Local and national appeal to save iconic Brixton building ‘at risk’.

An architecturally significant Brixton school with a significant history has been named by the Victorian Society as one of the 10 most endangered buildings for 2024.

The former Kennington Boys’ School on Cormont Road, a Grade II listed building opposite Myatt’s Fields Park, has been on the Historic England ‘at risk’ register since 2016.

Local history campaigner Tracey Gregory has launched a petition calling on Lambeth Council to immediately weatherproof the building.

The council said BLOGS that even a temporary fix would cost £1.5 million and that, in light of the pressures on its budget, it is looking at how to fund the work.

The building was requisitioned by the military wing of St Bart’s Hospital in 1914, along with the adjacent St Gabriel’s Teacher Training College.

The two buildings became London’s first general hospital, treating thousands of wounded soldiers throughout the First World War.

The need was so great that the hospital took over Myatt’s Fields Park opposite, as the demand for bed space for the wounded exceeded the space available in the school and college buildings.

The famous writer Vera Brittain, author of Testament of Youthworked as a nurse there.

Actor and writer Griff Rhys Jones, president of the Victorian Society, said: “This is one of those dilemmas that just seems confusing. How come this building can’t be reused? Recycled? Why can’t it be sold?

“Lots of distinguished old sites have been successfully repurposed for housing or commercial use. To allow this noble structure to deteriorate simply through neglect is surely bad and wasteful policy.”

Brittain described the school as “one of the few distinguished buildings in the bleak and dirty wilderness of south London”.

She was one of many nurses who cared for the wounded and dying at the school while it was a hospital. Her poem A military hospital it was written while he was working there.

Her fiance, the poet Roland Leighton, was killed in the war.

After the First World War, the building returned to schooling south Londoners, as it had done for more than a century.

It is a key feature of the Minet conservation area.

After the Second World War, the school became Kennington Boys’ School and later Charles Edward Brooke Girls’ School, before becoming vacant after the girls’ school moved to new premises nearby in 2012.

The building has been on Historic England’s ‘at risk’ register since 2016, when its condition was recorded as ‘poor’.

By the time of the 2023 register, its condition had deteriorated to “very poor”.

The Victorian Society said this demonstrated that its last owner, Lambeth council, “failed to undertake the necessary ongoing maintenance”.

A survey commissioned by the council in March 2016 is said to have identified that water ingress had caused significant internal damage.

Work to make the building wind and weather tight was identified as urgently needed in 2016.

“Some remedial work should have started in 2023, but no action was taken,” the company said.

“It is now essential that urgent work is done to stop further deterioration and to identify a new use for the building before the structure deteriorates further.

“Its central London location offers opportunities for reuse that do not apply to many buildings. Surely a sympathetic reuse could be found.

“Residents are very concerned about a building that has been a prominent feature of their lives and their locality but has been covered in green netting for years.

James Hughes, director of the Victorian Society, said: “London has a rich heritage of Victorian and Edwardian schools and this example by the prolific TJ Bailey is particularly splendid.

“Appropriately described as a building of ‘romance and fantasy’, its grand spiers, towers, dormers and Dutch gables combine to an entertaining kaleidoscopic effect.

“This is a building of enormous historical and architectural importance and is a landmark in the Minet Conservation Area, in a pleasant and desirable part of London, within striking distance of the city centre.

“It is also one with enormous potential for reuse, which the local authority must make an absolute priority.”

A Lambeth council spokesman said the school building was originally slated for refurbishment under the Blair government’s Building Schools for the Future program – but that the current government had decided to build a new school elsewhere.

“A temporary school operated on the playground of this site until 2019, allowing the condition of this Victorian building to deteriorate,” the council said.

“The building was then handed over to the council three years ago in a very poor condition and in need of very extensive restoration work.

“The council initially looked at a temporary fix, including repairing the roof, but even that alone would have cost £1.5 million.

“Given the cost of this work and the pressures on our budget, we are now looking at the feasibility of securing funding for the much-needed refurbishment and will consult with the local community before making any decisions about its future use.”

The Victorian Society has a statutory role in the planning process and its input has saved iconic buildings from St Pancras Station in London to Albert Dock in Liverpool.

Tracey Gregory said the school is next to St Gabriel’s College (formerly a teacher training college and now flats) and overlooks the Grade II listed Myatt’s Fields Park.

Local petition