Clapham North

These are the stations I have visited so far on the Northern Line and below shows you the ones still to visit. There are 52 stations on the line. These maps can be a bit misleading as compass wise they are not correct. Clapham North is south and High Barnet and Edgware are the northernmost stations. I've only just noticed that there are two stations missing from this map. Nine Elms and Battersea power station were opened in 2021 and are on a branch line from Kennington.

As you can see from the map, the Northern line has two routes through Central London. The reason for the different routes and branches on this line is because it was an amalgamation of three separate  railways which combined in the 1920s and 30s.  Of the 52 stations, 38 are underground

The station opened in 1900 as Clapham Road station and was modernised and redesigned by Charles Holden in 1924.  Escalators were installed and the facade replaced. The name was changed to Clapham North in 1926.

Opposite the station is the Clapham North pub which until 2003 was known as the Bedford Arms. Apparently it is a popular pub with Aussie ex-pats.

I turned left out of the station onto Clapham high Street. This road is a section of the A3, the London to Portsmouth road. There has been a road here since Roman times when the romans constructed a road called Stane Street from London to Chichester.

This mural is a map of Clapham showcasing places of interest. This hand drawn map was created by Jenni Sparks and shows landmark buildings, famous residents and local history. I found it a very useful guide of the area.

This large Victorian pub called The Railway is conveniently located for commuters. 'Sardine' the big fish skeleton is by Russell West and is a well known feature in the area.

There are lots of businesses on this road, mainly eating establishments of every variety which all seemed to be busy.

This building has had many uses. It was constructed in 1911 as a public hall and the Clapham Winter Gardens. At some point it became a music hall  and was then a depot for Ferodo a manufacturer of brake pads etc.  In 1960 it was occupied by another motor spares company, Cannon's.

 Now it is the Royal Shakespeare Company's London based rehearsal studios.

The next building on the High Street is the Temperance Billiard Hall, built in 1910 by Norman Evans. 

It was built at the height of the 'Temperance Movement' when alternatives to pubs were being built. By 1939 around 50 billiard halls had opened throughout London. In 1988 it became the offices of Moxley Architects. I noticed that it now has a notice outside advertising the property as luxury apartments.

This attractive late 19th century building, built from red brick and white Portland stone banding was once a bank. The wooden panelled door and decorative windows still exist and is a building that will probably be listed before too long. 

 

You can still read this ghost sign for Gillette Shaves.

The next building of note on the High Street is the Library. This award-winning building is the largest library in Lambeth. The £80 million development which includes  a library, health and leisure centres and  residential accommodation. The £6.5 million construction cost of the library was paid for by the sale of the 136 residential flats that form part of the 12 storey development. The leisure centre which includes a swimming pool has been built a few hundred yards away is part of the same development.

Outside the building are these large letters spelling out the word Library. They were designed by Andrew Logan in his familiar mirror mosaic style. To make them relevant to the area he has included items and momentos donated by Clapham residents.

At first I couldn't find my way in as the entrance is through Mary Seacole medical centre. Glad I persevered as it was impressive on the inside. It has a spiral design which is flexible to allow transformation into a performance area where the open spiral ramp offers visitors a great view of any performance.

Once outside I realised that if I continued along the road I would be back at the previous station of Clapham Common so I returned to the station to look down some of the other roads.

 

Underneath  the railway bridge were these arches. There are more than 5200 railway arches across the country with the majority being in London.  Many are already home to a wide variety of uses from gyms to nightclubs, car repair shops and food and drink venues. However, a large number of them were sold off in 2019 by Network Rail without a thought of the small businesses renting them. The company that bought them set up a business 'The Arch Company' to manage the properties and since then the rents have doubled.

Another entrance to the Clapham Deep shelter has been painted by the Women's Mural Collective. I wrote about the shelters in more detail here .  For some years the area around the shelter had become overgrown and looked derelict. The walls had to be repaired and the area cleared before painting could begin. The shelter has been painted by the artist 7th Pencil. All sides of the landmark have been painted as a tribute to female mural artists from the past and the present. The 'London Wall' were an all female group of street artists during the 80s and 90s in London. The WOM are a collective of London based female artists. The work took a month to complete and local people had a vote to decide on which design they preferred.

Posters about the female artists are displayed on the outer railings.

I continued down Clapham road past these large 3 storey Victorian houses. Some remain as family homes, others have been converted into flats and some taken over by businesses.

This is the Grade II listed St John the Evangelist church. Built in 1841/2. It was built as a chapel of ease which means it is not the parish church but is built within the boundary of the parish for those who cannot travel to the parish church easily. A very classical looking building.

I had not come across this organisation before but it has been in existence for almost 40 years. Founded in 1986 to help people find peaceful solutions to conflict. In 1985 the Standing International Forum on Ethnic Conflict, Development and Human Rights was founded with the purpose of alerting governments and the world to developing crises. The following year it merged with International Alert on Genocide and Massacres to become this charity.

There were some very impressive buildings on Bedford Road. The block of four storey terraced houses were part of a housing development undertaken by George Jennings in the mid 19th century.

The area is now a conservation area with the majority of properties dating from 1870s and were built in phases by Jennings. When built each house was identical with the use of materials and details. Over the years  overpainting and replacement of some doors and windows have changed the overall look. This one has retained all the original features of Jenning's design.

Rathcoole House on Ferndale Road is a different design from the others. Made of red brick it incorporates many ornate details. This landmark building marks the entrance into the conservation area.

On the house is this terracotta plaque with the date of the build as well as the initials of George Jennings above the name of the road.

On the way back to the station I came across this mural under the railway bridge. It was very difficult to get a good photo because of the light entering the tunnel. 

The artwork is titled 'Inner bark Out' by Flo Brooks in 2023. It is painted on six aluminium panels. The theme is Clapham Common being an important site for meeting up both now and in the past. It shows animals and people engaged in moments of play, work and rest.

Clapham Common

This is the 8th station I have visited on the Northern line. It opened in June 1900 as the new terminus of the City and South London Railway. It remained the terminus until the Morden extension was opened in 1926.

As I got off the train I was surprised to see an island platform. This station and the next one at Clapham North are the only two deep level stations that have a narrow island platform. It is quite narrow and I wouldn't want to be here during peak times when there will be numerous passengers waiting for a train.

 

Stairs from the ticket hall are full of light from the domed window above.

The signs were restored in 1997

 

The station entrance was redesigned by Charles Holden in 1923-24. It was listed as a Grade II building in March 1981.

Across the road is the other exit/entrance to the station behind this very unattractive wall.

Next to the main entrance is a row of shops with a Waitrose food store.  I wonder if house prices and rental costs have increased as often happens when this supermarket is nearby. It is known as the 'waitrose effect' .

Above the store is this plaque. I'm not sure why it is so high up as it is impossible to read from street level. As stated this is where the Macaulay family lived. Zachary Macaulay was a member of the Clapham Sect who were believers in the abolition of slavery. Macauley went to the Caribbean in 1784, as a teenager, and took a job as an under manager of a sugar plantation in Jamaica.   On his return he became a member of the Clapham Sect, a group of Tories who opposed slavery and backed other causes such as penal reform and the abolition of capital punishment. William Wilberforce, a Member of Parliament was also a member of the Clapham sect and an abolitionist. Macaulay used his first hand knowledge to inform Wilberforce who made speeches in Parliament. The slave trade was finally abolished in 1807.

I continued following the road, which is called the Pavement, round to the old town.

On the left was The Lodge built in 1868 as a fire station. It was built on land owned by the parish which had previously been used for the Parish lock up. A lock up was often just one dark cell used for locking up prisoners over night. In time the fire station was too small for the expanding village and in 1902 was replaced with a larger fire station. From 1912 it was renamed the Lodge and it became the Common Keeper's residence for Clapham Common. In 2004 it was sold and is now a private residence.

 Old Town has Clapham's most historic buildings. These three houses were built in 1706 as part of a large country estate. Clapham's earliest arrivals came from London to escape the Great plague of 1665/6 and then the Great fire of London in  1666. Samuel Pepys, the diarist, visited Clapham many times and moved there permanently in 1701. He praised the area for its good air and distance from the stench and noise of London. When he died in 1703 he left a legacy of £5 to the poor of Clapham and a series of mourning rings to Clapham residents.

With easy stagecoach connections, 19th century Clapham became one of the London's earliest city suburbs. By the 1820s horse-drawn buses ran regularly into central London. The population greatly increased with the arrival of the Underground followed by electric trams three years later. In 2014 regeneration of the Old Town took place creating a new square.

Next to the early 18th century houses is Maritime House. It was built as the headquarters of the National Union of Seamen in 1939 and is now owned by the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT). The building is divided up into offices and flats.

At the top of the building  are some large fish and a ship's prow.

Looking out over the new square is The Sun pub which was built in the 1820s. It was lucky to have escaped destruction during the bombing of WW2 as adjacent buildings were lost.

 

This area of Clapham had numerous eating places which I'm sure would be very busy in the evenings and at weekends.

On leaving  the Old Town I passed the Omnibus theatre. The theatre opened in 2013 following a seven year campaign by the local community to prevent developers buying this victorian building which was the old Clapham Library.

Next to the theatre is this residential building known as George West House. It was originally constructed in 1915-16 for the Ross Optical Company. The firm was founded in Clerkenwell in 1829 but moved to Clapham in 1891.In 1916 the Ross Optical company was permitted to build a large new factory building because the firm was considered vital to the war effort. Prior to the war many optical instruments were imported from Germany. The company produced a number of products that included microscopes, telescopes, binoculars, photographic lenses etc. The company ceased trading in 1975 when it was unable to compete with foreign competition. 

I crossed the road and walked onto the common. The first thing I noticed was this cattle trough. The metropolitan Drinking Fountain and Cattle Trough Association was founded cattle troughs in 1859 to promote the provision of free drinking water for people and animals. It was started in London as a response to the filthy polluted water of the River Thames which was full of untreated sewage, rubbish and effluent from factories. Eleven years after the first fountain had been erected there were 140 fountains in place in addition to 153. The words cattle trough were added to the Association's official title in 1867 when the association decided it needed to help the plight of animals that were being brought to London markets without access to drinking water. By 1885 over 50,000 horses were drinking daily from the troughs in London. Today there is still a need for drinking water from fountains. In 2018 the mayor of London began installing the first of 110 new drinking fountains in an attempt to stop the use of plastic water bottles. By 2022 the busiest of the new fountains in Camden High Street was dispensing 227 litres a day.

Not far from the trough is the Temperance fountain. The purpose of these fountains was to  encourage people not to drink beer by giving them a free supply of safe water to drink. As coffee and tea were so expensive these drinking fountains were an obvious choice for the Temperance societies to provide. This one on the common depicts a woman giving water to a beggar and was cast by F. Millar of Munich. It was commissioned in 1884 but was not erected in Clapham until 1895. The statue had first been placed by London Bridge but the weight of the granite and bronze statue was causing cracks to appear in the arches of the bridge so it was gifted to Clapham.

In the north of the common is the Holy Trinity church. Built in the 1774-76 it was known as the base for the members of the Clapham Sect. They lived around the Common and were worshippers at the church. Just after it was built a fence was erected encircling the church which was very handy for the inhabitants of the local cottages to hang their washing on. As a consequence an order was made in Sept 1777  'That the Beadle be directed if he finds any cloaths hanging on the church fence to throw them off.'

Clapham Common is mentioned as far back as the Domesday book of 1086. It was originally common land for the use of commoners to graze their animals and  collect firewood. In 1877 the land was designated as 'a Metropolitan Common' which protects it from development and preserves its open character of not being enclosed land. The Common offers a wide range of sports including football, tennis, basketball, roller skating amongst others. There are three ponds/lakes. One of which is used for fishing. On a sunny, Sunday morning like today the Common is a magnet for dog walkers, runners and families.

In the middle section of the Common is the Windmill Inn. Named after a windmill which was recorded on this site in 1631. This building was built in 1790 and was used as a coaching inn where the horses would be changed and the passengers receive refreshments or even an overnight stay if needed. Once the railways arrived from the 1840s onwards the need for coaches decreased rapidly. In 1848 Young's brewery bought the Inn and it became one of the last to which their beer was delivered in a horse drawn dray. 

In the 1890s this row of houses was built to replace a grove of chestnut trees but other than this no other developments have encroached the Common.

 

I left the Common to go and explore some of the backstreets of Clapham and came across this unlikely building in the middle of a council housing estate. 

 There was no information nearby and so I had to wait until I was home before researching this incongruous feature. It turns out that this is a Georgian orangery, a place where exotic plants would have been grown as well as a place of entertainment. It was built in 1792 -3 by the grandson of William Thornton, a merchant who became a director of the Bank of England. His grandsoin, Robert, director of the East India Company was also a keen gardener and he was responsible for extending his grandfather's mansion and gardens here. In 1851 Thornton House was sold off and converted into the Notre Dame convent school which closed in 1939 and became derelict. After the war the council built a housing estate on the land.  One part of the mansion did remain however and that was the Orangery. It was given Grade II listed status in 1955 but unfortunately does not seem to have been used for anything since. I'm not quite sure what you could do with it but it does add a surprising element if, like myself, you wander around the back of Clapham to see what you can find.

I walked back to the High Street and came across the entrance to the deep level shelters constructed during  WW2. Four were built south of the River Thames and could accommodate 8000 people in each one. 

The underground farm, mentioned on the plaque,  was the brainchild of Steven Dring and his business partner Richard Ballard who began their urban farm of growing microgreens here in the deep shelter. LED lighting was the breakthrough that made it possible by giving enough warmth and light to grow a wide  range of leaves. The shelter was stripped, cleaned and painted. Bunk beds were replaced with stacks of giant draws of salad leaves. The crops consist of pea shoots, radish, mustard, coriander, parsley and rocket grown on capillary matting made from recycled carpet. There is a sophisticated irrigation and ventilation system in place. The underground farm uses 70%-90% less water and 95% less fertiliser than conventional farming. The farm focuses on supplying local supplies local people and businesses. It is also certified carbon neutral. 

This mock tudor building which used to be The Plough public house was rebuilt in 1920s. It is now a privately run pub known as The Stane Street Syndicate'. the name Stane Street comes from the old Roman Road that Clapham High Street follows which was called Stane Street by the Saxons.

This mural painted by Loretto is also on the High Street. The Dream Band is made up of Hendrix, Moon, Dylan, Presley and Lennon

The building with its semi circular window was built in 1914 as the majestic cinema. In 1960 it closed as a cinema and became a recording studio and bingo hall. The bingo hall only used the ground floor so this was sealed off and the upper gallery and balcony were converted into the recording studio. In 1985 it became a nightclub and although it has changed owners it is still a nightclub today.

I left the High Street and wandered down a couple of side streets. This building is the Postal Office which opened in 1902.

I am now on Venn Street which was developed in the 1890s. In 1910 the Electric palace cinema opened but by 1918 it had closed and the building was sold. The opening of a new cinema here in the 1990s led to the arrival of cafes, restaurants and an art gallery.

I can see why Clapham is popular with singles and families. It is an attractive and buzzy place on the doorstep of Central London just 10 mins on a tube to London Bridge. It is a lovely place to visit especially on a hot, sunny day like today. I sat outside the Picturehouse for a cool refreshing drink before going home. I had put my camera and phone away otherwise I would have taken a photo of a man (about 30ish) wandering past in his 'y' fronts and socks! Only in London!