We track down the history of The Rookery, Streatham’s secret garden, and the spa town it was built to serve.
You’re unlikely to stumble across The Rookery unless you go looking for it, tucked across from a little-explored corner of Streatham Common. Go looking for it anyway. This quiet garden of ponds, rose pergolas and immaculate white blooms sits on the site of one of South London’s most fashionable 18th century spas, and it’s one of several private-turned-public secret gardens scattered across the capital, and one of the more overlooked.
What’s so special about Streatham’s Rookery?
What if we told you that you could find the vestiges of a private garden that used to belong to a fashionable 18th century spa escape in Streatham of all places, would you be curious? You should be.
That’s exactly what you get at Streatham’s secret Rookery, sitting on the remains of one of South London’s most fashionable mineral springs. The wells here were discovered in 1659, and by 1746 they were significant enough to appear on John Rocque’s map of London, labelled simply as “Streatham Wells”.
The manor house is long gone, but the garden was replanted in the early 20th century as an Old English Garden, complete with a woodland walk, white garden and grass terraces, all of which survive today.
Make your way to the top of Streatham Common, leaving behind the rather bland expanse of grass of the lower common. You’re aiming for the top right of the common, past the point where the common proper turns into woodland, turning the corner to reveal what you’re here for: Streatham Rookery.
History of The Rookery
Beautiful as Streatham Rookery is, it’s also got a lot of history to it.
As we mentioned, it was the former site of a fashionable spa, Streatham Spa, and the large house that gave the gardens their name was built here in 1786 to accommodate the visitors who came to take the waters. It wasn’t actually called The Rookery until 1826, when the house was renamed under a later private owner. It’s difficult to believe it today, but there were a number of these spas across London, each fed by mineral springs discovered in different parts of the city.
By 1910, with the springs long out of fashion, the estate was facing redevelopment. A local resident named Stenton Covington led the campaign to save it, and the local committee he headed raised £3,075 by public subscription to buy the site outright, a considerable sum at the time. Covington Way, the road that now runs alongside the gardens, is named after him.
The site was gifted to the London County Council in 1912, which demolished the house and had its own Major Philip Maud relandscape the gardens, laying out the Old English Garden in the former kitchen garden. The Rookery opened to the public on 23 July 1913, and has remained largely unchanged ever since.
The gardens cover a relatively small space but make up for it in variety. Alongside the Old English Garden, there’s a rock garden with its own stream, and a White Garden that opened the same year as the rest of the site. It’s often assumed that Sissinghurst has the oldest White Garden in the country, but Streatham’s actually predates it by at least 30 years.
The White Garden, originally laid out for a Victorian wedding, was popular enough that Queen Mary and the Princess Royal visited in person in 1936. Today the whole site is Grade II listed on English Heritage’s Register of Historic Parks and Gardens, part of it was declared a Local Nature Reserve in 2013 to mark the gardens’ centenary, and it’s managed day to day by the Streatham Common Cooperative alongside the Friends of Streatham Common. In summer, the lawns also host open-air theatre performances.
The Rookery Cafe
There’s a small but well-received cafe just inside the entrance to The Rookery serving tasty breakfasts, coffees and lunches. It’s a lovely local spot that has become a real neighbourhood hub.
The London x London Take: This isn’t a garden you stumble into by accident, and that’s rather the point of it. It’s small enough to see properly in half an hour, but the White Garden and the rock garden’s stream make it worth timing a visit for late spring when everything’s in bloom. Pair it with a walk across the rest of Streatham Common and a stop at the cafe, and it’s a proper half-day out for the cost of nothing at all.
Planning your visit
Address: Covington Way, Streatham, London SW16 3BX
Opening hours: The Rookery opens at 7.30am and closes 30 minutes before dusk, so hours shift with the seasons. Lambeth’s own advice is to check current times online before visiting rather than rely on a fixed schedule.
Getting there: Streatham rail station and Tooting Bec tube (Northern line) are both a walkable distance away, the latter also close to Tooting Bec Common if you want to make a longer day of it, and the 249 bus stops close to the entrance.
Cost: Free to enter.
