A Sunday afternoon walk, that was really enjoyable despite being along quite so many roads! Although we we did not officially start out in Kingsbury, that is where I will start out my blog! We started past “Roe Green Park”. Not surprisingly, the park’s name probably was derived from the Roe Deer that once roamed in the area right up until the Medieval period near Roe Green House. The house sadly is no longer there and village which was built in it’s place during 1918 and 1920, was done by Prussian/German prisoners of war after World War I. The park was created about 1935.
Much to my surprise I was found that walking the roads wasn’t too unpleasant as it gave us a lovely sight of a wonderful thatched cottage. This was totally unexpected in the middle of the suburban surroundings! I was most impressed, it is something I would more expect in Devon or Cornwall 🙂 I am still trying to locate some more history about this beautiful buildings. Even as we walked on, I realised we were quite high up as we were treated to quite a view over London, particularly the view over the new Wembley National Stadium.
It was not long before we we walking by yet another park. It was “Silver Jubilee Park”. It was shame we did not get the time to walk it, therefore we will be coming back to investigate this one!. This Park had been in existence for a long time before it was renamed “Silver Jubilee” for the Jubilee of King George V. We were right at the northern end of the park, which was opposite Holy Innocents Church, Kingsbury. This beautiful little Parish Church which was designed by the architect William Butterfield in 1884. William Butterfield was also responsible for designing Keble College Chapel and All Saints’, Margaret Street, London.
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| From 2011 – 25.09.2011 – Kingsbury – Edgware Walk |
The path soon turned away from the park and into the long “Edgware Road”. Not much to talk about here you may think. Well to be truthful, at this point I was sad to see that quite a few things had shut down, so I am lacking slightly in photos for a while! Also I was slightly distracted with being hungry in thirsty! Although we did make one decision and that was to make our destination towards Burnt Oak.
We firstly made our way through Colindale. It was not long before we came across a curious discovery. An Art Deco building, which was covered all over by car sales and “Hurricane room” signs. Somehow, it could not still not hide the fact that this used to be a cinema. The cinema was designed by the Harrow architect Arthur.P. Starkey, who was assisted by the architect Frederick Adkins and was opened in 1935 as the Odeon Theatre.
Sadly, the Odeon was closed by the Rank Organisation in September 1960, and the building remained empty and derelict for many years. The cinema has a mixed history from the 70’s to 80’s, even gaining a second screen, but it was never enough for it to keep it open, so in 1981 it closed for good. The building itself is still used as a snooker club and is also a car sales room – if you look carefully at my photo, you can see the art deco building hidden just behind the sign –
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| From 2011 – 25.09.2011 – Kingsbury – Edgware Walk |
We left this particular movie history behind, to continue to walk through Colindale. The road just seems to drifts into Burnt Oak Broadway. Unfortunately for me I could not really see any real markers as to see when we were had crossed any boundaries! But I could not resist to take yet another photo of yet another beautiful Art Deco building.
This building was at one time “The Savoy Cinema”, which had been designed by the architect George Coles. The cinema opened in 1936. This must have been an amazing cinema as from the research that I have found the auditorium was equipped with a Christie theatre organ which had previously been installed Cinema, Glasgow, Scotland. I can only imagine the excitement of listening to one of those organs appearing in the cinema!
The Savoy was taken over in early 1960’s, then only to suffer the same fate as the previous cinema to close down never to show a film again. The building was then converted into a bingo club, which was the first to operate in London. Luckily the building retained all it’s original features and is now a Grade II Listed building
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| From 2011 – 25.09.2011 – Kingsbury – Edgware Walk |
At this point we turned of the Broadway to walk through the busy Burnt Oak High street. It struck me how busy it was for a Sunday. Passing the station we were once again walk a park. It was nice and pleasant after all those roads we had just negotiated! We had entered Watling Park.
Watling Park, opened in 1931. In fact this whole area, was once part of the “Goldbeaters Farm”. The London County Council took it upon themselves in 1924 in the “Home fit for Heroes” campaign to build a whole new estate. A piece of land was set aside for this beautiful new park. It is really nice park to walk through particularly as the silk stream run through it 🙂
We left the park behind, to make our way to Edgware. We walked through Orange Hill Road and up to Deansbrook. Deansbrook is not the same as the silk stream that runs though Watling Park. It seems that Edgware and Burnt Oak have quite a few streams and brooks in the area!! We finally reached Edgware where we finished our walk for the Sunday afternoon 🙂
These are all the photos for the afternoon –
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| 2011 – 25.09.2011 – Kingsbury – Edgware Walk |
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