2025 marks the 150th Anniversary of Bedford Park. Considered to be the first garden suburb, it was described by the Poet Laureate and heritage campaigner John Betjeman as “the most significant suburb built in the last century, probably the most significant in the western world.” Bedford Park’s buildings and community spirit became an inspiration and model for the creators of later garden suburbs and cities.
The Bedford Park Society and St Michael & All Angels Church are working with other local organisations to launch a series of events, including concerts, a party, an exhibition and a special publication to commemorate the anniversary throughout 2025. Celebrating the rich architectural heritage and social history of Bedford Park, the events will be open to everyone and will be widely promoted under the specially designed 150th logo.
The estate’s developer, Jonathan Carr, purchased the first 24 acres of land in 1875, and his vision was realised over the next few years, as the houses, stores, church, a club with a stage, and The Tabard Inn came to fruition. Recognising the benefits of improved transport with the opening of Turnham Green station, Carr planned a new kind of estate in which aesthetically acceptable houses at modest rents would be set in an informal layout that preserved as many mature trees as possible.
Full details will be published in due course, but plans for 2025 include:
- New Year’s Day — Wednesday 1 January, 4.30pm at St Michael’s: a Viennese New Year concert, led by David Juritz, former leader of the Mozart Players
- Sunday 2 and 16 February at 3.00pm at St Michael’s: Brandenburg Concertos series by Chiswick Chamber Orchestra, led by Sandy Burnett and Andrew Pears. Tickets and information.
- Saturday 1 March, 11am to 8.00pm at St Michael’s: Hymnathon 150 — singing of the top 150 hymns chosen by local people, with some of the Chiswick choirs and musicians who took part in the church’s previous Hymnathons in 1987, 2012 and 2017.
- 7 May: Bedford Park Society’s celebratory party at a local venue, open to all.
- May: launch of Bedford Park Society’s portable exhibition focussing on the community and communities attracted to the garden suburb — artistic, political, social and professional – to be displayed in a number of locations in Chiswick during the year.
- June: launch of Bedford Park Society’s special anniversary publication celebrating the architectural beauty of Bedford Park to be distributed free to local residents in the suburb and made available more widely.
- 6 to 22 June: Bedford Park Festival including anniversary celebrations on Green Days (7 and 8 June) and celebratory Choral Festival Mass with choir and orchestra on Sunday 22 June.
- 10 to 17 September: Chiswick Book Festival featuring anniversary events.
- September: Bedford Park Society’s annual lecture with 150th anniversary theme.
Watch out for news of the events: https://smaaa.org.uk/, https://www.bedfordpark.org.uk/ and social media: #BedfordPark@150
Further information from: Kate Bowes, Bedford Park Society: information@bedfordparksociety.org.uk and Torin Douglas, St Michael & All Angels torindouglas@gmail.com
NOTES TO EDITORS
* Bedford Park was founded in 1875 as the first garden suburb and its origins were inspired by the Aesthetic Movement of the 1870s. It immediately attracted a community of artists, architects and other aesthetic types and was immortalised in G.K. Chesterton’s story, The Man Who Was Thursday. An advertisement of the time proclaimed it to be “the healthiest place in the world (Annual Death Rate under 6 per thousand)”.
* Bedford Park houses, in the Queen Anne style of architecture, are based on designs by Victoria architects Norman Shaw, E. W. Godwin, E.J. May and Maurice B. Adams. Pretty tree-lined avenues of family homes with gardens were interspersed with artists’ studios. Community buildings, including the Church and Parish Hall, the Stores, a School of Art, the Tabard Inn and the Club, helped to create an integrated ‘village-like’ community, living in ‘sweetness and light’. See Bedford Park Society’s Galleries.
* Among Bedford Park’s ‘progressive’ early residents were the poet W.B. Yeats, dramatist Sir Arthur Pinero, architects C.A. Voysey, Maurice Adams and E.J. May, actors William Terriss and Florence Farr and artists T.M. Rooke and Lucien Pissarro, whose father Camille painted several views from the house.
* It was described by the Poet Laureate and heritage campaigner John Betjeman as “the most significant suburb built in the last century, probably the most significant in the western world.” Bedford Park’s buildings and community spirit became an inspiration and model for the creators of later garden suburbs and cities in Britain and around the world.
* During the 1960s some of the houses were demolished and others increasingly came under threat. In 1967, after a campaign supported by John Betjeman, The Bedford Park Society and St Michael & All Angels Church, Bedford Park became a conservation area. More than 350 houses are listed as Grade II and the church and inn are Grade II*.
