personal finance

Let’s move to: Bermondsey, south-east London: a chaotic collage of its eventful past


What’s going for it? Bermondsey has been so pummelled by fortune that it looks as if it has been put together by a vigorous, acid-fuelled game of consequences. The past 80 years, in particular, have been eventful. The blitz, postwar rebuilding, deindustrialisation, the death of the docks and gentrification have left a cityscape that is collaged to a degree perhaps unequalled in this most chaotic of cities. Take a walk from its ancient heart, the old high street Bermondsey Street, past the Victorian parades of Tower Bridge Road and along Grange Walk, which once abutted Bermondsey’s abbey and 18th-century spa, and the game begins: Georgian terraces opposite 80s Brookside vernacular houses, next to 30s council flats, beside Victorian cockney terraces, facing 00s luxury apartment complexes, round the corner from 19th-century philanthropic housing. Take a right and you hit intense foodies hunting for single-estate hazelnuts at Spa Terminus food market, then repeat, repeat, repeat until you hit Peckham. On the plus side, you are never bored…

The case against It is hard to know whether this fragmentary neighbourhood comes together or remains a collage of atomised bits, but that is contemporary London for you. Lots of property speculation along the potential route of the Bakerloo line extension.

Well connected? Trains: Bermondsey station is on the tube’s Jubilee line; South Bermondsey rail station has four to six an hour to London Bridge (5 mins), Peckham (5 mins) and to various south-east London spots. Plans are afoot to extend the Bakerloo line down the Old Kent Road to Lewisham.

Schools Primaries: Tower Bridge, St James’ CofE, Southwark Park and Grange are all “good”, Ofsted says, with St Joseph’s RC, Riverside, Boutcher CofE, Phoenix, Galleywall and Ilderton “outstanding”; John Keats is yet to be inspected. Secondaries: Compass and City of London (Southwark) are “good”, with St Michael’s RC and Harris “outstanding”.

Hang out at… You won’t want for top-notch-but-top-dollar treats on Bermondsey Street and Maltby Street; next-level foodies go to Spa Terminus. The real action, though, is in the Nigerian/Greek/Colombian/YouNameIt spots on Old Kent Road.

Where to buy Take your pick: the “HOW MUCH?” old heart of Bermondsey Street and warehouse apartments of Shad Thames and the riverfront; the more appealing, slightly more affordable centre around Bermondsey Spa Gardens; the more normal habitat of Asda and B&Q in South Bermondsey and the Old Kent Road. Townhouses, £750,000-£1.5m. Terraces and cottages, £475,000-£750,000. Flats: three bedrooms, £325,000-£4m; two bedrooms, £300,000-£1.75m; one bedroom, £250,000-£1m for the poshest riversides. Rentals: a one-bedroom flat, £1,100-£3,500pcm; a three-bedroom flat, £1,500-£6,000pcm.

Bargain of the week Two-bed postwar flat, needs decoration, £275,000, with acorngroup.co.uk.

From the streets

John Parfett “The market on Maltby Street; Machine bike shop and cafe on Tower Bridge Road; lovely old pubs on the river east of Tower Bridge. Downside: the traffic on Tower Bridge Road is getting worse.”

Jess Brown “One of the last M Manze pie and mash shops – there are still queues.’”

Live in Bermondsey? Join the debate below.

Do you live in Ventnor? Do you have a favourite haunt or a pet hate? If so, email lets.move@theguardian.com by 6 August.



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