Islington & Highbury Corner
this post is not finished and not edited or checked
Post to the north Highbury Drayton Park
Post to the east Islington Essex Road and Canonbury
Post to the south Islington Angel and Upper Street
Post to the west Caledonian Road and Barnsbury
Almeida Street
Site of Sir William Pitcairn's Botanical Garden. Five acres.
He was physician at Barts. Laid out in the late 18th century
Garden between Almeida Street and Waterloo Terrace called after Sir William
Napier. Sunken with a frieze by Musgrave Watson from the Hall of Commerce in Leadenhall Street and later at
University College, an imaginative piece of rescue work. Demolished 1922. Winged figure of Commerce with intellectual
figures of Music and Literature plus the fruits of physical labour. Garden of 1971-5,
Alwyne Villas
19 home of Dame Flora Robson
4 octagonal garden house with a rebus of bolt and tun for
Prior Bolton, 1532 the last Prior of St. Bartholomew's
South of Canonbury House and Alwyne Place. Two polygonal Elizabethan summerhouses
marking the boundary of the gardens.
Savies developed the estate
Arundel Square
Last Victorian square built in Islington. Public garden in
the centre. Bought by the council in
1957 and a playground funded by Frederick William Vanstone. Originally, money ran out before it could be
a full square. It was built on land known as Pocock's Fields, originally
part of Barnsbury manor. The Pococks were a Berkshire family from the Newbury
area, who moved to Shoreditch adjoining the City during the reign of Queen
Anne. One descendant a coal merchant, traded in the City at St Bride's Wharf; another,
Richard, acquired land north of the village of Islington including the 14 acres
of grassland (1826) on which Arundel Square was later to be built. His son
Samuel in 1841 owned all open land between the Back Road and the new
Pentonville Prison. At this time the south side of Bride Street was e sought
for building purposes. Building
accordingly began in 1850, but piecemeal, row-by-row. The intention to complete a full square
failed apparently because money save out- instead of a south side, the inhabitants
got a railway, running through deep cutting between the square and the backs of
Offord Road houses. On the death of a former owner in 1957, dispute over the disposal ended
with the sale of the north side. In 1970
the square was among the first properties in Islington Borough to be designated
part of a conservation area under the 1967 Act. Many houses have been converted
to flats and maisonettes. The square - actually a parallelogram by the
alignment of the W side – provides typical Islington contrasts. The East side,
as an extension of Arundel Place, is a orthodox early/mid-Victorian terrace of
tall houses, for years shabby, now restored by the Council Their 'Before' and
'After contrast makes a good illustration of how such terraces respond to
changed condition, and now, except for war damage have survived largely
untouched.
North side properties, disputed ownership, 1957, became
Circle 33, modernised, greatest interest, designed for porticoes
16-17 demolished for the railway, 16 rebuilt later. North London Railway
cut through the square in 1850,
Gardens originally run by a residents committee, then
Council. In 1976 they reverted to
waste ground.
Astey's Row
Part of 40-acre estate of Fowler family Lords of the Manor
of Barnsbury. Of considerable
importance in the reigns of Queen Elizabeth I and
James I
New River here
1892 enclosed in 48" pipes in 1892—3. Cross is seen as ornamental ponds of 1950. Its course is
represented by serpentine ornamental ponds, landscaped in 1950. The original width is indicated at the south end by the gardens,
and at the north end by some old trees and the
line of railings
Halton Mansions. Astey's Row of the 1820s has been demolished, and the original Canonbury Villas have
been replaced by Halton Mansions, an early
Council estate
Barnsbury
Between Upper Street and Caledonian
Road, situated in the parish of Holy Trinity, Islington is the district of
Barnsbury. It takes its name from Ralph de Berners, to whom the manor of
Isledon was granted by the Bishop of London in the thirteenth century. ‘villa de Iseldon Berners’ 1274, ‘Bernersbury’ 1406, ‘Barnersbury’
1492, ‘Bornesbury’ 1543, that is ‘manor of the de Berners family', from Middle
English ‘bury’. William de Berners held land here in 1235; the surname is from
Bernieres in Calvados, France. In the 13th century spelling, ‘Iseldon’ is an early form
of Islington. After the Conquest, ‘bury’ was used with the
sense ‘manor, manor house', and is frequently found in Middlesex names used in
this way, as in the nearby Canonbury and Highbury. Some of the early forms of
this name allude to its location in the parish of Islington. Until about 1842
it was known as the Caledonian Fields and the Barnsbury Fields, and was little
better than a mere waste dotted with cottages and huts. The fields were
notorious as a centre of brutal sports, and the habits of the population were
generally of that low order then commonly found on the borders of a great city.
1947 'funereal and dreary'. Major award for the canal way project for
enhancing the canal side. After
the erection of the prison a big clearance took place of all the old cottages
and huts, which was followed by the construction of wide streets and houses for
the middle classes upon these sites.
Yarrow and Hilditch steam carriages
Barnsbury Grove
7 North telephone exchange set up National Telephone Co
1900 on the site of the Sandemanain chapel where Michael Faraday preached until
he was 70
Barnsbury Park
8 Charles Chubb,
lock manufacturer, died here. Listed
Grade II, Terraced house, c 1818. used
as offices
14 home of Sickert 1931-4
Barnsbury Park School for Girls originally had been Offord
Road Higher Grade.
Barnsbury Park Open Space.
Laid out 1967.
Barnsbury Square
Barnsbury Square (1827; 1835-44). Few
spots in Islington can have been looked on as more historic than the moat
enclosure on the site of Barnsbury Square. Reed Moat Field, on the flat
hill-top north of Pentonville and the White Conduit, was the survival of a
mediaeval farm belonging to Barnsbury Manor, but throughout a large part of the 18th
century topographers and historians had identified both Highbury's and
Barnsbury's early works as ancient encampments. The
open ridge commanded views over the vale of Maiden Lane, and towards the green
slopes of Highgate and Hampstead. Dent's Survey outlines the 'camp', without
identifying it, at one end of an irregularly shaped mass which he names
"Gravel Pit Field. Thomas Albion
refers to the "camp, with its evidently Roman” defensive rampart and sedgy
fosse” the moat was drained in 1826 and the site excavated for building
materials. According to Cromwell, in
about 1820 the fields had been "in great degree broken up by digging for
brick-clay and gravel", though the grassy 'Praetorium was still visible and
the long western ram part survived, probably little changed over the centuries.
"Thomas
Tomlins who notes that when Mountfort House was built on the moated site, drained
in 1826, nothing relevant was excavated. Even in the 1970s when the mediaeval
origin was accepted, Islington Council erected a plaque on Mountfort House
recording it as site of a "Roman camp". It has now been removed.
Later building on all sides obliterated all signs of the enclosure, and Barnsbury Square's garden, which might have been a
natural means of preserving the old earthwork, is not on the site at all. Sir
Johnston Forbes-Robertson, reminiscing in 1925 about his childhood recalls
"a considerable dip or trench" in the garden. In 1810 Mr Bishop, then
living in the village of Paddington, leased Pond Field and land east of it as
far as the Back Road, for 9 years to Robert Clarke younger, Esq., of Oundle in
Northamptonshire. Building had already
started in the 1820s and new roads had been laid out: most of the site was undeveloped; Chief developer Thomas Whowell acquired all the part of Pond
Field west of "a newly intended Square called intended to be called
Barnsbury Square", including the ancient moated site. In 1835 he built, or
caused to be builtMountford House. Further, its
west side as laid by Whowell is eccentric, with loop-like excrescences north
and south of Mountfort House.
15 Mountfort House.
On site of the moat of Barnsbury farm house, Built
by Whowell 1835. 1930 became a factory,
which extinguished the whole mound.
Pilasters inside from Carlton House. 1896 Home for destitute boys. 1914 Gibbs silk dyer. 1944 English and French Dyeing Company. 1935 Mica and Micanite Supplies. Garden became part of the factory. Workshop out the back. 1980s offices. first appears in Rate Books 1836. Whowell did not intend Mountfort House for himself,
and it was let to two clergymen, the Rev. John Jackson
and the Rev Henry Beamish, who from 1840/41 was replaced by the Rev. Henry
Hamilton. Forbes-Robertson family lived at here 1859-74. In the
1880s and 1890s a couple of private schools appear, and Mountfort House was run
as a Home for Destitute Boys by Mrs. Margaret Hughes, and from 1910 by the Rev.
Charles Spencer. In 1914 it was taken by Henry Gibbs, identified
in the 1923 as "silk dyer", and the house was converted to industrial
use. In 1944 it became the English and French Dyeing Company Ltd. and after a
period lying empty the House has been restored and converted to offices. in 1992 there was a plan for the south-facing house become a private house and for Mica House to be flats and studios. The workshop was used for furniture manufacture.
Mica House. In 1935
Micanite Supplies, of 1 Offord Street, acquired the garden and which was then covered by a huge factory. A single-storey workshop, extended the length of the garden, with a tall industrial
chimney at the rear. - The chimney dismantled in the 1970s.
4 Mountfort
Terrace home of a portrait painter, Frederick Ullman (1886-8).
Mountfort
Crescent
has pairs of semi- detached, bow-fronted
stuccoed villas 1837-47.
3 home of architect, John McLellan (1883-8)
6/7, 8/9, 10/11 original The rest of this side is industrial, built out over the former back garden of
the rebuilt 35 Thornhill
17 Set back between the Crescent and
Mountfort House, modest Mount Villa later called Hebron), in widely channelled
stucco.
Mountfort Crescent, begun in 1841, intended for five houses - At first Whowell
seems to have occupied the single house in Mountfort Crescent, which
subsequently became the vicarage for Holy Trinity Church and later for St
Andrew.
Gardens. An acre of ground. The roughly rectangular
leases had always included the right to the 'soil' of the square, and covenants
ensuring that the gardens were maintained as pleasure grounds for the
residents. In 1889 the Metropolitan Public Gardens Association purchased the
lease of the gardens, laid them out as a park, and in 1891 transferred them to
Islington Vestry . For long-term protection,
however, it would be necessary to buy up the reversionary interests. From the
end of 1905 freeholders elected a committee via the Town Hall, offering to
settle for a land valuation provided the gardens could be maintained for the
public. They urged the Council to purchase: in the 1880s Mr. Zambra, of the
firm Negretti & Zambra, had purchased the whole estate of 29 houses with
the right to the 'soil' of the square, and had split it into individual
freeholds. Lawyers established
that all conveyances to the owners contained a covenant that the square must
not be built on. in 1912 was an attempt was to convey the gardens to the
Council under the Act for preserving London's Gardens of 1906; gardens were taken over by tennis clubs, the ground was levelled to make
courts, embankments were raised over the lawns. railings were
broken and mature trees damaged. The square was protected it from being
built on. Still there was the obstacle of the need to secure all the occupiers’ In 1932 the gardens were at last passed the Borough.
The MPGA provided financial support; the square gardens were officially opened
Barnsbury Street
Built by Progress Co. Land. Glasshouses designed by Richard Carpenter as
well as the almshouses. Railway Gothic
square. In 30s the only facade was in the South West corner until the 1960s. Restoration work for Barnsbury Housing Association by Kenneth Pring. Stands in the middle of the north side. c. 1830-41.
The terrace was rescued by the Barnsbury Housing
Association, and convened with new blocks of
flats, behind the end by Pring,
White & Partners, 1969-71,
2-4 Barnsbury Hall, Corner College Cross
Site of Rochford's Iron Foundry, demolished. Stood on the
corner of Milner Square, and in 1971 it was the Barnsbury Chapel
Tilloch, pioneer of motive power and steam engines
Islington Proprietary School 123 later British Syphon
Manufacture, demolished
139 Drapers almshouses, restored. Corner Cut Throat
Lane.
Huntingdon Arms decorative pub with a coat of arms. Top window in arcade
44 Drapers Arms centres Lonsdale Square on the north.
Handsomely Italianate. Elegant, the very attenuated arched bays framing its
windows. This stuccoed frontispiece of
c. 1839. attractive garden terrace behind.
Relics of Townsend's Nursery behind the houses into the
1870s
Battishill Street?
Battishill Gardens opened 1975 by Betjeman. 1842 stone frieze from Parr's Bank and Hall
of Commerce, Threadneedle Street - had been in University College in bits for
50 years
Berkeley Crescent?
Parallel to City Road.
1848
St. Matthew's.
Bombed and destroyed
Bewdley Street
Was originally called Upper Park Street
started in 1820s. .
Braes Street
Bride Street
Named after the Pocock family coal
wharf in the city. South side given over
to gardens, which in 1848 were sought for building purposes by the Pococks.
Brooksby Street
Leicestershire Village where developer Clarke came from 1820s.
5 site between and Lofting Road, timber wall now industry
55 Rising Sun
Morgan's Cottages
Bushy Street?
Drapers’ Arms, corner Cut Lane. Built by Progress Co. Land. Glasshouses designed by Carpenter who also
designed the almshouses. Railway Gothic
square in 30s only facade in the SW corner until 1960s
Canonbury Avenue
Canonbury Lane
Canonbury Square
The Stonefield
estate was run by R.Cloudesley, 1521.
Canonbury Square was built on what had been part of the old manor of Canons
Burh, dor Canons of St Bartholomew Smithfield, on farm-land from Ralph de Berners in 1373. In 1767 Spencer Compton, the 8th
Earl, let Canonbury House, outbuildings, and adjoining grounds
along the large pond to John Dawes, a City broker. He built Canonbury Place, which he leased from Lord Northampton, and lived there. pleasure gardens surrounded Canonbury House - a tavern opposite
the tower on the site of the old stables. Part was held by dairy
farmer, Richard Laycock. in the 1790s, the small mansion adjoining the tower, partly filling the west side of the old
manor house court. In 1803, the 9th Earl signed a building
agreement with Henry Leroux of Stoke Newington, for a large plot. bounded by Hopping Lane, and by the continuation of Canonbury Lane, opposite one of Laycock's dairy
farms. Leroux had to build on the fronts next the Upper Street and Canonbury Lane. Any bricks made from earth dug on the site should net the
Earl 9d per 10d. Leroux was prohibited from allowing any nuisance industries, By 1809 Leroux was bankrupt. and his property was auctioned and the land had been bisected for the New North Road. By 1811 only a few houses existed. Development of Canonbury Square
was determined by Laycock, as chief land-owner and he agreed with Lord Northampton to build on the
south and east sides of the square, and south of Canonbury Place, up to New
North Road and Lower Road. .From the 1860s the area began to decline, as people moved to newer suburbs. the professional class gave way to clerks, craftsmen, bricklayers and plasterers. The
district reached a nadir between the two World Wars and parts were destroyed by bombs, By the 1950s, the square was a slum. the 6th Marquess of Northampton decided to sell much of estate. ,The purchasers.
Western Ground Rents, developed part of it and bomb sites were rebuilt, chiefly by Louis de Soissons. new houses from 1954 renewed interest from the middle classes. In the 1970s the Northampton family re-acquired part of the
property, selling leaseholds of flats.
Gardens -the Marquess was the first landowner to open
his private square-gardens. Canonbury was formally opened in 1884 by Brabazon, Chairman of the
Public Gardens, Boulevards and Playgrounds. statue of a young girl, originally from Italy, lent to the Council in 1943 by
Mr Stokes, of 343 Essex Road. The railings, were replaced by chicken-wire netting in the war but in 1946 the Council included the square in a plan to rehabilitate and in the 1950s the gardens were laid out .
8, plaque to
Samuel Phelps 1804-1878 which says
'tragedian lived here'. Phelps lived
here from 1844 to 1867. During this period he took over the management of the
Aquatic Theatre, later to be known as Sadler’s Wells
17a Evelyn Waugh here lived On the second floor as
a young man, from 1928-30.
18 from 1837 lived George Daniel,
bibliophile and antiquarian book collector (1789-1864).
6a during the 1950s was the home of
Duncan Grant and Vanessa Bell.
27b George Orwell lived here from 1945 until his
death in 1950, with his wife and adopted child. His wife died long before him.
36, the home from 1844 of the Rev.
Arthur Johnson, who kept a school there for many years, Joseph Chamberlain, MP
(1836-1914) was a pupil.
39 Northampton Lodge seem to pre-date
1818 minute front garden, The house existed in
1811, empty, Different and
mysterious, Estorick Collection of Modern Italian Art.
42-45 Henry Leroux's original terrace Earliest and grandest is Henry Leroux's range,
a fine '2nd-class' terrace in dark pick with extremely long drawing-room
windows, consisting of nos., and with different fenestration.
47 now exists only to ground-floor
level has become part of no. 46. Even the existing floor is a pastiche post-war
rebuilding. The original building, occupied since 1921 on a 3-yearly and then yearly
tenancy by Be Comrades of the Great War (later renamed the Canonbury
Ex-Servicemen's club), was demolished in 193 7.
48 Restored
Canonbury Grange. A single villa. It has a large garden
at the side alone of the square's houses. In 1987 the house was gutted and heavily restored.
8 from 1844-66 lived Samuel Phelps,
the famous actor-manager of Sadler Wells.
Under him Sadler's Wells reached its pinnacle of Victorian fame when in
those unlike surroundings he staged all of Shakespeare's plays to packed
audiences.
12-13 Built above cellars on a raised
pavement. Bath style, to maintain the building level where the ground falls away,
not completed until 1829.
Holy Trinity fills the square, or the Marquess declared it
unsafe to get them out
Park along the line of the river. Gardens formally opened 1884.
Statue. Maintained by the vestry of
Islington.
College Cross
New College Mews, replica of Victorian Turkish bath
Cooksfield. Cubitt
built it with Manchester Terrace, laid it out and built houses in the centre
Chapel Church Mission Society College, on site of Sutton
Dwellings 1825-1915
Loyal Islington Volunteers 1790s east side, 1625 site of
botanic gardens 1770 123
Manchester terrace, Cubitt, 1827,
Mitchell House
Colony Mews,
Compton Road
Downing Terrace
Compton Square
Where cab drivers serviced their vehicles. Bombed
Crane Grove
Crossley Street
Digswell Street
Dorinda Street
Dorset Place?
Dovercourt Estate?
Baxter Arms
Salters' Hall
Ellington Street
Essex Road,
No claim to distinction was called
Lower Street from time immemorial until late in the nineteenth century. 'Real' Whittington Stone ended up here
possibly a Roman route and certainly medieval.
Has also been called Seveney
Street, Lower Street, and Lower Road.
Houses let us pubs through 17th.
A cattle- market was established in
1833 by John Perkins of Bletchingley in Surrey, who, intolerant of the dirt and
cruelty of the old Smithfield Market in the City, and the nuisance and danger
of driving vast herds of cattle through the crowded London streets, projected
this new market in the north of London. It was built at a cost of £100,000, and
opened on 18 April 1836, but so strong was the popular acceptance of old
abuses, that this excellent new market proved an utter failure and was soon
closed. It covered nearly fifteen acres on the east side of Essex Road close to
Balls Pond Road, and was enclosed by a brick wall ten feet high, with vast
sheds on all its' four sides.
50 Poet Thomas Hood and his parents
lived here 1807.
79 back of Thomas J.
Kirton & Co., Manufacturing Chemist, 1876.
18th
84 Half Moon
pub on site of much older inn. RHS Receiving House.
100-102 Fisher
House 1845. mansion situated
nearly opposite the east end of Cross Street.
It was built early in the seventeenth century by Sir Thomas Fisher, and
had very fine grounds. In 1845 it was demolished for local street improvements,
but for some time previously it had been uninhabited.
119 Thatched House. The modern Thatched
House, dating from the 1930s, had at least four predecessors:
Job's House, the oldest, burnt down in 1742, its successor was removed to the present site during the building of
Halton Road, and the third was burnt in
1829. The son of the keeper of Job's House was Dr William Hawes (c.1749-1808), who discovered means of
resuscitating the apparently drowned, and ran a
private life-saving service for people rescued from the Thames. In 1774 he launched this as a society, which eventually
became the Royal Humane Society.
161 Mecca bingo. The street’s most spectacular
building the former Carlton Cinema. A multicoloured Egyptian front with two
recessed columns, 1930 by George Coles.
Interior in lavish Empire style.
292 Palladian floor cloth factory Samuel Ridley. The most prominent
building, the preserved facade of a
floor
cloth manufactory built in 1812; balustrade and central pediment, giant Ionic
pilasters to the upper floors. Later
used as a beer bottling factory;
converted to borough housing offices 1972
366 Elena Hotel corner shop with Jays on the top and
ironwork
Annett's
Crescent of
1819 by William Bumelli, an attractive sweep of
stucco; first-floor windows within broad segment-headed
arches
M.McCarthy Almshouses founded with money from local widow,
1646. 1827 demolished
Essex Road Station built for Northern Line 1904. 1904 16' diameter tunnels to take main line
stock and Great Northern trains to the City.
Many houses on both sides of Essex
Road were destroyed in the great blitz of 1940.
Large bombed sites have been cleared and one of them at the corner of
Essex Road and New North Road is now covered by four-storied blocks of London
County Council flats. This includes a long row of new shops which has been set
back from the old building line in Essex Road
The Crown became City Farm House
Ferriby Close
Florence Street
Vestry hall sold in 1927 and became Lido Cinema, then
petrol station
Furlong Road
Laid out in 1839. .
Albion Lodge
1884 detached. With openwork parapet.
18-20 with an
adapted basement storey, Leeson Hall, Conservative HQ but built for the
Sandemanian Church, 1886 by T. S. Archer
12 Pestalozzian Schools
Garden Row?
Improved Industrial Dwellings Co. 1866 Palmerston
Dwellings
Gembron Street?
165 Peabody,
Girton Mews
Halton Road
At the back of the Town Hall in
Halton Road are several fine blocks of Council flats
St.Mary Islington School
Haslam Close
Hawes Street
Highbury Station Road
Laycock Junior School
Liverpool Buildings
Hume Court?
Huntington and Thornhill Grove
Wild bit of ground there since the estate was built
Barnsbury copyhold which mean that the change of tenant meant that a fine had
to be paid therefore no large changes, 1822 law changed and many tenants there,
'fine blocks of workers flats' pre- 2nd World War
1 Barnsbury Park Collegiate School became TA
14 White Conduit pub
30-32 Anna Sher Children's Theatre
St.Katherine's House
Islington
Named as ‘Gislandne’ – the ‘hill of a Gsla’.
Pre-reformation the land belonged to various religious institutions. On traditional north route
Engineering Firm producing machinery for bread,
confectionery, chemical and laundry industries, Service centre for London and
Southern counties and making small parts
Islington works by John Lofting, 1695. Dutchmen, used battery brass or scruff poured
into mould made from sand only obtainable at Highgate. Did six at a time and cast for thimbles. Boys removed the cones from the
thimbles. Ground by horsepower. 1740 went to Marlow
Shackell and Edwards, manufacture of lamp black, printers
ink, and oil boilers
Jeffrey wallpaper factory.
Had taken over Morris, then taken over by Sanderson 1930
Islington company making laundry making machinery, control
equipment and hydrographic instruments.
Drew materials from a wide area but needed the skilled labour from
Islington
Islington Park Street
Lambert Street
Laycock Street
Large dairy farm area
Transenna's Works HQ.
Tidmarsh and Sons, Window and Sun Blind manufacturer, since 1843
Barnsbury Park School. Finsbury Pupil-Teachers Centre. Board School. 1901
Laycock School
Laycock Green
Laycock Mansions
Legion Close
Leigh Road
Eton House
is; now on the site of Dawes’ Highbury House for 1778-81, He lived
there until his death in 1788.
Demolished 1938
V2 total
destruction of twelve houses in Leigh Road,
Liverpool Road
Old back lane to Upper Street, named in 1822. An attractive stretch of similar two- or three-storey terraces and pairs of
villas of the 1830s and 40s, extending to
the large leafy churchyard beyond. Built
up between 1820 and 1840.
57 The George. Exuberant Edwardian
71-79 built before 1812 following Act to allow building on the Cloudesley Estate but not
part of the estate.
83-199 Cloudesley Terrace built 1819, the boundary of the Cloudesley
estate
84-124 Trinidad Place 1834. Named because of the
ground landlord's West Indian estates, Part of Milner Gibson Estate. A terrace along the estate boundary;
The Plant Room,
the headquarters of TV gardener Joe Swift's garden design and construction
company.
86 was 3
Trinidad Place home William Spencer Dove the builder.
126b double block, by James Gorst, on
the site of the former Bray’s with a touch of the Egyptian and Art Deco but
blending happily with the surroundings, bears the date-plaque "Gibson Square
1988". Previously 126/8 Brays lorry drivers’ hostel.
In the 1960s the area was a
favourite parking ground for lorry drivers on their way through London, many of
whom stayed locally overnight, while the huge beached pantechnicons
overshadowed two houses at a time even to their first-floor windows. The problem lad a tragic end when one night in November 1974 the
building caught fire, thought to have been caused by a cigarette end, and 8 of
the occupants died. The hostel was never reopened on the site, and the premises
were not rebuilt until 1988.
138-178 Felix Place, a triangle of land cut into Back Road, tapering off to the north at the
corner of Barnsbury Street. This
belonged
George Pocock the dairy farmer, who built there a row of small houses there
called Felix Place in 1818. There was a
pond in a field adjoining it.
Terraces and
1970s replica of a Victorian Turkish bath. Between here and College Cross.
Housing by Cubitt
208-292, Park Place council flats. Sign still says Park Place.
209-211 Barnsbury, this is a large gastro-pub with a
horseshoe-shaped bar, and bare floorboards. The lighting makes an interesting
use of wine glasses, and the pub has a changing collection of artwork on
display that can be purchased. Was previously the
Windsor Castle
377 home of
Victorian illustrator Robert Seymour.- worked for Dickens and then shot
himself.
489 Adam and Eve
Adelaide
Andrew G.Soutter, Paint, 1906
Arundel Terrace
Houses
and flats for
Barnsbury Housing Association between Barnsbury Road and Lofting Road, Pring, White & Partners’ ingeniously
intricate
Barworth Court
Birkenhead House
Crabb concertina makers
Duchess of Kent
Felix Terrace a
triangle of land cut into Back Road, tapering off to the north at the corner of
Barnsbury Street belonged George Pocock the dairy farmer, who Built there
in 1818.
Mersey House.
Mersey Housing Estate by London County Council at the northern end,
bought during 2nd World War, 1947
Old Royal Free Square. Converted 1987-92 from
the former London Fever, later Royal Free, Hospital of 1848-52 by Charles Fowler &f David Moccatta - a
model of useful after-life for redundant hospitals. daycentre, incorporating the hospital water tower
Palmer's Place Methodist Church
New
housing which
turns its back on the road, by Islington
Architect's Department, 1977-80. On the
site of Park Place 1790; the
sign remains. Date
plaque is on the King's Rooms
Penton Primary School
Prince Regent
Pugin Court
Registry Office of 1872. Parish workhouse became registry office. With a quirky comer turret, converted to housing in 1994.
Business Design Centre was the Royal Agricultural Hall.
Smithfield club, 1798. Built on site of 1861/2 cattle lairs. Music hall, circuses. Grand Ball for 8,000 in 1869. 125 ft roof, Lord Barnes foundation
stones. Queen Victoria's cat. Crufts, started by Spratts. Sankey and Moody. Blondin at 90. Motor shows.
Closed 1939, used as a postal sorting office, bought by Islington in
1976. Exhibition hall. Very like Crystal Place, built at the same
time. During refurbishment, a walkway
was found which might have come from there.
Some of the structure went there rather than to Sydenham. Used by the Post Office 1943-1972. Saved by
Sam Morris and became the Business Design Centre. Main front was in Liverpool
Road to be used by the drovers. Magnificent hall inside. Hotel and galleria.
Samuel Lewis
Buildings. Philanthropic tenant block with art nouveau
lettering and five rows of trees. . 1909-10, one of the first eight schemes for this housing trust, all by C. S. Joseph &
Smithem. Five rows of flats with trees
between. Site
of London General Omnibus Co., 1890s, coach factory
between Flights yard and Park Street.
Previously Richard Laycock's cattle lairs. Became the Samuel Lewis buildings 1914. Hislop and Sons,
St.Mary Magdalene Church of England School rough ground
Wesleyan Methodist Church
White Horse
Liverpool Street
Cabinet Theatre
Royal Panarmonium Gardens
Lofting Road
Lofting made thimbles locally in 1695. Was John Street
Barnsbury Mews, properties on urban scale. Islington, 1976, London County Council
housing demolished, 1960s. South side
Barnsbury HA, good housing commendation.
1937
North London Synagogue
Lonsdale Square
The land known as Gosseyfield
immediately north of the Milner-Gibson estate was held of Barnsbury Manor by
the Drapers' Company, left in 1690 by the daughter
of John Walter, one of its former Clerks. revenues to be used towards
maintaining almshouses, which Walter had founded in Southwark and Newington. Gosseyfield is recorded as used for a cattle-pen for herds bound to and from
Smithfield. The Drapers' Company were relatively late in entering the building
race, they
appointed their own surveyor, who was also district surveyor for East
Islington. the young Richard Cromwell Carpenter (1812-55), friend of
Pugin and a keen Gothicism; Lonsdale Square is Islington's sole Gothic venture in this genre, The single square which Gosseyfield could accommodate
was laid out in 1838, not occupied until late 1842 and completed only in 1845. an architectural curiosity, in 1851 a third of the occupants were recorded as
being in orders- perhaps the ecclesiastical style had appeal - and more than 14
per cent as professional. It sank in prosperity
early in the 20th century, the houses falling into multiple occupation, many
let as furnished rooms, . During the Second
World War the railings were removed, but unlike most Islington squares the
gardens remained private owned, and a gardener was employed until 1959. the Company offered the gardens freehold to the Council at a
nominal £50, though a long time was to pass before improvements were made. In
1970/71 the Council replaced the proper
railings. In 1954 the Drapers' Company
auctioned the square, and when it had passed to private ownership the estate
agents, Prebbles, acquired
Stonesfield and Lonsdale property. Some unprotected tenants in the square, A Tenants' Crusade was
then formed , Lonsdale Square subsequently
became owner occupied. Many of the houses were converted into flats,
3, Lonsdale House, was occupied in
1843-63 by one of Islington's Academies for Young Gentlemen, run by Daniel
Spranze, who had formerly had a school in White Conduit Fields.
30 Another popular Victorian
journalist resident was George Sims, son of a glass merchant in Aldersgate,
born in Clerkenwell in 1847 and working on the Weekly Despatch and other papers, and
author of a number successful plays. Lived there 1878-9 but by 1880 moved to
Camden Road and later still lived in Gower Street.
48 Probably the most distinguished
inhabitant was the prolific and versatile London journalist "Aleph",
alias William Harvey, who died there in 1873. He was contributor to the
London City Press and author of London Scenes and Lain People (1863); he was
also a surgeon, and Honorary Superintendent of Islington Reformatory.
Dyers Almshouses.
Sold by Drapers Company in 1954, then auctioned and sold to an estate
agent
Lonsdale Police flats
Madras Place
Madras system of education at St Mary Magdalene Church of
England school
Malvern Terrace?
Built 1836 along the boundary of a nursery which remained
on the south of the square. In 1889
taken over by the vestry as Thornhill Gardens 124 Square curiosity of plan plainer villas.Group of unique 1 830s London terrace houses built on the site of
Thomas Oldfield's dairy and cricket field. Cottage-style gardens in cobbled
cul-de-sac.
Marquess Estate
Built by LB Islington 1976 to great acclaim.
Mountfort Crescent
house became vicarage
Mountford Square sold for building in 122. By private act.
West Lodge was originally Suetonious Lodge
10 commercial and still has door;
9 Radiant House astragraphs. Mr.Wilson founded Islington
Clerical. Sickert lived there
Public garden in the centre had various problems. 1889 Metropolitan Public Gardens Assoc. &
1891 Islington Vestry had a long row about the freeholds and the gardens became
derelict although taken over by tennis clubs
Mylne Street?
New River after it left New River Head. Small bit of Owens Row is left but name is
still on the car park. New River went
right down it. City University goes over
the route
Napier Terrace
Infill by Islington Borough of maisonettes with a sunken
garden. Walled with a long relief sculpture
Hall of Commerce Frieze
Orleston Street
Building Works Yard
Pleasant Place
Richmond Grove
River Terrace North?
1-5 bombed and used as a warehouse, Presbyterian Gothic
church of 1834, next to 10 here originally at the council in 1960
Rotherfield Street
22-28
grander,
three-storey, c. 1826. Here the giant fluted Ionic pilasters, more
exceptionally, Ammonite capitals - an invented order based on the shell, employed by George Dance in 1788 for his Shakespeare
Galle Pall Mall, but better
known from its use by Amon Henry Wilds Brighton
Sable Street
Sebbon Street
Scott Estate
Developed
from c. 1800, a grid of street around the two roads,
which flank Annett's Crescent. Much
post-war rebuilding here, but some good survivals, restored after Islington acquired the whole estate c. 1973
St.Clement's Street
St.Clement. Built 1863 at the sole expense of Cubitt,
therefore ambitious for the neighbourhood.
Gilbert
Scott 1863-5 united with St David's, Westbourne Road as flats
Montague Court
St.Mary's Grove
Victoria Road?
24 Victoria Garage.
Private bus garage. Truby Motor
Haulage Co. Alma and Alberta buses.
Westbourne Road
38 more elaborate than the rest. Actually part of Arundel
Square. Numbered
with the square, is really part of this - late 1850s –1860.
Arundel Terrace
Arundel Arms
St.Giles Christian Mission
St.David. 1935 incorporating arcades of previous, burnt
down, church
Wynford Road Estate
Starcross School,
Elizabeth Garratt Anderson School
Sun Brewery
King Edward
Hall built for the residents
20 Mitre
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