Where and why to buy in North Kensington

The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea contains 38 conservation areas. These are neighbourhoods where the council wants to preserve the quality of the buildings and consistency of the architecture. One of the less well-known is the Oxford Gardens – St Quintin conservation area, covering a collection of streets in North Kensington.

Russell Simpson has recently taken instruction on a semi-detached seven-bedroom family home on Oxford Gardens. The property is typical of the beautiful buildings found in the neighbourhood, with this section of the street containing several large houses of red brick, with double-fronted façades and Arts & Crafts decorative details.

Nearby streets offer Victorian terraces, paired villas, and even cottage-like council properties from the interwar period. Many of these properties date back to the second half of the nineteenth century when the neighbourhood was transformed by the arrival of the train.

In 1863, the Metropolitan Line opened in London. It connected mainline railway termini at Paddington, Euston and King’s Cross to the business and financial districts of the City. The following year, the line was extended towards the growing suburbs of Hammersmith. Originally a viaduct across open fields, the line stopped at Notting Hill – on the site of the modern Ladbroke Grove Station.

The arrival of the train turned North Kensington into a desirable destination. Developers began building new streets of terraced and semi-detached housing to support a growing middle class of commuters.

One of the investors in the new line was a developer named Charles Henry Blake. He began his career as an indigo planter in Bengal, and later prospered as a manufacturer of sugar and rum in India. Having speculatively bought land around Notting Hill, between the 1860s and 1890s Blake started to build housing across the Portobello and St Quintin estates.

Blake’s early developments included the northern end of Ladbroke Grove, as well as the streets of Oxford Gardens, Cambridge Gardens and Basset Grove. They were lined with detached or semi-detached houses, containing numerous rooms and generous gardens, designed for Victorian families with children and servants.

The quality was also high. Most of these houses were built from gault brick with stucco bases and dressings. The detached properties were also double-fronted, with canted bay windows and curved pediments topping the first-floor windows. On Bassett Road, the facades were even more ornate, with stucco quoins, Doric porches, and balustraded first floors.

At the same time, a mix of hospitals, schools, churches, convents and council properties were also constructed. Some of these buildings are impressive, adding to the unique character of the neighbourhood.

For instance, in 1862, a Dominican Convent with an orphanage was founded. Then, in 1877, a Carmelite Monastery was built for an enclosed order of nuns. The former has since become a popular Spanish-language school, while the latter remains in religious use. The area also boasts a French-language school, along with excellent state and private schools.

Even more impressive is the St Charles Hospital, a Grade-II listed institution built in a simple Gothic style. Originally a workhouse for the poor, it later contained a training school for nurses, established by Florence Nightingale in 1881.

The buildings are now an NHS hospital, and many of their original features remain. This includes sash windows, slate roofs, decorative brickwork and wrought-iron railings. Little wonder the celebrated architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner called St Charles ‘one of the chief landmarks of North Kensington.’

The conservation area is also close to several parks. Kensington Memorial Park lies on the western border, and the open spaces of Wormwood Scrubs are a short walk away. Meanwhile, to the east, there are the fashionable cafes, restaurants and independent boutiques lining Golborne Road.

This mix of schools, parks and attractive architecture helps to explain the popularity of the neighbourhood, especially among young families. The Oxford Gardens – St Quintin conservation area offers beautiful properties on a similar scale to nearby Notting Hill, but with a greater sense of quiet and calm. And, 160 years after the first trains arrived, it’s still well-connected to the city centre.