Hilly Fields is located in

Ladywell Ladywell is a locale in Lewisham in South East London, England, and a ward in the London Borough of Lewisham between Brockley, Crofton Park and Lewisham proper. It has ample green space including Ladywell Fields and Hilly Fields which borders ...

ward in Lewisham, South East London, and is managed by the

London Borough of Lewisham Lewisham () is a London borough in south-east London; it forms part of Inner London. The principal settlement of the borough is Lewisham. The local authority is Lewisham London Borough Council, based in Catford. The Prime Meridian passes throug ...

. Preserved as a park through the efforts of

Octavia Hill Octavia Hill (3 December 1838 – 13 August 1912) was an English Reform movement, social reformer, whose main concern was the welfare of the inhabitants of cities, especially London, in the second half of the nineteenth century. Born into a fa ...

, the park was opened in 1896.

Origins

By the late 19th century, Deptford Common had been lost to developers. The philanthropist Octavia Hill was active in Deptford, and learnt of building proposals in the Hilly Fields area. Supported by the

Commons Preservation Society The Open Spaces Society is a campaign group that works to protect public rights of way and open spaces in the United Kingdom, such as common land and village greens. It is Britain's oldest national conservation body and a registered charity. Foun ...

, the Kyrle Society and the

Metropolitan Public Gardens Association The Metropolitan Public Gardens Association (also known as the MPGA) is a charity in London for the purposes of the preservation of public parks and gardens, established in 1882. It facilitated the creation of new public open spaces, including f ...

Hill formed a committee in 1889 to secure the preservation of the area as a public park. Hill's committee succeeded in getting the

London County Council London County Council (LCC) was the principal local government body for the County of London throughout its existence from 1889 to 1965, and the first London-wide general municipal authority to be directly elected. It covered the area today kno ...

to open the park in 1896, the same year that the

National Trust The National Trust, formally the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, is a charity and membership organisation for heritage conservation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, there is a separate and ...

acquired its first property,

Alfriston Clergy House Alfriston Clergy House in Alfriston, Polegate, East Sussex, England, was the first built property to be acquired by the National Trust. It was purchased in 1896 for £10. The house lies adjacent to the Church of St. Andrew. It is a Grade II* ...

; Hill was one of the three co-founders of the Trust. One of her co-founders, Robert Hunter, was the chairman of the committee to save Hilly Fields. The park was laid out to a design by Lt Col

JJ Sexby John James Sexby VD (known as JJ Sexby) (15 July 1847 – 10 May 1924) was a British civil servant who served as the first Chief Officer for Parks for the London County Council from 1892 to 1909, and was responsible for the creation of many of Lo ...

, the Chief Officer of Parks for the LCC. Responsibility for the park transferred from the LCC to the LB of Lewisham in 1971.

Facilities and Features

Within the park there are a number of facilities. The Francis Drake Bowls Club was opened in 1906. Other facilities include three tennis courts, a cricket pitch, a basketball court, a football pitch, a dog exercise area and a monthly farmers’ market. For the Millennium in 2000, a stone circle was erected. The circle received a mention in the Civic Trust’s Awards in 2002. A nature reserve was established in 1992. The park has a café, called Pistachios in the Park. The park hosts a 5 km

Parkrun Parkrun (stylised as parkrun) is a collection of events for walkers, runners and volunteers that take place every Saturday morning at more than 2,000 locations in 23 countries across six continents. Junior Parkrun (stylised as junior parkrun) ...

on Saturday mornings and a 2 km Junior Parkrun on Sunday mornings. One of the features of Sexby’s original design for the park was a bandstand. This was still in place in 1924. The Bandstand is now long-gone, but it is featured in a modern mural on the park café. The summit of the park is 175 feet above sea level, from where views of central London can be obtained. There is an active Friends Group. Hilly Fields is within the Brockley

Conservation Area Protected areas or conservation areas are locations which receive protection because of their recognized natural, ecological or cultural values. There are several kinds of protected areas, which vary by level of protection depending on the ena ...

School

In the centre of the park, and pre-dating it, is a secondary school. Built in 1884-5 as West Kent Grammar School, it later became Brockley County Secondary School. It is now

Prendergast School Prendergast School is a girls' secondary school and sixth form located on Hilly Fields, Brockley, in the London Borough of Lewisham. It has an independent board of governors. The school motto is from Chaucer's Prologue to ''The Canterbury Ta ...

. The school is listed (under its former name of Hillyfields Sixth Form Centre)

Grade II* In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

but only for the ‘exceptional’ mural paintings, executed between 1933 and 1936, in the school hall, by four painters connected with the

Royal College of Art The Royal College of Art (RCA) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom, with campuses in South Kensington, Battersea and White City. It is the only entirely postgraduate art and design university in the United Kingdom. It offe ...

: Charles Mahoney,

Evelyn Dunbar Evelyn Mary Dunbar (18 December 1906 – 12 May 1960) was a British artist, illustrator and teacher. She is notable for recording women's contributions to World War II on the United Kingdom home front, particularly the work of the Women's Land A ...

Mildred Eldridge Mildred Elsie Eldridge known as Elsi Eldridge, (1 August 1909 – 10 March 1991) was a British artist, mural painter and book illustrator. Biography Eldridge was born in Wimbledon in London where her father was pawnbroker who later became a ...

and Violet Martin.

Cultural references

Edith Nesbit Edith Nesbit (married name Edith Bland; 15 August 1858 – 4 May 1924) was an English writer and poet, who published her children's literature, books for children as E. Nesbit. She wrote or collaborated on more than 60 such books. She was also ...

referred to Hilly Fields in her 1913 non-fiction work ''The Wings and the Child''. The Brockley-born novelist

Henry Williamson Henry William Williamson (1 December 1895 – 13 August 1977) was an English writer who wrote novels concerned with wildlife, English social history and ruralism. He was awarded the Hawthornden Prize for literature in 1928 for his book ''Tarka ...

referred to the campaign to save Hilly Fields in his 1952 novel ''Donkey Boy''. The poet David Jones used Hilly Fields as inspiration for his 1961 poem ''The Tutelar of the Place''. In 1982, musician

Nick Nicely Nickolas Laurien (born 1959), known professionally as Nick Nicely (stylised nick nicely), is an English singer-songwriter who records psychedelic and electronic music. He is best known for his 1982 single "Hilly Fields (1892)". Nicely released ...

, who lived in Brockley at the time, released the single "Hilly Fields (1892)" inspired by the park.

References

{{coord, 51.460, -0.025, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title Parks and open spaces in the London Borough of Lewisham 1896 establishments in the United Kingdom