Description
The Marquess Estate was built in 1966-76, the first large estate constructed by the new Islington Borough Council, Designed as a dense urban village and built in the vernacular style, it provided residents with small domestic gardens, larger shared gardens and greens, landscaped footpaths, and incorporated a number of older trees. However it came to be regarded as over-complex and soon became difficult to police, as a result of which re-structuring began in the late 1970s, with major refurbishment from the late 1990s, its name changing to New River Green. As part of the most recent regeneration project, a new public park named St Paul's Park was created, with a formal garden facing St Paul's Road, as well asa football pitch, wildlife garden and informal play spaces.
Practical Information
| Previously known as | New River Green |
|---|---|
| Site location | Essex Road/St Paul's Road |
| Postcode | N1 |
| What3Words | ///label.leaps.puts |
| Type of Site | Housing/Estate Landscaping |
| Borough | Islington |
| Open to Public | Yes |
| Opening Times | unrestricted |
| Facilities | football pitch, informal play space |
| Public Transport | London Overground: Canonbury. Bus: 38, 56, 73, 341 |
| Research Updated | 1 June 2017 |
| Last Updated | 18 October 2026 |
Full description
The Marquess Estate was originally designed by the architects Darbourne and Darke, based upon their Lillington Gardens Estate in Westminster of 1961 (q.v.). It was built in phases and incorporated existing housing such as flats of the 1950s by architect E C P Monson, and it was to have crossed over St Paul's Road via a bridge. The largest green space of the estate was along Marquess Road. In 1982 the architectural correspondent of The Times commented on 'traces of Tudor gardens and Lutyens ideas' in the houses arranged round an open green. Opened by Prime Minister Harold Wilson, it was designed as a traffic-free 'village in the city', and won praise at the time but it proved hard to police, becoming unsafe and subject to vandalism and crime. Nikolaus Pevsner described it as 'informal to the point of confusion'. As a result restructuring began in the late 1970s, continuing in the 1990s when over 460 homes were demolished, the street pattern simplified and the name was changed to New River Green. Red House Square was remodelled by 1995. The redevelopment project by Countryside Properties, costing over £21m, aimed to provide 260 new homes for rent and shared ownership, 63 homes for sale to owner occupiers developed by Copthorn Homes, as well as shops and business units developed by Countryside Commercial. To the west was the landscaped New River Walk (q.v.), partly demolished in the late 1990s to provide improved road access and security. A new public park was designed by Islington Architects as part of the Marquess regeneration project. Named St Paul's Park it features a formal garden facing St Paul's Road, with a football pitch, wildlife garden and informal play spaces adjacent to the houses and school.
Further Information
| Grid Reference | TQ323847 |
|---|---|
| Site Ownership | LB Islington |
| Site Management | Housing Department; Parks Department |
| Dates | 1976; 1990s |
| Designers | 1966-76: Darbourne and Darke |
| On National Heritage List for England (NHLE), Parks & Gardens | No |
| Registered common or village green on Commons Registration Act 1965 | No |
| Protected under London Squares Preservation Act 1931 | No |
| Local Authority | Islington |
| In Conservation Area | No |
| Tree Preservation Order | No |
| Nature Conservation Area | No |
| Green Belt | No |
| Metropolitan Open Land | No |
| Special Policy Area | No |
Please note the Inventory and its content are provided for your general information only and are subject to change. It is your responsibility to check the accuracy.
Nearby parks and gardens
St Paul's Shrubbery is a small park entirely overlooked by the backs of houses on land owned by the Marquess of Northampton and leased to the New Crown public house, owned by the Cannon Brewery Co. Ltd. Part of the site was originally laid out as tennis courts and let out to a club; in 1928 the gardens were provided for the use of tenants of the houses overlooking the site, who paid an annual charge of £1.
The garden was the centre of an irregular circle of villas, which were built by 1863 on the Marquess of Northampton's Canonbury Estate. Originally named Canonbury Park Square, it was renamed Alwyne Square in 1879. The central garden was described in 1928 as having a low wall with iron railings, planted with grass, bushes and trees. Following bomb damage in WWII, the square was rebuilt in 1954 by the developers Western Ground Rents, designed by their surveyor Nash, and now consists of small blocks of flats, and rows of terraced houses. Only one of the original houses remains. The garden contains grass, with some mature horse chestnut trees, and is surrounded by modern railings.
New River Walk follows part of the former waterway of the New River, constructed in 1609-1613 to bring fresh water from springs in Hertfordshire to supply London's growing population. The section of the route through Islington is formed into a series of linear parks, preserved as a nature trail, although the continuous stretch of water in these gardens is actually formed by ponds landscaped to resemble the former river. It was first planted as a garden in the 1860s by the New River Company but remained open water until 1946. It was transferred to Islington Council in 1951, who undertook re-landscaping and opened the public gardens in 1954. Astey's Row Rock Gardens are at the southern end of the New River Walk where the river had been enclosed in pipes in 1892-93 when the area was built over. In the 1950s the pipes were removed and the rock gardens laid out by Vanstone's of Much Hadham. Additional re-landscaping took place in 1996-98, and the gardens were re-opened by Princess Alexandra on 18 June 1998.