Stamford Hill Strips

The Cathedral Church of the Good Shepherd was originally built as the 'Ark of the Covenant' for the Agapemonite (Abode of Love) sect, which had been founded in Somerset by Henry James Prince. Prince came to Clapton with his congregation when he built the church here in 1892. It was closed in the 1920s but later acquired in 1956 by the Ancient Catholic Church. The church has a garden to the front with lawn, flower beds and shrubberies either side of the path leading from the fine wrought iron gates to the church door.

Clapton Common is a small fragment of the former Broad Common; the south side, overlooked by the early C19th Clapton Terrace, forms an extension to the Common. Maps of 1745 show a number of hamlets in the area and in the C18th/C19th smart villas were built in Upper Clapton for City bankers and merchants, development accelerating after arrival of the railway. Clapton Common was preserved as public open space in 1872 as a result of a successful public petition that led to 180 acres in Hackney being protected from encroachment. It retains its large pond but public amenities, such as a Keeper's Box and drinking fountain, no longer exist, and the small mock-Tudor pavilion provided as public toilets became derelict.

Allens Gardens forms a strip of communal garden behind a development of 10 blocks of 3-storey flats on Bethune Road built in 1874 by Matthew Allen, from whom the site takes its name. He was in partnership with the Improved Industrial Dwellings Company. The garden was for the use of residents, with greenhouses and wash houses as well as recreational facilities. The Bethune Lawn Tennis and Bowling Club was based here until 1929. The gardens were later publicly accessible, a series of garden 'rooms'. Since 2004 a compartment in the south has become an urban market garden run by Growing Communities, with raised beds, fruit trees, and an eco-building.