Route Developer: Des de Moor/Chris Wingrove
Route Checker: Kate Harding
Start Point: Rhodes Community Centre, Woodland Street, E8
[1] Leaving the community centre turn right onto Carlisle Walk and walk past the sports area on the left withTrinity Church on your right. At the junction with Forest Road turn left. Cross Forest Road and turn right into Holly Street.
Walk along Holly Street, past the GP surgery and Leisure & Community Centre. Cross Richmond Road at the crossing, and continue along Holly Street past junctions with Mapledene Road, Jacaranda Grove and Middleton Road. After the garage on your right, continue along a short pedestrian path into Albion Square.
(A) Albion Square is an early Victorian garden square in the heart of Hackney. It was designated a conservation area in 1975 and provides the setting for a number Grade II listed buildings and a drinking fountain of local importance.
[2] Enter the gardens through the metal gate on your right. Walk through the gardens and exit through the gate at the opposite end. Once out of the park, bear left into Albion Drive, cross it and turn right. Go across a short pedestrian section to reach Haggerston Road. Turn left onto Haggerston Road, passing the church and All Saints Centre - Clowns International. Stay on the left hand side of the road, and continue past a community garden and shops at Scriven Street. At the end of Haggerston Road you reach Dunston Road where you turn right.
The new building across the canal is one of the new academies, the Bridge Academy, a mixed, non-denominational school for 11 - 19 year olds, specialising in music and mathematics.
On the left go down the small set of steps to reach the Regent’s Canal towpath.
The Regent's Canal (built 1812-20) provides a link from the Paddington arm of the Grand Union Canal to the Limehouse Basin and the River Thames in east London. This section of the canal opened in 1820, following the Paddington to Camden section opening in 1816. In the 1920s the canal was used to transport commodities such as iron and steel, grain, raw materials for HP sauce, leather waste, last blocks, cresylic acid, zinc ashes, and even cheese but now is used mainly for pleasure cruising. The navigational depth is, on average, 3 feet 6 inches (1.1 m) and can take boats up to 72 feet (21.9 m) long and 14 feet (4.3 m) wide with a headroom of 9 feet 2 inches (2.8 m).
Turn right at the bottom of the steps and walk along the towpath. Watch out for cyclists especially under Kingsland Road and Whitmore Road bridges where visibility is especially bad. As you walk along the canal you can see small metal sculptures on the far wall. Just before Kingsland Bridge, there is a map of this area of the canal.
[3] Go under Kingsland Bridge. As the path slopes up you will come to the Kingsland basin on the right, where several narrowboats are usually moored but is now being redeveloped. Continue along towpath to Whitmore Road bridge. A plaque at the bridge tells you what cargo was carried. Almost straight after is an access ramp leading up to Whitmore Road.
Leave the towpath here, join the road and continue left, away from the canal and towards the church, passing flats, the Rose Lipman community centre and a café to your left. At the next junction, turn right into Downham Road. Take the next left into Mortimer Road, a very quiet street with very pretty gardens. On the right hand side of Mortimer Road at number 56 is a blue plaque dedicated to Philip Henry and his son Sir Edmund Gosse.
Philip Henry Gosse was an English naturalist and inventor of the seawater aquarium. He is the author of Omphalos, an attempt to reconcile the immense geological ages presupposed by Charles Lyell with the biblical account of creation.
Sir Edmund William Gosse was an English poet, author and critic.
To the left at the end of Mortimer Road is St Peter’s Church.
[4] At the end of Mortimer Road, pass through a short pedestrian footway to reach De Beauvoir Square.
(B) De Beauvoir Square is a classically laid out garden square and is protected under the London Squares Preservation Act of 1931. Until 1820 the area now covered by De Beauvoir Town was open country with a few grand houses. The square was originally part of an elaborate plan by William Rhodes to create a 150-acre estate reaching from the newly-cut Regent’s Canal to Balls Pond Road. Only De Beauvoir Square was landscaped as planned.
Go right and cross the road to enter the gardens through a metal gate. Continue around the circular path through the rose beds. There is seating here and a small playing area for children under 7. Exit the gardens through another metal gate and turn right. A detour left and right into Mortimer Road will take you to the territory of William Lyttle, the so-called Mole Man, whose tunnelling up to 20m in all directions from his house (no 121) caused street subsidence in 2001.
Turn left into Hertford Road. Cross to the right hand side of Hertford Road and then turn right into Englefield Road. When you reach the junction with Kingsland Road, cross at the controlled crossings.
As the name Kingsland suggests, this was royal hunting territory, part of the hunting grounds of a Tudor royal residence at Newington Green and was heavily forested with plentiful wild bulls, stags and wild boars. In the 18th century it was frequented by Dick Turpin, the famous highwayman.
Cross the cobbled off-shoot of Kingsland Road, and then cross Richmond Road to the left hand side. On the right hand side of the road there is a brown plaque on a building indicating the old printing works of the Hackney Gazette which operated here from 1870 – 1858.
Continue along Richmond Road as it goes slightly uphill and to the left. The road then bears right, passing over the new Overground Line. Pass a Methodist Church to the left and just afterwards take a cut-through passing between low-level brick houses signposted Mayfield Close. Carry on along the right hand side of Mayfield Close. Cross Forest Road and continue ahead into Beechwood Road.
Opposite the primary school (which took a direct hit in bombing in World War Two) is Holy Trinity Church.
(C) Holy Trinity Church, Beechwood Road is the Clown’s Church and has a small exhibition about clowns and their history which may be viewed on the first Friday of each month from 12 noon to 5pm. The first Sunday in February is the annual clown’s church service at Holy Trinity Church in memory of the clown Joseph Grimaldi. The clowns usually perform for the public after the church service. Joseph Grimaldi ("Joey") is regarded as the greatest British clown. He was born in London in 1778 and died in 1837. His performances at the Sadler's Wells and Drury Lane theatres were extremely popular and helped to establish the British clowning traditions which continue to this day.
Immediately after Trinity Church Hall turn right into a footway leading to a car park. Walk through the car park and turn left at the end into Carlisle Walk. Continue ahead to return to the community centre.