The pretty front of Latchmere House faces north-west which means that the slightly less pretty rear faces south-east. This is the much less pretty side that looks north-east towards Richmond Park.
The prisoners' quarters are beyond the fourth side so I'll not be taking any pictures of that until it stops being a prison. Perhaps it will become the school that North Kingston has been asking for for many years, in which case the ugly metal fence might remain.
Funny angle that shot. It'll be interesting to see how the site is developed - whether access to the site will be from Latchmere Lane or Church Road. Hopefully all the trees will be kept and also the grassy margin between the wall and the existing housing. Maybe someone will maintain it in the future - the Home Office never paid much attention to cutting the grass, gettingt rid of the graffiti and fly-tipping. I can't see it becoming a school - the school is needed by Kingston but the prison is in Richmond - an insurmountable problem! TC
ReplyDeleteAs far as I can tell, Latchmere House is split almost equally between Kingston and Richmond, which will make any redevelopment problematic.
ReplyDeleteHello Matthew. Thanks for your reply. I see your point.
ReplyDeleteInspired by your photo of MI5's Camp 020 (Latchmere House), I started to look up a story I vaguely remembered about the Soil Society and Jorian Jenks who was interned there. I'd also heard that there was a Ham property used for promoting utopian ideas - and I found mention of Alcott House.
Do you happen to know whether Alcott House (Ham Common) still exists? Is it now maybe St Michael's Convent. There's a Wikipedia page about Alcott House and the Ham Common Concordium. All I can find is that it was a school on the north side of Ham Common. TC
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_020
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcott_House
I've found a publication (on p21) which has a photo of the garden at 'Alcott House', but frustratingly no photo of the house itself.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.archive.org/details/bronsonalcottata00sanbrich
Searching Google Books has proved quite fruitful and I've found a picture of the house and garden here http://www.vegsource.com/john-davis/vegetarian-equals-vegan.html
ReplyDeleteMany thanks Matthew, that's very helpful.
ReplyDeleteI don't recognise the building, however the building in the left of the scene looks rather like the end of St Andrew's Church on Ham Common - the two slim spires are very characteristic. That would locate Alcott House somewhere in the woods at Ham Common. Maybe the artist used his/her license though. Don't suppose it's the rear of Ormeley Lodge. Regards, Jon.
http://www.vegansociety.com/feature-articles/prototype%20vegans.pdf