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Coordinates: 51°32′41″N 0°08′45″W / 51.5447°N 0.1459°W / 51.5447; -0.1459

Kentish Town
Kentish Town  Kentish Town shown within Greater London
OS grid reference	TQ285845
London borough	Camden
Ceremonial county	Greater London
Region	London
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	LONDON
Postcode district	NW5
Dialling code	020
Police	Metropolitan
Fire	London
Ambulance	London
EU Parliament	London
UK Parliament	Holborn and St. Pancras
London Assembly	Barnet and Camden
List of places: UK • England • London

Kentish Town is an area of north west London, England in the London Borough of Camden.

History[link]

The most widely accepted explanation of the name of Kentish Town^{[by whom?]} is that it derived from 'Ken-ditch' meaning the 'bed of a waterway'. Kentish Town was originally a settlement along the River Fleet which flowed through the area, and today runs underground.^[1]

Kentish Town is first recorded during the reign of King John (1207) as kentisston. By 1456 Kentish Town was recognised as a thriving hamlet, and in this period a chapel of ease is recorded as being built for the inhabitants.

The early 19th century brought modernisation, causing much of the area's rural charm, the River Fleet and the 18th century buildings to vanish, although pockets still remain, for example Little Green Street. Between the availability of public transport to it from London, and its urbanisation, it was a popular resort.

Large amounts of land were purchased to build the railway, which can still be seen today. Kentish Town was a prime site for development as the Kentish Town Road was a major route from London northwards. Probably its most famous resident was Karl Marx who lived at 9 Grafton Terrace from 1856.

1877 saw the beginning of mission work in the area as it was then poor. The mission first held their services outside but as their funding increased they built a mission house, chapel, and vicarage. One mission house of the area was Lyndhurst Hall, which remained in use before being taken over by the Council. The Council wished it to sell it for residential use, and the hall was demolished in 2006.

During the 19th century and early 20th century the area of Kentish Town became for many years the home of many famous piano and organ manufacturers,^[who?] and was described by The Piano Journal in 1901 as "...that healthful suburb dear to the heart of the piano maker".

A network of streets in the East of Kentish Town has streets named after places or persons connected with Christ Church, Oxford viz: Oseney, Busby, Gaisford, Caversham, Islip, Wolsey, Frideswide, Peckwater & Hammond. All these streets lay behind the Oxford Arms. Some of the freehold of these streets is still in the name of Christ Church Oxford.

A network of streets in the north of Kentish Town were formerly part of a large estate owned by St John's College, Cambridge. Lady Margaret Road is named after Lady Margaret Beaufort, foundress of St John's College. Burghley Road is named for Lord Burghley, Chancellor to Elizabeth I and benefactor of St John's. Similarly, College Lane, Evangelist Road and Lady Somerset Road are street names linked to the estate of St John's College.

In 1912 the Church of St. Silas the Martyr (designed by architect Earnest Charles Shearman) was finally erected and consecrated, and by December of that year it became a parish in its own right. It can still be seen today along with the church of St Luke with St Paul and the Church of St. Barnabas (handed over to the Greek Orthodox Church in 1957). The present Church of England parish church is St. Benet's.

In his poem Parliament Hill Fields, Sir John Betjeman refers to "the curious Anglo-Norman parish church of Kentish Town".

Kentish Town Road contains one of London's many disused Tube stations. South Kentish Town tube station was closed in June 1924 after strike action at the Lots Road power station meant the lift could not be used. It never reopened. The distinctive building is now occupied underground by a massage shop and on ground level by a 'Cash Converters' pawn shop at the corner of Kentish Town Road and Castle Road. There have been proposals to rebuild the station.

Kentish Town was to see further modernisation in the post-World War II period. However, the residential parts of Kentish Town, dating back to the mid-19th century have survived and are much admired architecturally.^{[by whom?]}

Political representation[link]

Kentish Town is part of the Holborn and St Pancras seat currently held by Labour's Frank Dobson. However, although considered traditional Labour heartland the area has often defied its demographic by resolutely maintaining a strong centrist vote. Kentish Town was an early base for the Social Democratic Party and in recent years the increasingly middle class population has returned large votes for the Green and Liberal Democrat parties. In May 2006 the Liberal Democrats won two of the three Council seats in Kentish Town, strengthening this hold by taking the final seat in a by-election in November of the same year. In the Council elections in May 2010, Labour regained all three Council seats.

Filming location[link]

In 2002 the comedy and drama film About a Boy was filmed in Lady Margaret Road, which is located at the top of Kentish Town. The front house shot used in the TV series Spaced is also very close to Kentish Town. Many of the filming locations used in the 2006 film "Venus", starring Peter O'Toole and Lesley Phillips, were in Kentish Town.

Shops and businesses[link]

In 2005, a survey of Kentish Town by the local Green Party claimed that out of 87 shops on Kentish Town Road (locally known as Kentish Town High Street), 53 were still independently owned.^[2] The high street is a mixture of national retail chains and independent shops, including a long-standing bookshop, several delis and organic stores. Many 'World Food' shops have opened up on the street. However, since 2009 there has been a marked increase in independent shops being replaced with chain stores including Pret A Manger, Costa Coffee and Sainsbury's.

Culture, bars and music[link]

Kentish Town has always been noted for its pubs and bars. Pub rock is usually traced back to the "Tally Ho", a former jazz pub, where Eggs over Easy started playing in May 1971, and were soon joined by Bees Make Honey, Brinsley Schwarz, Max Merritt and the Meteors, Ducks Deluxe and others.^[3] Other music pubs include the "Bull & Gate" which featured early performances by Blur, The Housemartins, Suede, PJ Harvey, Ash, The Pogues, The Men They Couldn't Hang, Keane, The Libertines, Muse, The Shamen, Manic Street Preachers, and Coldplay. The pub was the site of the extremely popular and influential six-nightly 'Timebox' club run by Jon 'Fat' Beast from 1987 to 1992.

In more recent years the are has become noted as leading the trend for the resurgence of back-to-basics, real ale pubs like the CAMRA award-winning Southampton Arms, the Pineapple, and Tapping the Admiral. Many of these are stocked with ale from the Camden Town Brewery, located in a mews in West Kentish Town. A new bar is set to open on the site in March 2012.

Kentish Town is also home to The Forum (formerly known as the Town and Country club), for many years well into the 1950s one of Kentish Town's most popular and comfortable cinemas, and now a popular live music venue.

In the last five years Kentish Town, and particularly West Kentish Town, has become renowned for its art galleries, studios and creative spaces. Most notable are Spring Studios, the Zabludowicz Collection, the Beardsmore Gallery, photographer Rankin's Annroy and Leighton Space.

Torriano Avenue, dating back to 1848, is a popular Kentish Town street being home to Pete Stanley, one of the country's best-known bluegrass banjo players, British actor Bill Nighy, The Torriano Poets, a beacon of culture where local poets have met for over 20 years and still hold weekly public poetry readings on Sunday evenings; its founder was John Rety. The street is also home to two pubs, one being an 1850s hostelry The Leighton, the other The Torriano, which was for many years an old-fashioned community off-licence. One of London's most famous nudist public baths, Rio's, is in Kentish Town.

The Kentishtowner

Kentish Town is home to North London's only daily online magazine, The Kentishtowner, founded in 2010, which casts a wry look at the area's arts and entertainments scenes, and features contributions from a wide range of broadsheet journalists and readers.

St Pancras public baths[link]

St Pancras Public Baths

The largest municipal building in Kentish Town is the St Pancras public baths, opened in 1900, designed by T.W. Aldwinckle. The large complex originally had separate first and second class men's baths and a women's baths, along with a public hall. Little of the interior remains intact. The baths were closed in January 2007 for refurbishment and re-opened at the end of July 2010.

Architecture and geography[link]

Kentish Town has a fairly large boundary, stretching from Camden Gardens to as a far north as the Highgate Road/Gordon House Road junction near Dartmouth Park. Kentish Town generally includes the areas to the west, around Queens Crescent and to the east around Torriano.

Many of the old buildings remain, albeit hidden behind the facades of modern shops or neglected, and it is still possible to get a good impression of Kentish Town's heritage in present-day NW5.

Notable residents[link]

• Mike Barson, the keyboardist of the British pop/ska band Madness
• Sian Berry, Green Party politician and 2008 Green Party candidate for London Mayor.
• Tom Conti, actor
• Giles Coren, restaurant critic
• Hunter Davies, writer
• Simon Day, comedian
• Margaret Forster, writer
• Ben Goldacre, medical doctor and journalist
• Eddy Grant, reggae and rock artist
• Patricia Hewitt, former Secretary of State for Health
• Bert Jansch, folk musician
• Jim Jeffries, comedian
• Tessa Jowell, Olympics Minister
• Frank Lampard, footballer
• Roger Lloyd Pack, actor
• Karl Marx, 19th century political philosopher.
• Scott Mills, Radio 1 DJ
• Harry Mount, historian, barrister and journalist.
• Mohamed Nur, Mayor of Mogadishu
• Gareth Peirce, solicitor
• Lucy Porter, comedian
• Alan Rusbridger, editor of the Guardian newspaper
• Jon Snow, TV journalist
• Keir Starmer, Director of Public Prosecutions
• Noel Fielding, comedian
• Jim Sturgess, Actor and Musician

Transport[link]

Kentish Town has a range of transport connections: a mainline railway station on the St. Albans/Luton Airport to Brighton/Gatwick line; Underground station, overground connection (at Kentish Town West and Camden Road stations) and multiple bus routes.

Nearest stations[link]

• Kentish Town station
• Gospel Oak railway station
• Kentish Town West railway station
• Camden Road railway station
• Camden Town tube station

Neighbouring areas[link]

• Camden Town and Chalk Farm to the south
• Barnsbury to the south-east
• Tufnell Park and Holloway to the east
• Dartmouth Park and Archway to the north-east
• Highgate to the north
• Hampstead and Belsize Park to the west

Footnotes[link]

References[link]

• Denford, Steven (2005), Streets of Kentish Town, Camden History Society, ISBN 0-904491-62-5 
• Tindall, Gillian (1980), The Fields Beneath, Paladin Books, ISBN 0-586-08320-0 

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