Ever walked past the Farm on Stepney Green and wondered about the ruined arch on the north-west corner of the site?
The Baptist College, Stepney, was opened in 1810 by the Particular Baptists. Its buildings included rooms for tutors and students, a refectory, and a library. The college relocated to larger premises at Holford House in 1856, and became Regent’s Park College.
To the right of the main building was the College’s Academical Institution Chapel, the arched doorway of which is the ruin you can see today. The rest of the building was destroyed by an incendiary bomb during World War II.
Our entire site is made up of former bombed streets, and it wasn’t until 1979 that a group of local residents cleared the remaining debris to create the Farm.
In 2010, the Chapel ruin was fenced off and left to become overgrown during ten years of site occupation by Crossrail. Now that it’s been returned to the Farm, we’re tidying it up and preserving this beautiful piece of local history.
Sadly, it’s not safe to allow visitors inside, but being isolated, it’s the ideal location for some additional bee hives. You’ll soon be able to see these from Stepney Green and Garden Street, and in time we’ll be running additional educational workshops on bees and pollinators.
Some of the rubble that we’ve collected up inside the ruin will also make an ideal bug habitat, increasing biodiversity on the site, along with our new wildlife pond and wildflower meadow.
In front of the Chapel, we’ve cleared the overgrowth and brambles, ready for our Greencare volunteering group to plant up lots of bee-friendly plants and flowers for spring. You’ll also notice two ‘bug hotels’, built by corporate volunteers in September 2021 with the help of Hands On London.
There’s so much history to be discovered on the Farm, and over the coming months we’ll be revealing more about how we are integrating the past into the future of the site.
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