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* on The National Heritage List for England, Parks & Gardens
Bedford Square was built between 1775-86 on the Bedford Estate to provide fashionable town houses. The estate remained sealed by gates until 1893. The square is no longer residential and the central garden, laid out between 1775-80, is now mainly surrounded by offices. Described as 'the best and most complete Georgian square left in Bloomsbury', its large oval garden remains for the private use of keyholders. It is surrounded by late C18th cast-iron railings and has shrubberies, lawn and mature plane trees, and a C19th hexagonal pavilion, which has been restored, and new benches and metal edging have been installed on the resurfaced perimeter path.
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Bedfords Park comprises land formerly belonging to the manors of Bedfords and Earls (or Nerles); the name may derive from a C14th landowner. In 1452 one-time Lord Mayor of London Sir Thomas Cooke bought and amalgamated both manors for farming, the land remaining in his family for c200 years. Subsequent owners expanded the estate and in 1865-7 the C18th manor house was enlarged and surrounding hilltop planted as gardens with exotic trees, some of which remain, as does a horse chestnut avenue and part of the walled garden. The last owner sold part of the estate in 1920 and in 1933 his widow sold Bedfords to Romford UDC, who initially opened the house as a museum and café. Used during WWII by the National Fire Service and as a base for home defence, the 1950s saw rapid decay and vandalism and it was demolished in 1959, now the site of the visitors centre. Remnants of the original steps from the house can still be seen. To the south the deer park remains; a red deer herd was first established here in 1934.
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Beeston's Gift Almshouses were built by the Girdlers' Company in 1834 as a terrace of 7 Tudor-style houses, in front of which is a pleasant garden with railings to the road, mature trees, lawns, shrubs, roses and a mid-C19th cast-iron water pump. They are named after Cuthbert Beeston, Master of the Girdlers' Company, who left property near London Bridge where the first Girdlers' Almshouses were founded in 1582. That site was sold in 1824 when land was needed for building a new London Bridge, enabling the Girdlers' Company to buy the site in Consort Road and to build Beeston's Gift Almshouses. The terrace was extended in the 1960s with the addition of two one-storey wings when two other small almshouses were re-located here, those of Richard Andrews and of George Palyn, the latter previously located in Choumert Road.
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* on The National Heritage List for England, Parks & Gardens
Belair Park is a typical late C18th 'pocket estate' with a mansion, originally called College Place, a home farm and landscaped grounds, including a water feature created from the River Effra. Renamed Belair in c.1829, the estate remained in private ownership until 1938. In WWII house and grounds were requisitioned for wartime use, the grounds cultivated as allotments. After the war the estate was acquired by the Metropolitan Borough of Southwark as a quasi-country club facility accessible to Southwark residents, and the house was restored. When the new Borough of Southwark was created in 1965, controlled use of Belair ceased and it was opened as a public park. The mansion was let and has been run as a restaurant in recent years.
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* on The National Heritage List for England, Parks & Gardens
Belgrave Square was designed by architect George Basevi, who laid out the square and the gardens were first planted by Thomas Cubitt in 1826. They have been restored to the layout of 1867, and have lawns, large plane trees, pergolas with wisteria, roses and annuals, a quiet garden, tennis court and play area for children. In 2008 the original viewing mound in the centre of the garden was re-instated and among the trees are those that date from the original plantings. Within the garden is a collection of statuary, including modern figurative works.
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The Bellingham Estate is a large LCC housing estate built for railway workers on former farmland between railway lines, which was once near the hamlet of Southend and was still rural until the 1920s. Largely completed by 1923, the estate is laid out on cottage-style principles on a semi-formal plan with Bellingham Green as a central open space onto which 6 tree-lined roads converge. Other landscaping on the estate includes avenues of trees, grassed areas, allotments and playing fields. In 2001 Bellingham Green was renovated after years of neglect.
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Bells Hill Burial Ground was consecrated in 1895 by the Bishop of St Albans, and was established to provide for the parish of Chipping Barnet. Entered through a small lych-gate, older monuments are found to the north east of the cemetery where there are mature cedar, yew and other species of trees; more recent graves are to the west. The main path from the entrance gate has been narrowed in some places where new graves have been provided.
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Belmont Mill Hill Preparatory School is on the site of Belmont House, built in 1772. When the estate was sold in 1911 it comprised over 14 ha. of land, including c.4.05 ha. of pleasure grounds. Belmont School opened here in 1912 and its grounds contain remnants of the earlier planting and an early C19th gothic folly, although changes have been made over the years to accommodate new buildings including the chapel of 1925, sports and other educational facilities. Today the school grounds comprise the original house, school buildings, quadrangle, sunken garden, Master's Lawn, open areas and extensive playing fields, as well as wooded areas, a pond used by a local angling club, a smaller pond and wild life area. There are numerous fine mature trees and also a number of younger trees with plaques commemorating particular pupils or events. The grounds around the main buildings are particularly well planted.
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Belmont Park has semi-mature planting in an undulating grassland landscape. The site is bordered to the west by the railway line. On the west side of the railway is a dense belt of trees, many of which are fine and mature. This land is known locally as Old Belmont Hospital Meadow. The 1st edition OS 6inch map of 1866/7 shows the site as open land set between the railway and the Brighton Road.
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In the 1860s this sloping woodland was part of land owned by the Midland Railway Company. In 1948 the company leased it for various uses including tennis courts, nursery gardens and an industrial estate. Later owned by LB Camden, redevelopment of part of the land was under discussion from 1971, but it was not until 1982 that an architectural competition led to a scheme that provided for recreational use and housing. Russell's Nursery Estate housing estate abuts the woodland, which is partly freely accessible and partly a Nature Reserve managed as ecological woodland, having restricted access.
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Until the mid C19th the area of Upper Belvedere was farmland, with few buildings on the Abbey ridge apart from Abbey Farm and a staging inn. Housing was built from the 1860s aimed at more affluent residents, with villas in good-sized plots and landscaped road verges along Woolwich Road. Belvedere Recreation Ground dates from 1896 and is in two parts north and south of Woolwich Road. The north part had a bowling green, a boating lake later becoming a paddling pool and bandstand, the latter becoming the site of a sandpit with surrounding lime and horse chestnut trees. The old paddling pool is now Belvedere Splash Park. The south part of the park is now predominantly playing fields but at one time had a bandstand and tennis courts, but the path layout is little changed and mature trees include horse chestnut and a fine copper beech.
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In 1936 land near St Mary's Church in Northolt was acquired by the MCC and the local council for public open space, which became Belvue Park. Situated adjacent to the parish church are notable earthworks of the moated medieval manor house, excavated in the 1950s and '60s that provided evidence of Saxon occupation. Fragments of Iron Age pottery, as well as Roman roof tiles have also been found at the highest point of the park.