Great Eastern Railway to Chingford. Hackney Downs
Great Eastern Railway to Chingford
The Great Eastern line to Chingford running north from Hackney Downs station and having diverged from the line to Enfield continues northwards
Post to the south Hackney
Post to the north Upper Clapton
Marks a spring there at the Hackney Downs end
Amhurst Road
90 Pembury Tavern. This pub was built in 1866 - with an address of Medina Terrace, Dalston Lane. In the 1990s it closed and re-opened in 2006. This very handsome building is now owned by Individual Pubs, with a tie in to Milton Brewery. They take bitcoins.
Apsland and Marcon Estates Community hall
Lower Clapton Congregational Church, Hall and School. This was a new church built in 1864 in Kentish rag stone. Replaced by shops and flats after the church closed in 1951
Many distinctive blocks of workers flats
Samuel Lewis Trust Estate. By Joseph of 1931-2, extended 1934 and 1937-8. The last pan, with curved balconies, glazed 1969, was built as and 'all-electric' block of 40 flats. Traditional brick detail
Log's Downs Estate. Traditional brick detail LCC
Evelyn Court. Built 1934 for the Four Per Cent Industrial Dwellings Company and innovative for its date. Ten austere, five storey, blocks by Burnet, Tait & Lorne, blocks with staircase access, laid out in rows, built of standardized reinforced concrete to save money, and said to be the first box-framed structures to use reinforced concrete in Britain. Repetitive steel frame design. The walls, now pastel-coloured, were originally painted white, with green stair-towers. Lorne was a Council member of the Council for Research on Housing Construction.
Hackney Fire Station and Lower Clapton Church
1-17 Gibbons matching art deco shop fronts. Worth a glance. Gone
Community College. Previously Hackney Institution. Founded as the North East London Institute in the late c19; enlarged by the LCC in 1925. From this time, the front building, quietly dignified, with restrained detail of an Arts and Crafts kind; tiled quoins, large arched windows to the main
Aveley Road?
Artisan dwellings London County Council 1937/8.
Bodney Road
1 Bodney Road Joinery. In the 1930s this was a branch office for the British Union of Fascists.
2 this site was bought for a fire station in 1912. The building has now been converted to flats. At the rear is a Caretakers lodge or wardens house. In the Second World War this was the American Ambulance Station
58 Palestine House site of the Operative Jewish Converts' Institution. Demolished and now under part of the housing estate.
Brett Road
Brett Manor. A small block of maisonettes by Edward Mills built in 1946 by Manor Charitable Trustees to provide affordable housing for ex-servicemen and older members of the Eton Manor Boys' Club and their war widows. This was the first reinforced concrete, box frame building to be completed in London and it was designed in conjunction with Ove Arup and Partners. The building has nine flats – eight maisonettes and a roof penthouse with roof garden. Built on the site of Manor Assembly Rooms, later a cinema and a club
Temple Works. Offices and flats on what was a construction firm site
Brett Road Mission. In the 1950s this became a Government Office. In the 1950s this was Curtis Wipers, making adjustable windscreen wipers.
Cecelia Road
Was Norfolk Road. Hackney West Recreation Ground run by Hackney District Board
Clapton Road
Was called Hackney Lane all the way to Stamford Hill
Clapton
Name recorded in 1339 as ‘Clopton’ meaning ‘farmstead on a hill’. This was a rural area, which gradually became a commuter suburb.
Clapton and Stamford Hill more than any other part of Hackney keeps memories of its prosperity, despite the fact that its relatively open areas took some of Hackney Council's major housing efforts. There is still plenty of green relief in and around the curving main artery, of Clapton Common, and then Lower Clapton Road, although the old spacious low houses and tall trees have largely gone
Path to Temple Mills via Millfield.
Roman sarcophagus
Forecourt Wall to Pond House. Early 19th Listed Grade II but at one time considered to be at risk.
Stables. Early 19th. Listed Grade II but at one time considered to be at risk.
Ponds. There are some mysterious remarks about the pond itself! The original Hackney Water Works is said to have used wooden pipes to a reservoir in Clapton. Clapton ponds are, apparently, Tudor. There were two plots in the centre of the High Road opposite the chapel and in line with the pond which had on them U shaped pipes of the East London Waterworks - that was ‘Opposite Clapton ponds’. Was that the mysterious reservoir?
Clarence Mews
40 studio space and house, designed by architect Ed Frith of Moving Architecture. A double height glazed wall provides natural light and there is a private courtyard garden. The site was the garden of a Georgian house until the 1960s, but was used most recently as a mechanic’s yard. The house includes square dance studio and on the ground floor a design studio and family living spaces.
Clarence Mews Mixed Developments. This incorporates flats, a house, workshops and studios. There is a secure front entrance overlooking the street, while the rear elevation faces onto private gardens.
48 19th brick warehouse standing near the corner with Clarence Place. This is now housing
Clarence Place
1a the Episcopalian Church of Archangel Michael. In 1975, Beatrice Butler started a mission in her home. From 1987 Beatrice encouraged her son Matthew to be came the leader.When her brother in law, Bishop Austin McDowell, visited from St Vincent and the Grenadines, he ordained Matthew and Beatrice and Matthew was later consecrated as Bishop. In 2001 The Episcopalian Church of Archangel Michael diocese was established.
Clarence Road
This was originally called Back Lane
78 Duke of Clarence Pub. First recorded in 1851 this pub closed during the 1990s and is now flats.
51a Hackney Church of England Grammar school. This school was functioning by 1829 and had connection with King's College, London. The building was on the west side of the road and had been designed by William MacIntosh Brookes. In 1888s its debts were cleared and it became known as King's College or Hackney Collegiate School until 1895. It was then used as a mineral water factory and beer bottling plant. the buildings were demolished in 1903. The site is now part of the Pembury Estate
Conistone Walk?
Side of Homerton Hospital length of wall survives from Hackney College
Dalston Lane
A busy route connecting Dalston to central Hackney, with scattered remnants of c18 and earlier C19 terraces and villas. An industrial area developed in the c19.
236 Academy Apartments. This is in the buildings of what was Hackney Community College. The college dates back to 1790 when an institution for 30 boys opened in Shacklewell, which moved in 1803 to Dalston Lane and were joined by a girls department in 1810. By 1819 it was known as the Hackney School of Industry and financed through donations and the sale of sermons. A new building on the corner with Amhurst Road was erected by James Edmeston in 1837. This was later acquired by the North-East London Institute. Which was a school of music, science, and art based at 236 and 238 Dalston Lane. This was taken over in 1897 as a central site for Hackney Institute becoming its northern branch and as such transferred to the London County Council in 1909 and amalgamated with other relevant institutions in the area. The buildings were enlarged by the London County Council in 1925 and the building dates from this time with with restrained detail of an Arts and Crafts kind. In 1928 it was the London County Council's Hackney Technical Institute and in 1947 Hackney technical college. In due course it became administered by the Inner London Education Authority. In 1974 after further amalgamations it became part of Hackney College. The administrative headquarters were moved away from here in 1974. . When the Inner London Education Authority was abolished it was run by, by Hackney Council, when it was again renamed. It later became an independent institution, mainly funded through public funds. For a few years it was known as The Community College but then reverted to Hackney Community College. Since then this site has been sold off for housing
Printing works
Downs Park Road
Laid out quickly before an anti enclosure movement could start on the
Hackney Downs School. A Gothic lodge and diapered brick boundary wall remain from the school built by the Grocers' Company in 1875-6 by Theophilus Allen. Routine LCC exposed concrete and brick ranges, 1965-70, around the site of the main building, burnt down in 1963. Closed in the 1990s.
Roman pottery
New Testament Church of God. 1876 Presbyterians. Built in 1876 for the Presbyterians, who moved here from the iron chapel in Shrubland Road. Picturesquely composed, in a good corner position. Rough random ragstone, Decorated tracery. Projecting tower-porch with angled pinnacles
Downs Road
Laid out quickly before an anti enclosure movement could start on the Downs
Wooden post box
Downsview School 1969 by ILEA: concrete blockwork with awkward red brick trim and some curved windows. Appears to have gone and to be part of the Tiger Way complex.
Goodwyn London brewer. Boulton and watt engine 1783
Downs Road Methodist Church 1870 Charles Bell. Flat gabled ragstone street front with coarse Decorated tracery
The Beckers, another Hackney estate by Frederick Gibberd, planned in 1956. This has buildings of contrasting heights in the manner of the LCC, but different from them in style. Plain lower ranges with blue spandrel panels and shallow pitched roofs, simpler than Gibberd's work elsewhere. Two eleven- storey point blocks with livelier elevations: glass balconies, curved tops to the lift towers. They show the move away from the prettiness often years earlier towards a tougher urban image.
Gould Terrace
Goulton Road
Hackney Downs
Hackney was still largely rural in character up to the beginning of the 19th century. Hackney Downs are referred to as lands called the ‘Downe’ 1550 and were the home of William atte Doune 1302, that is ‘William living at the down or hill', from Middle English ‘atte’ and ‘doun’. An amorphous area between Shacklewell and Lower Clapton, largely rebuilt with housing estates between the 1930s and the 1960s. This route follows a roughly chronological tour of styles from the 1930s to the 1960s, starting at Hackney Downs station and ending with the chief asset, Hackney Downs, common land, preserved from the 1860s as open space, an early success of the Commons Preservation Society. Managed by LCC. Enclosure. Managed by Hackney District Board. Flint finds, Roman pottery in Downs Park Road.
Hackney Brook, quite a big stream pre-New River Barton, Source in Clissold Park lakes, West of Downs was a spring, two memorial fountains instead Willard & Young
Grocers School playground used to be part of Downs.
Great Eastern Railway down one side. Railway line marks the line of the Hackney Brook
Lammas lands higher than any spot as near to the City. Now commons area, 40 acres
Included the playground of the Grocers Co School to the south. Much aggravation at attempts to enclose it. Much detail gory of battle between Celtic invaders and the Romans. Battle of Clapton. Editor says its fiction. Flint finds.
Hackney Downs Station. 1872. Between Rectory Road and London Fields on One Railway. Built by the Great Eastern Railway on the London side of the line from Coppermills Junction. Rebuilt 1980 in crisp red brick all funded by Urban Aid. Some Great Eastern canopies remain.
Signal box. An early example of a power box 1960. H.H. Powell, Regional Architect, Eastern Region, with forceful far-projecting top fascia above a fully glazed control area.
Hindry Road
Institute Place
.
Kenmure Road
Manor Assembly Rooms. These were licenced from 1849 and lay behind Tyssen's Manor House in Mare Street. They could be rrached by a covered way from Mare Street and were later used by Hackney Literary and Scientific Institution. In 1877 they included a concert hall and a skating rink. They were demolished by 1894 and were by the Manor Feature Film Theatre
18 The Manor Feature Film Theatre opened in 1909 in what had been the Manor Assembly Rooms. It operated until at least 1915. The site is n . Initially run by Inner London Education Authority (ILEA) and, following that, by Hackney Council, when it was renamedow the Brett Manor flats.
Kenmure Yard
Landfield Estate
Built by the LCC in the late 1950s on the site of ‘navvies island’, which Lord Amhurst wanted to upgrade.
Lower Clapton Road
Bishop Woods’ Almshouses. These were built in 1665 under the will of Thomas Wood, the Bishop of Lichfield who came from Hackney. The almshouses provided for 10 widows over 60 years old and Wood also provided for a twice-weekly chaplain.. The six almshouses were restored in 1888 and again in 1930; they were requisitioned in the Second World War and re-opened in 1948. The buildings are in a semi circle around a courtyard behind a brick wall and railings. The single storey cottages contain some 17th brickwork but most of the fabric today is from the late 19th. From the early 20th the charity has been administered by Dr.Spurstowe’s Charity. The charity now finds that the cost of renovation is too great and is looking to sell the cottages and the site and rebuild elsewhere. Chapel. a small Gothic chapel was added to the almshouses during restoration. It seats 10 people and may be Britain's smallest chapel
158-160 a pair of early 19th houses form the remaining part of what was once St James’ Terrace. The Terrace was built about 1825 as four properties, but could be a re-facing of a late 18th group. It was partially demolished in the 1870s as part of the building of Mildenhall Road.
153 The Mothers' Hospital of the Salvation Army. In 1889 the Salvation Army opened a rescue and maternity home in Mare Street but by the beginning of the 20th the accommodation was inadequate and the Salvation Army bought an acre site here to build a maternity hospital for unmarried mothers. The foundation stone was laid in 1912 by Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll. The Hospital's consisted of six semi-detached houses built in 1824. They were linked by two arches leading to the ward buildings which were in the gardens of the houses. The central house had a sign saying 'The Salvation Army: The Mothers' Hospital' Each ward block ha a delivery room, three wards, a kitchen and bathroom and a portrait of General Booth and his wife. Between the buildings there were gardens, with trees, shrubs and flowerbeds. One bungalow was for unmarried mothers, another for poor married women, another for special cases and the other for Jewish mothers. During the Great War the hospital cared for large numbers of widowed pregnant women who were subsequently destitute. After the war all mothers, married or not, were admitted. In 1934 an out-patients department was opened and in 1937 isolation block. During the Second World War, the hospital was evacuated to Derbyshire but some patients stayed in London. An air-raid shelter was built and the walls of the wards were strengthened with steel girders and blast walls erected. Patients were kept active so they could get to the shelters and this turned out to be good for them. Patients always spent the night in the shelter with their babies. In 1940 the Hospital received a direct hit and two of the ward blocks destroyed. The Hospital became part of the NHS in 1948. Salvation Army members were still on the staff, and this relationship continued. All services moved to a new unit at the newly opened Homerton Hospital in 1986 and the buildings were demolished and replaced by a housing complex - Mothers' Square. The white archway leading through to Mothers' Square remains. A plaque confirms an architectural award for Mothers' Square, and another shows its opening by Prince Charles.
179 British Asylum for Deaf and Dumb Females. This was in an early 18th house probably built for James Coram, a timber merchant. He sold it to Markham Eeles, a china merchant, who substantially rebuilt it and added entrance gates. The Asylum moved here in 1864. It had been established in 1851 when following an incident the plight of deaf and dumb women came to the attention of a Mr. and Mrs. Sutton and so they got together a committee of ladies and gentlemen, a secretary was appointed, and the asylum was opened. It was bought by the Council in 1932 who demolished it. The asylum appears to have survived in other premises into the 1980s.
Byland House. This stood on the west side of Clapton Ponds. It served as a vicarage for the second and third incumbents of St James’ Church. It was sold to the Council in 1932 and demolished for the Powell Estate.
Powell Estate. This replaced the Deaf and Dumb Asylum and other houses. It was replaced itself in the 1970s
211 The Fountain. This pub has been on the site since 1814. It closed in 2006 and is now housing.
144-146 The British United Shoe Machinery Company Ltd ., which moved its warehouse and servicing depot from Bethnal Green Road to Hackney in 1956. They were a very large manufacturing company – said to be the world’s largest supplier of footwear manufacturing equipment and based in Leicester
Clapton Ponds. This is now two small garden enclosures divided by Newick Road. Clapton Pond South. This has a bridged pond probably dug in the 17th or earlier. From 1707/9 it was a water supply reservoir the with water being brought here via wooden conduits from a waterworks at Jeremy's Ferry. plots in High Road aligned with the almshouse chapel held the U shaped pipes of the East London Waterworks. After a period of neglect the pond was restored as a reservoir in 1760 and continued to supply water to the area until 1833 when the Hackney's water supply was re-routed making it redundant as a reservoir. Hackney District Board took it over in 1898 for a public garden. It was re-landscaped in 1977-79 keeping the bridge and trees and replanting shrubs.
Methodist Chapel. This was a Wesleyan chapel which stood on the west side of the road a block north of the corner with Downs Road. It was in ragstone with a tall spire. It closed in 1934 and was replaced by a church in the Sunday School in Downs Road to the rear, and was later demolished.
179 British Asylum for Deaf and Dumb Females. This was in an early 18th house probably built for James Coram, a timber merchant. He sold it to Markham Eeles, a china merchant, who substantially rebuilt it and added entrance gates. The Asylum moved here in 1864. It had been established in 1851 when following an incident the plight of deaf and dumb women came to the attention of a Mr. and Mrs. Sutton and so they got together a committee of ladies and gentlemen, a secretary was appointed, and the asylum was opened. It was bought by the Council in 1932 who demolished it. The asylum appears to have survived in other premises into the 1980s.
211 The Fountain. This pub has been on the site since 1814. It closed in 2006 and is now housing.
144-146 The British United Shoe Machinery Company Ltd ., which moved its warehouse and servicing depot from Bethnal Green Road to Hackney in 1956. They were a very large manufacturing company – said to be the world’s largest supplier of footwear manufacturing equipment and based in Leicester
143 a c18 three-bay brick front with pretty open-pedimented door case on a house of older origin. Surviving timbers suggest a mid-c16 to c.17 date. Extended and remodelled probably c. 1814.
162 Pond House. A villa of 1800, with semi- circular Doric porch, a basement and tripartite ground-floor windows. Gate piers, decorated with a Greek key pattern. Two storey three bay house substantial chimney stacks. The entrance is below a semi-circular porch supported. The rear visible from Mildenhall Road, is built from brown brick, with a large semi-circular bay. There is an inappropriate rear extension and two modern garages facing Mildenhall Road. There are perimeter walls with stables and inside is an elegant curved staircase. It was built for Benjamin Walsh, a stockbroker, soon after 1800 and it is said that in the early 19th it was the home of the Chair of East London Water Works, Samuel Preston. From the 1880s until 1904 it was a school and then a clothing factory. From 1939 to 2001 it was occupied an ex servicemen’s club, Hackney Volunteers. It is now into flats.
Hackney House was east of the road with its estate going back as far as Millfields. 1727 built for Stamp Brooksbank governor of the Bank of England. Designed by Colen Campbell. Bought for the new college in 1786. Demolished c.1799
Mare Street
Called Church Street between Dalston Lane and Amhurst Road
387 known as the Manor House built in 1845 for the manor steward, J.R.W. Tyssen. Best Georgian in style, of plain yellow brick, seven bays with recessed centre. Shops added on the ground floor
Crown Pub. Site of Blue Posts Pub, where stagecoach ran to Holborn by Dalston Lane. Station of the Knights Templars. Was Templars House brick built 17th, became tenements demolished 1825. House became pub called Blue Posts and then Bob’s Hall. Then became a stonemason’s yard. Formerly with good pub detail of c. 1900
St John. 1797 not finished until 1812. Rebuilt in 1955 after a fire. The new church of 1791-4 by James Spiller, adjoining the medieval churchyard, has a show front to the facing Lower Clapton Road, of vast size with plan of a Greek cross, The tower faces north, yet the High Altar faces east, the church was damaged by fire in 1955 and repaired by N. F. Cachemaille-Day and William Lock. Monuments from the old church are in the lobbies. On the back panel only the name and date 1519, probably inspired by the similarly simple inscription on the tomb in St Paul's Cathedral of Urswyck's friend John Colet.
Tower of St.Augustine’s the medieval parish church of Hackney 1306-1798. The old church was demolished in 1798. It was a 14th century building with good brasses, whipping post, ducking stool, and links with the Knights Templar. The Tower was left because it was thought the new one would not hold the bells, which are still there - from 1292. At the third level, an early c17 Turret Clock. The iron frame and some of the mechanism are original, the two clock faces later. Additionally from the old church the Rowe Chapel, south of the chancel in 1614, survived until 1896.
Churchyard large and leafy. Managed by Hackney District Board. Walled in 1707 and planted with avenues of trees in 1797 under the supervision of Harry Sedgwick. Burials ceased in 1859, and the tombs were rearranged in 1893 when a formal public garden was created. part relandscaped as a walled quiet garden in 1964 by the Borough Engineer.
354 Midland Bank. Prominently sited close to the church tower; the stone facing with rusticated ground floor and the large Baroque entrance were added in 1900 to a house built in 1803 on the site of the medieval vicarage. The house was used for parish meetings until the mid c19 – in effect the old Town Hall. Church House built 1520 by Christopher Urswick, a friend of Henry VIII, and then became a charity school. Demolished in 1802. Hammack & Lambert’s building of 1864-6 replaced the watch house, engine house and committee rooms put up by the vestry in 1802 The Dennett system of fireproof flooring was first applied to a town ball here- It was extended in the same manner by Gunton, Lowther & Gunton in 1895~8 and demolished in 1937 to give space for a civic forecourt for the new town hall
387 known as the Manor House built in 1845 for the manor steward, J.R.W. Tyssen. Best Georgian in style, of plain yellow brick, seven bays with recessed centre. Shops added on the ground floor
The main road. Has older and grander houses
143 a c18 three-bay brick front with pretty open-pedimented door case on a house of older origin. Surviving timbers suggest a mid-c16 to c.17 date. Extended and remodelled probably c. 1814.
145-153 set back, three stately pairs of c. 1824 with ground-floor windows in arched recesses. These were formerly used by the Salvation Army's Mothers' Hospital and refurbished for housing by Hunt Thompson, 1992-3
Priory House, registry office
White Hart
Windsor Castle Tavern, ‘Priory works’ refronted in the 1880s. Was this a lodge for the Priory?
Marcon Place
May Place
Mildenhall Road
Built on the site of the grounds of Clapton Housel
Montague Road
Terraces with doorcases with mermen. 1861.
Mothers’ Square
1987-90, replacing, the hospital. The new and adapted buildings provide housing, sheltered flats, day hospital and nursing home. The square is friendly but formal, a bevelled rectangle of continuous terraced houses, given character by coloured brickwork and cheerfully coarse classical detail in deliberate imitation of Victorian Hackney builders' vernacular. Busy rhythm of paired stumpy columns on the ground floor. A central pergola distracts from the parked cars.
Newick Road
Built on the site of the grounds of Clapton House
Orchard Place
Ottaway Street
6 Rooftop Nursery. UK’s first granulated rubber roof to save space the play area is on this roof. Moveable walls of translucent acrylic screens coloured plastic velvet or silver thermodrape to allow many different combinations of room. WHAT Architecture 2005.
Pembury Place
Pembury Road
London County Council estate
Pembury Estate, 1938 London County Council housing, and a school.
Hackney Church of England school was in Clarence Place and now under the estate. Founded 18th and demolished 1903
Poulton Mansions
Rectory Road
Sanford Terrace 1788 – renovation following a public enquiry
The Beckers, Gibberd estate for Hackney 1956
Rendlesham Road
92 London Tavern
Rowhill Road
St Andrew's Mansions, tall half-timbered and tile-hung mansion flats, introduce a whole street of the same, a late c19 development by A. Bedbow & W Andrews of Wood Green.
Site of Howard’s House. Birthplace of John Howard. He sold it to Thomas Smith. Elizabethan style and demolished in 1826
Shellness Road
Thistlethwaite Road
Built on the site of the grounds of Clapton House
19 childhood home of Harold Pinter
Rebuilt Nightingale School. May or may not include parts of vanished Downside School rebuilt by GLC 1969. Also Downsview School now in this complex.
Upper Clapton Road
Opposite ponds Wesleyan chapel
Wayland Avenue
British History Online. Hackney. Web site
Clunn. The Face of London
Connor. Liverpool Street to Chingford
East London Record
Field. London Place Names,
GLC. Home Sweet Home
Hackney Society Newsletter
London Borough of Hackney. Web site
London Gardens Online. Web site
Lost Hospitals of London. Web site
Lost Pubs Project. Web site
Pevsner and Cherry. London North
Robinson, Lost Hackney
Skyscraper News. Web site
Walford. Highgate and Hampstead to the Lea,
Watson. Hackney and Stoke Newington Past
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