a circular seat representing a variety of buses, by Lodewyk Pretor. 1999

Colworth Road
St Andrew’s Church. The church covers a small parish on the edges of Epping Forest. The church was built 1887- 1893 to meet growing demand the site was given in 1875, and was intended for a church in memory of local resident and businessman, William Cotton. At first this was an iron church. The present church is by Arthur Bloomfield. The chancel was paid for by William Cotton’s children as a memorial to him. However the congregation were unable to pay for continued work and building stopped. The Church was very fashionable at first. There were day and evening classes, an amateur orchestra, gym, tennis and cricket club. An Arts & Crafts style Church Room was also built in 1904 by Henry Smart. This was burnt down in the 1960s. However, popularity declined and a decision was taken to close the church in 1967 but instead the Church Rooms were sold and replacement work had never been completed.

Connaught Road
Connaught School for Girls. This began as a primary school in 1932 before becoming a secondary school for girls in 1948.

Dyers Hall Road
Plant nursery site in the 18th. The road is built on land given by John Peck to fund four homes for widows of Dyers Company members who had lived in Bethnal Green.
Terraced houses were built along Dyers Hall Road from some time between 1895 and 1901.

Esther Road
Jubilee Works. Until 1981 this was N.Reder making radio equipment. Now housing

Forest View
The Crib –slum housing long since removed

Gainsborough Road
Road with its end cut off because of the Mway. It now loops round as a slip road crossing the Mway and the railway.
Church known as "The Tunnel" in the Second World War. This was the underground tunnel at Gainsborough Bridge Church where people sheltered from air raids.
City Blinds Factory in Gainsborough House
Tesco car park on the site of Gainsborough Lodge.

Grove Green Road

Vertigo & 491 Gallery. Used as arts and community space and named for the Hitchcock film. These buildings were abandoned having been used as storage space during Mway construction. It was previously a printing works bad housing. itchcHHi


Grove Road
Sculpture of a leaf-covered figure, by Stephen Duncan, 'Leaf Memory', 2001.

Hanbury Drive
Green Man Medical Centre

Hartley Road
44 A new smaller vicarage built in the garden of the older vicarage in 1979.

Harvey Road
2 Leytonstone and District Ex-Servicemen’s Club
39 Clara Cottage

John Drinkwater Close
John Drinkwater tower. This was built on the site of Bushwood House and Tylney Houses. It was a 22 storey block built in 1970. Since demolished

Kingswood Road
This is the northern end of what was Fillebrook Road before the Mway was built

Kirkdale Road
Board school.  Kirkdale Road board school opened in 1876 and had doubled in size by 1891.  It was condemned in 1929 and seniors and juniors were moved. It was partly rebuilt for infants in 1932 and the rest became education office. Damaged by a rocket in 1945 it moved elsewhere and eventually closed in 1948. The education offices remained but have since been closed and the site is now a car park.
Police Station opened 2007 on rail side land used as car parking.

Leyspring Road
Leyspring House.  This was a big house with a spring in the courtyard, standing in 33 acres of ground stretching between Browning Road and Bushwood.  It was burnt down. The house at one time belonged to the Charrington brewers

Leytonstone High Road
Part of the main highway from Epping to London which was used by distance coaches and market carts and wagons.
566 Lincolns. This pub was the Elms dating from 1870 and owned by Watneys. In 1986 it became The Lincoln and in 1996 Big Hand Mo’s. A Lincolns again in 2001 it lost its licence following a drugs raid. It is used an Indian restaurant
578 Methodist church. The church began in the Davis Lane home of Mary Fletcher who moved to Leytonstone from Hoxton in 1763. An iron Chapel was opened here in 1876 replaced in Brick in 1880. This was burnt down and the present Chapel was opened in 1972. At the back of the building is Lister Hall which is part of the old Church.
640 Red Lion. There was a pub here before 1670, called the Robin Hood. It was called the Red Lion by 1754 and owned by Truman’s from 1873.  It was rebuilt in 1891 and designed by W.D. Church with curly strap work decoration, stucco foliage panels above the windows and a lead corner turret. It was taken over by the Cannon Brewery, later Ind Coope.  It became a live music venue in the 1970s and hosted one of Led Zeppelin’s first London gigs.  Other bands which played there include Yes, Genesis and Roxy Music, and Atomic Rooster.  In the 1980s it was renamed Luthers and later Cuba Bella. In 2002 it became Zulu’s but has now reopened as the Red Lion.
674 this was the Two Brewers pub which closed in 1964.
689 Rex Cinema, this was opened by Associated British Cinemas in 1936 and designed by their in-house architect William R. Glen. It had a facade in white faience tiling, broken by six vertical columns. There was a decorative panel on the side wall of the proscenium side wall showing deer in a forest. It closed in 1960 and became an ABC Tenpin Bowling alley. This closed in 1972 and the building was demolished and is now the site of flats.
692 The Sheepwalk – this was the Crown Pub. A predecessor Crown was demolished in the 19th but had been associated with Charles II. Victorian clock in the bar.
694a, 696a, 698a Row of terraced houses hidden by shops which have been built on their gardens. They are probably 18th and can be seen from Aylmer road.
Bearman's Department Store. Closed 1984 and since demolished.
821 Rialto Cinema.  This opened in 1909 as a roller skating rink and in 1911 was converted into “The Rink Picture Palace” by P. Cornish. The High Road entrance was adjacent to Bearman’s Department Store and reached by a long arcade. It was taken over by Bernstein Theatres in 1926 and in 1926, was rebuilt by Cecil Masey and interior design by Theodore Komisarjevsky. It opened as the Rialto Cinema in 1927. It had stage facilities and an orchestra as well as a Compton theatre organ which had 2Manuals, rebuilt in 1931 to a 3Manual/8Ranks instrument. It was taken over by Denman/Gaumont Theatres Ltd. in 1928.  It was bombed in 1945. It was re-named Granada in 1967 and closed in 1974.  It was demolished and used as a car park for Bearmans Department Store. It then became the site of the Co-op site, which became a Matalan store. The organ is housed in St. Mary’s Church, Hornchurch, Essex.
822-837 Co-Op store. Department store which preceded Matalan who took over the building
Leytonstone House.  Built in 1800 for Thomas Fowell Buxton, the brewer, and the only survivor among the big 19th houses is Leytonstone House.  The house is now offices
Bethnal Green Industrial Schools. The Bethnal Green Board of Guardians had a policy of separating children under fifteen from their parents. In 1868, the Board bought Leytonstone House and its nine acres of grounds. Most of the outbuildings were demolished but the main house was kept an administrative centre. The schools opened in 1868, with accommodation in temporary iron buildings. By the 1880s brick buildings had been designed by A. & C. Harston. The original house became the matron's house and committee rooms and a passageway led kitchens and stores, then the dining-hall and then a swimming pool. To each side were the children's blocks, boys in the north and girls in the south, arranged as cottages. There was an infirmary and a two-storey school building. Workshops, a tailor's, shoemaker's, painter's and carpenter', were in a block to the north plus a bandroom.  In 1930, the site passed to the London County Council and continued as Leytonstone Children's Home until 1937.  It then became a hospital.
Leytonstone House Hospital. This opened in 1937 as an annexe to Darenth Park Hospital in Dartford.  Female patients were sent here to be trained for employment.  In 1948 it joined the NHS and became a branch of the South Ockendon Institution for Mental Defectives. It became their headquarters and also the main hall of the Hospital was used for recreation.  In 1950 Gardenia Ward and other wards were altered as 'treatment' moved away from domestic training to physical care and support.  Following problems at the hospital and the inauguration of a care in the community policy in 1983 the Area Health Authority announced the phased closure of Leytonstone House Hospital and The Hospital finally closed in May 1994.
Tesco In 1991 Tesco acquired the site containing Leytonstone House and the school buildings in order to build a major store – the hall of the industrial schools, with good timber roof, is now the chemist's shop. Other buildings have been converted to terrace housing. A cedar tree remains in the car park.
857 The Walnut Tree. Wetherspoon's pub
871 Sycamore House. This stood near the Green Man and belonged to Quaker, Arthur Lister – brother to Lord Lister, the surgeon. It was also home of mycologist Gulielma Lister, his daughter. It was demolished in the 1950s.
879 Welsh Church Hall. Used by the Woodhouse Players and other community groups.
881 Moreia Welsh Church. The building dates from 1958 when a group of Welsh Presbyterians moved here from the Moreia Church in Walthamstow. They were joined by The Reformed Baptists in 1979. Set back from the road, in brick designed by T. & H. Llewelyn DanielI. Inside is stained glass by Howard Martin of Celtic Studios, showing Welsh mission and preachers. It has simple wooden furnishings.  .
The Green Man. Establishments with this name have stood at the edge of the forest that since 1668. The earliest known inn was nearer to the Browning Road junction than either its successors, however. In the late 17th and 18th it was a refuge of highwaymen- and was reputedly only 40 yards from the Inn where Dick Turpin stole the racehorse "White stockings" from Joseph Major in 1737. The present building has Ipswich windows along a front and was built in 1927. The name has been changed to O’Neills.

Mohmmad Khan Road
This was previously Dacre Road
Leytonstone Mosque.  This is the old Elliott Rooms which belonged to St. Johns church changed with an entrance below. Islamic arch; minaret and gilded dome. The Rooms originated when Mrs Elliott, offered to build a spacious church room and it was opened in 1886, with a dinner given to the poor of the parish. They were sold in 1975 because of the cost of upkeep

Vernon Road
George Tomlinson Primary School

Wadley Road
Ripley Mews
Temple Close. Site of sweet factory for Bonds of London, making barley sugar cubes and Brazil nut toffee. Site is now housing

Wallwood Road
This refers to the 'wall' - Roman remains discovered here in the 18th close to the course of the Roman Road and near the Forest
Corbiucum – Close the name of which refers to a medieval park in the area.

Whipps Cross Road
The North Circular was originally to link the Green Man at Leytonstone with Hangar Lane

Sources
Browning Road Conservation area leaflet
Cinema Treasures web site
Closed Pubs web site
Day. London Underground
Leyton History web site
London Gardens web site
London Railway Record
Lost Hospitals of London web site
Pevsner and Cherry. London East
St Andrew Leytonstone web site
St.John’s Church web site
Vestiges
Victoria County History. Essex
Wikipedia Leytonstone Station web site
Workhouses web site

Comments

Get Callaghan said…
I used to live on Hainault Road.
Get Callaghan said…
I used to live on Hainault Road. One of my neighbours claimed that Sir James Hawkey aka Hawkey Hall lived there too.
Giles said…
566 Lincolns.

I don't believe this was ever used as an Indian restaurant. However when it was scheduled to be demolished the front was repainted and a sign added so that it could be used as a TV set depicting an indian restaurant "The Taj".

It is currently being demolished and will presumably make way for flats. A sad end to a historic inn. Colour it blue.

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