Clapham Common

Clapham Common

Clapham Common is a large triangular common, covering 220 acres, serving as an urban park, in Clapham in north-eastern Surrey. Originally common land for the parishes of Battersea and Clapham, it was converted to parkland under the terms of the Metropolitan Commons Act 1878.

The common is deep within the metropolitan conurbation and surrounded on all three sides by dense townscape. Its 220 acres are a valuable green space, in which are three ponds and a Victorian bandstand. It is overlooked by large Georgian and Victorian mansions, and nearby Clapham Old Town.

The common has attracted a regrettably seedy reputation at the wrong end of the evening but otherwise provides a much needed open, green break in the otherwise relentless townscape.

Holy Trinity Clapham, an 18th-century Georgian church overlooking the park, is important in the history of the evangelical Clapham Sect of the Church of England.

History

View on Clapham Common by J. M. W. Turner (1800-1805)

Originally common land for the parishes of Battersea and Clapham; the land was drained in the 1760s, and fine houses were built around the common from the 1790s onwards, which became fashionable dwellings for wealthy business people in what was then a village detached from metropolitan London. Some were members of the Clapham Sect of evangelical reformers, including Lord Teignmouth and Henry Thornton, the banker and abolitionist.

J. M. W. Turner painted "View on Clapham Common" between 1800-1805, showing that even though the common had been drained, it still remained "quite a wild place".

The common was converted to parkland under the terms of the Metropolitan Commons Act in 1878. As London expanded in the 19th century, Clapham was absorbed into the town, with most of the remaining palatial or agricultural estates replaced with terraced housing by the early 1900s. During Second World War, storage bunkers were built on Battersea Rise side of the park; two mounds remain.

About the park

Clapham Common has a range of sporting facilities, including a running track, bowling green, cricket, football, rugby and Australian rules football pitches, and a skateboard venue. The park contains three ponds, two of which are historical features, and a more modern paddling pool known as Cock Pond. Eagle Pond and Mount Pond are used for angling and contain a variety of species including carp to 20 lb, roach, tench and bream. Eagle Pond was extensively refurbished in 2002 when it was completely drained, landscaped and replanted to provide a better habitat for the fish it contained. Long Pond has a century-old tradition of use for model boating.

Holy Trinity Church (1776) is close to the north side of the park. It hosts its fete in the park every summer.

Clapham Common tube station and Clapham South tube station are on the edge of the park at its easternmost and southernmost points respectively. Both stations are served solely by the Northern Line.

A 270 view of Clapham Common

The bandstand

Clapham Common bandstand

In the centre of the park is a bandstand constructed in 1890. It is the largest bandstand in London and a Grade II Listed Building. For many years it was also erroneously thought to be one of the bandstands first erected in 1861 in the Royal Horticultural Society's gardens in South Kensington, which would have made it the oldest surviving cast iron bandstand in Europe. However, recent research has shown that these bandstands went to Southwark Park and Peckham Rye, and it appears that the Clapham bandstand was fabricated to a very similar design almost thirty years later.

The bandstand was left neglected and unmaintained for thirty years, and by 2001 it was thought to be in danger of collapse and had to be shored up with scaffolding for five years. In 2005–2006, a full restoration of the bandstand and surrounding landscape took place, partly funded by an £895,000 lottery grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund matched by £300,000 from Lambeth Council and a further £100,000 from local fundraising efforts and the proceeds of the Ben and Jerry's Summer Sundae event held on the Common. The drainage bund around the bandstand was restored with granite setts during the summer of 2011 at a cost of £12,000 to resolve design faults in the earlier works.

Events

The park has hosted various musical festivals, including the Colourscape Music Festival since 1989,; Get Loaded in the Park, from 2004 to 2011, South West Four Eurodance music festival annually in August since 2004; and other music events. In 2014 the Calling Festival, which had previously been held in Hyde Park under the name 'Hard Rock Calling Festival', moved to Clapham Common.

Sporting events held in Clapham Common and sports teams based in the park include the Latin American football League, which has played organised football on the red car pitches located on the south side of the park since the 1980s; the British Australian Rules Football League Grand Final, for which the park is the traditional venue; South West London Chargers rugby club formed in 2013 have their home in the park; London Titans football club play in the park; various sport teams are active on the park, including softball, korfball, and Australian Rules Football. Clapham Alexandra football club play some games on the park.

Benjamin Franklin used the ponds for science experiments, and developing a "magic" trick. While traveling on a ship, Franklin had observed that the wake of a ship was diminished when the cooks scuttled their greasy water. He studied the effects at Clapham Common on a large pond there. "I fetched out a cruet of oil and dropt a little of it on the water...though not more than a teaspoon full, produced an instant calm over a space of several yards square." He later used the trick to "calm the waters" by carrying "a little oil in the hollow joint of my cane."

Outside links

("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Clapham Common)

• Friends of Clapham Common
• Location map: 51°27’28"N, 0°8’58"W
• Streetmap: TQ287748