Another iconic building from my youth

Now yesterday I suggested some of the the all time iconic buildings of my bit of south east London.*

I started with the swimming baths at Laurie Grove, the telephone exchange and Health Centre on St Mary's Road and of course the Fire Station which is still there.

But reading back copies of the BBC news I see that even the fire station was nearly lost when it was one of those slated for closure in 2013.**

And that would have been a shame.  It was built between 1893-4 and is an impressive building reminding me of a grand French Chateau rather than a work a day fire station.

So much so that Peter decided to paint it just in case.

Painting; New Cross Fire Station, © 2015 Peter Topping from a photograph of New Cross Fire Station, January 17 2007, © Danny Robinson licensed for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 license

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*Iconic Buildings from Peckham, New Cross, New Cross and Deptford, Peckham
https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/New%20Cross%20and%20Deptford


**Two London fire stations win reprieve from closure plan, July 10 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23263766

The all time iconic buildings of where we live .................. what are they?

Now on this very wet day I have been thinking of what building I would nominate as my all time iconic building.

The rules are simple enough as I grew up  in Peckham and went to school in New Cross and often wandered as far as Deptford I have pretty much got a clear boundary which runs from Peckham Rye up past New Cross Gate and stops dead at Laurie Grove.

And as I am starting the series I reckon my list would include the Telephone Exchange and the Health Centre on St Mary’s Road, and the old swimming baths at Laurie Grove which opened in 1898 and just missed its centenary closing in 1991.

Added to these I think I would go for the old New Cross Public Library  and the Fire Station.

I could include Edmund Waller but it’s a bit like many board schools built between the 1870s into the 90s, so I shall leave it out.

And because I grew up with Saturday morning pictures I toyed with one of those majestic cinemas but they have all gone as have some of the pubs which I knew only as places to pass.

Which would also mean that the old coco factory on Kender Street would qualify but it was swept away decades ago and I don’t have a picture.

Now the beauty of the series is that it is open to anyone of any age, and of course is not limited to those who like me spent their earliest years in Peckham.

Everyone will bring a new take on what the area means to them and as I left in 1964 I have to say my buildings are frozen in time.

Location; Peckham to New Cross and on to Deptford

Paintings; the New Cross Telephone Exchange and Laurie Grove Swimming Baths, © 2015  Peter Topping

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