The Era of the Adventure Playgrounds

Posted on June 26, 2023 by Kennington Runoff

If you’ve ever had a mosey around the Ethelred Estate and the former Lillian Baylis school site (now luxury flats but don’t get us started) you’ve probably noticed a rather fanciful and fenced off adventure playground. It’s a smaller, updated version of what was a much more sizeable playground on the site, and we’re here as always to tell you of its fascinating history.

Junk playgrounds took off after WW2 and our offering was located on the site of a bombed school building. Forward thinking folks thought it would be clever to use these fallow sites as areas for kids, and also wisely substituted ‘junk’ with ‘adventure’ With a little help from the LCC, a determined coterie of Greater Kennington volunteers and children developed the large site mostly by using discarded detritus from the war. The concept was, instead of covering the site in concrete, to create a system of walkways, tunnels, ropes, enormous slides, and old tyres to play in. Included in the new Lollard Adventure Playground were handmade huts for children to undertake crafts when the weather wasn’t so great. The kids even grew vegetables there.

Now, to our 2023 eyes unsupervised nine year olds playing with giant bonfires and pushing around rusting cars might not be our precise definition of ‘safety’, but it must have been great fun for the kids. The concept at the time was to encourage children to learn by expressing themselves while also learning to avoid risks. This, so the thinking went, would foster confidence and independence. Our adventure playground occupied more or less the entirety of the school site and entertained thousands of local children until, sadly, Lambeth wanted the plot back for a school in the 1960’s. At least it wasn’t for luxury flats.

Due to a lack of funding from Lambeth, the playground was mostly closed in 2013 and since has served as a haunting and eerie relic of its former self, now rather resembling a sad and deserted amusement park from a Scooby Doo* episode. The playground is now run by a noble but underfunded charity and is only open on very specific days for free access play. The mission remains to provide a unique space in which children can enjoy varied and creative play in a homemade space. If you want to learn more they would love to hear from you.

*If you are too young to know who Scooby Doo is then please ask an elder.

Mystery of the Vacant Lot

Posted on June 4, 2023 by Kennington Runoff

Ever wondered about the existence and future of that giant gravelled eyesore of a vacant lot next to the Beefeater Distillery in Montford place? Well we’ve just been on a tour with the developers and we’re here to fill you in on what’s in store

For many years the site was occupied by Hayward’s pickle factory until it was partially destroyed in 1944. The bit that survived lives on as the Beefeater Factory. After changing hands a number of times, the lot next to it was purchased by TfL in order to have a place to store equipment and lorries working on the Northern Line extension. TfL have now partnered with Grainger Homes to deliver 139 homes, 40% of which will be dedicated to affordable living. It will be 11 floors and occupy most of the footprint of the site, with grasses and trees included. Construction will started by the end of 2023 and it will be called Montford Mews

Not what it will look like, This is the pickle factory

My first question to very peppy and well informed TfL developer Susanne is probably the question that almost all Runoff readers are thinking right now. Namely, what do you call ‘affordable’ and why is it that only people in high earning jobs appear to be living in these allegedly affordable flats? She said that Lambeth Living determine what is affordable and it is usually between 40 to 60% of the market rate. She added that people are allocated the flats based on their earnings the previous year and preference is given for people already living or working in Lambeth.

Gripping site photos

On our previous tours of Oval Village across the road we asked about access to the general public and if people will offer a short cut between Kennington Lane and the Oval. They confirmed that it will, and Susanne confirmed that the public will be able to walk through the Montford site as well. There will be businesses on the ground floor, but they will be light industrial (ie offices). We were heartened to discover that the affordable living people living in the affordable flats will have access to the same amenities (gym, etc) as folks paying the full whack.

Susanne also mentioned another very similar project that will see 450 (!!) new homes built above Nine Elms tube station. However, dear reader, it was long ago we became unable to keep up with the vertical insanity of Vauxhall, so if you want more details click here.

Planning permission has been granted for both the Montfort and Nine Elms sites. But please don’t ask us to weigh in on planning consent as we did that once and we still can’t get that toothpaste back in it’s tube.

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Sausanna and Nine Elms Laundry

Posted on May 22, 2023 by Kennington Runoff

Next time you pop over to the big Sainsburys at the top of Wandsworth Road in Vauxhall, look across the street and beyond the soulless high rises that surround you. If you were in that spot 150 years ago you would have been met by raucous female ex convicts and the smell of starch and soap. This is all due to an extraordinary enterprise by a campaigner named Sarah Meredith, and we’re about to tell you what she did.

When forced deportation of prisoners to Australia was outlawed in 1857, the government had to decide how to reintegrate people who had served their time. Work for men was plentiful in places such as factories, but a unique dilemma was posed for females. People didn’t want them working in their homes for reasons of trust, and Susanna was aware of this. She started Nine Elms Laundry in a disused and shabby Victorian building with a goal of giving jobs exclusively to women who were trying to piece their lives back together.

Some women lived at the laundry and others commuted to their daily 10 hour shift. The rules of the laundry were prominently displayed but not enforced punitively. These included no alcohol or money on site, and the expectation that they would not leave the premises without permission. Women who served a subsequent sentence were not judged and welcomed back into the fold after they’d served their time. Women from all denominations were accepted, which was unusual at the time.

The laundry was arranged as a self financing enterprise with mostly middle class patrons. Such was the success of the business that Sarah was able to offer to clean the clothes of poor people in Vauxhall at a discounted rate. This was crucial at a time in which your appearance alone could determine whether you could put food on the table. Susanna was also able to off free laundry services to people living with infectious diseases.

Records show that Susanna and her sister were living in South Lambeth Road at the time so were close enough to keep an eye on the shop and give a little extra support to the vulnerable women in her employ. We all need a Susanna Meredith in out lives now and again, and we hope there are more folks out there like her.

Thank you to the good people over at Vauxhall History who wrote most of this article. They are a great place to explore.

Paul Gambaccini @ Cinema Museum

Posted on April 17, 2023 by Kennington Runoff

On Sunday 30 April the first granddaddy of pop, the award winning Paul Gambaccini, will be interviewed at the Cinema Museum on a one off night called ‘Desert Island Flicks’. So instead of talking about his passion for tunes, he’ll be chin wagging away about the movies that made him the DJ he is today and why he cares passionately about films. This will be presented in an interview format with film clips and a chance to ask questions to the great man at the end. And there’s a bar…

In case you’re not in the loop, the Cinema Museum is housed in the former administration block of Lambeth Workhouse, which we wrote about in 2019. The building would have been the dropping off place for a destitute Charlie Chaplin and his mum and many others on hard times, but for the past 24 years has served as HQ to the museum. The museum has a packed collection of film related ephemera including posters, projectors, scary mannequins, scripts, costumes and lights. Your ticket to this talk will allow you to whiz through some of the museum, which is rarely open to the public. It’s like being dropped into particularly tense episode of Scooby Doo*.

Paul Gambaccini’s ‘Desert Island Flicks’ is on Sunday, 30 April at 19:30, with the doors flying open at 18:30, and tickets can be purchased here. As it’s a couple of weeks away don’t forget to put it in that sparkly pocket diary that we’ve been nagging you good lot to buy for a number of years now. Did we mention there’s a bar?

* If you’re too young enough to get this reference please ask your parents.

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Bert Hardy, Chronicler of Greater Kennington

Posted on February 7, 2023 by Kennington Runoff

From the archives, the sixth and last edition of our month of best history posts

Bert Hardy (1913-1995) was a self trained photographer and resident of Elephant and Castle who worked as chief photographer for the Picture Post during a pivotal moment in the history of the UK. Hardy travelled the world photographing wars and current affairs and closer to home covered the D-Day landings and a certain royal wedding. Closer to home ever still, he was commissioned a series of photographs called ‘Life in the Elephant’ over a three week period in 1949 depicting working class life in the Elephant.

Set amidst a backdrop of bombs and building sites, Hardy captured the backdrop of a seemingly unchanged pattern of life….horse drawn carts, trams, kids playing…juxtaposed against a community that was changing radically. The wintry weather had a great deal to do with the effect of these photos, as did Hardy’s predilection for haze and smog. The photos below are just a snippet of those generated for the Post. We invite you to Google the man and you might just find yourself down your own time consuming but very enriching rabbit hole. Meanwhile enjoy the photos below.

A small boy reads a newspaper at the kitchen table while his mother opens a tin of food at their home in the Elephant and Castle area of London, 8th January 1949. Original publication: Picture Post – 4694 – Life In The Elephant – pub. 1949 (Photo by Bert Hardy/Picture Post/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

The Quiet Life and Death of Kennington Theatre

Posted on January 30, 2023 by Kennington Runoff

From the archives, the fourth edition of our month of best history posts

The fourth in our series of images from Lambeth Archives Were you aware that for a brief moment in time greater Kennington (Walworth) had a world class theatre in Kennington Park Road? It’s marble clad limelight flourished for just 23 years before being briefly converted into a cinema, and then it lay derelict before being damaged by enemy action and then final action from Lambeth council.

Screenshot 2019-07-18 at 14.45.51

Kennington Theatre was situated to the north of the park where a hefty block of flats currently reside. The frontage was executed in Portland stone, with the interiors highlighted by marble columns and fireplaces. As was the fashion at the time, the emphasis was on French renaissance and no small expense was spared on fittings and adornments.

Screenshot 2019-07-18 at 14.46.32

Following what seemed to be a successful season of pantos and plays the theatre was closed and converted into a cinema in 1921. According to records it’s last license was granted in 1934 and then left derelict. Afterwards the Odeon group purchased the property and had designs on demolishing the building but this never transpired, and it lay derelict for a number of years.

The final nail in the coffin of Kennington Theatre came at the end of 1943 when the back of the now defunct building was partially damaged by a German bomb. As it was then deemed a hazard to the public it was purchased by Lambeth under a compulsory purchase order and bulldozed. The site is now occupied by a mid century block of flats. Next time you walk by, cast your mind back to the other century of Kennington panto goers who tread before you.

If you’ve ever wondered why listing buildings is important, now you know..

The Three Stage Life of Imperial Court

Posted on January 20, 2023 by Kennington Runoff

From the archives, the second edition of our month of best history posts

Fixate your eyes girls and boys, as we’re about to give you a little potted history of a lovely neo Classical institution in Kennington Lane with a funny badge on the front of it; Imperial Court.

1. The Licensed Victuallers School, Kennington Green

In 1794 the Friendly Society of Licensed Victuallers was established to educate the children of publicans affected by long term illness, incapacity, or poverty (take it from Peggy Mitchell, running a pub isn’t easy). As this was the era that proceeded free public education, publicans were keen to ensure their children’s education and well being. The school was so popular that admission was granted exclusively on the basis of a lottery, but over time the school was so oversubscribed that a larger building was required.

The original school was demolished in 1835 and the core of the building we have inherited was erected in 1836 (with extensions in 1890). The school was now able to expand its enrollment from 100 to 250 pupils, both boys and girls. The children were generally taught apprenticeships and educated from the age of 7-12 until they were 15, and then sent on their way with a small bonus for good conduct. The school moved to Slough in 1921.

NAAFI

Following WW1 The comprehensive welfare of Forces was put into sharp focus, and from 1921 to 1992 Imperial Court again served the public proudly as the headquarters of the Navy, Army, and Air Forces Institutes, or ‘NAAFI’. NAAFI existed (and on a much smaller scale still does) to provide catering and recreational activities needed by the British Armed Forces and their families posted overseas. This included mess services, selling British goods, and organising entertainment and activities.

Providing non combat services to troops and families required trained staff, on a voluntary and on a paid basis. To this extent NAAFI in Kennington served as a training centre for cooks, cleaners, caterers, and people interested in the logistics of getting auxiliary services to people overseas. Training at NAAFI was often undertaken by women, and their work in the war effort is duly celebrated at the Imperial War Museum (keeping it local).

3. Flats

Imperial Court was Grade 2* listed in 1980, so it is luckily beyond the grasp of the wrecking ball. After it was sold in 1992 it was converted into flats and now functions as a home to your neighbours.

Manor Place Baths

Posted on January 16, 2023 by Kennington Runoff

From the archives, the first edition of our month of best of history posts

From Baths to Boxing to Buddhism

Victorians are well known for many things. We know they were sanctimonious and strived to make our minds pure, and the natural progression was to have clean bodies and clothes, so for the health and hygiene of all the mortal bodies of Walworth, in 1895 work got underway to create Manor Place Baths. In addition to offering showers, it also had three swimming pools, private changing cubicles and large do it yourself laundry facilities. Think of it as kind of a Victorian water park.

Over the years the Baths became more of a community centre and also a place for people to obtain a bit of privacy in an era where privacy was at a premium. Women could trade children’s clothes, men could catch up in the men’s pool, and even children could come along. As the pools weren’t heated and our Greater Kennington forebears didn’t fancy losing their toes to frostbite, the men’s and women’s pools were covered over with wooden flooring in the wintertime, which gave said forebears a brilliant idea……Use it in the winter as a boxing venue.

Manor Place saw its first bout in 1908 and went on to host a roll-call of the famous and infamous, including the Kray twins. It became so well known that when the BBC began to broadcast boxing they chose our little Baths as their first venue. For more than 40 years, The Metropolitan Borough of Southwark’s Charity Boxing Committee organised the bouts, which saw the cream of the boxing world come to Walworth, giving locals the chance to see top-flight, professional boxing on their own doorstep

Fast forward to the 1970’s. By then the now sadly extinct Heygate Estate had been built and most people had their own bathrooms. Domestic labour saving washing machines were now commonplace and those who didn’t found that newly opened laundrettes would do quite nicely. The final nail in coffin of Manor Place came when the new Elephant and Castle Leisure Centre opened in 1972, which put into sharp focus just how deteriorated and outdated Manor Place had become.

Later in life our Baths were used as offices for Southwark Council and later rented out by a Buddhist organisation for use as a meditation facility. It was purchased by Notting Hill Housing Trust in 2017 and it is currently being developed into market rate flats and ‘affordable’ housing. The reason this is taking so long is that the building is, thank baby Jesus, Grade II listed and Notting Hill have to be very careful as to how it is adapted.

Charlie’s Home Movie

Posted on November 17, 2022 by Kennington Runoff

We’d like to share with you a fascinating clip of our local Tramp Charlie Chaplin visiting his old homes in central Kennington in 1959, where he lived in at least four places. In this home movie (at bottom) made by his wife, he first visits 287 Kennington Road, just behind the Doghouse Pub. The next home is at 3 Pownall Terrace, a now nonexistent row of homes just behind the Texaco in Kennington Road (and if your friends tell you that he lived in Pownell Terrace at the back of Kennington Park – smugly correct them). This flat is mentioned many times in his memoirs. And after a few scenes in West Square, Chaplin finds himself by a very different looking Methley Street where Chaplin, with his mum and brother, lived in the garret at number 39. Chaplin also famously lived at the Lambeth Workhouse which we wrote about in 2019.

287 Kennington Lane
A petrol forecourt
39 Methley in middle

This video gives us a snippet of our hallowed patch in the 1950’s and is an interesting testament to how things change but at the same time remain constant. After two minutes the video morphs into more of a traditional home movie, showing scenes of a rather dismal and tophatted London still recovering from bomb damage. And the brightest of you (which is most, as you’ve read this far), will see a brief glimpse of Chaplin’s old school, now the Lycee flats in Kennington Lane.

The Tale of Two Fountains

Posted on October 13, 2022 by Kennington Runoff

Next time you go for your constitutional in Kennington Park, take a moment to inspect two unloved fountains which you’ve probably walked past a thousand times but never taken notice of. Their creation and endurance are interesting reminders of the people and events that have unfolded in our hallowed patch over the years.

In the southwest corner of the park you can find part of a fountain which was donated by philanthropist Felix Slade in 1861. This is the same Slade who founded the school of art and a number of professorships. Slade lived in Aulton Place, and the story goes that while walking through the park he asked for a glass of water and was handed dirty water in a chipped glass (with Aulton Place only over the road he could have just popped back home but let’s not get stuck on tiny details). When he saw kids playing in the park without access to clean water, Slade to took to the task like a duck to, well, water.

Slade’s solution for the lack of clean water was laudable but perhaps a bit over the top for a working class Victorian neighbourhood. He funded the erection of an elaborate fountain on a plinth in red Aberdeen granite with brass handles, a large bronze urn, and his own monogram stamped over it, lest people forget who put it there. The handles were nicked shortly thereafter, followed by the urn. When the urn was replaced it was nicked again and then went from being a fountain to a curious oddity and relic of the past. The ornate base remains and is a reminder of the gulf of understanding and wealth that exists in Greater Kennington to this day.

A bit further up into the park you can see the column which is the remains of Tinworth Fountain. It was created in 1872 in buff terracotta by the Doulton Factory in Vauxhall and was the centrepiece of an ornate sunken garden located where the basketball courts currently reside. It was almost totally destroyed in WWII and put back together without its resplendent and overflowing bowl, which moved and then lost. After being relocated several times it found its current home while still sporting its grand central feature, a sculpture depicting the pilgrimage of life. Sadly the sculpture was knocked over and completely destroyed in 1981. The column that we see today was later used as target practice by local youths.

Our beaten and bombed column still stands and if you look closely you can see the painstaking efforts made to both restore and destroy it. Some very clever soul even decided to replace some of the unglazed buff terracotta poured concrete. Nevertheless, Kennington Park has meant many things to many people over the years, and our battered little monuments stand as eternal reminders of that.

Kennington Runoff

Surreptitiously exploring Kennington, including the suburbs Vauxhall, Oval, Walworth, and Elephant since 2012

Category Archives: history