Last days of Peckham Rye Station Arcade

The Arcade in front of Peckham Rye station is empty and awaiting demolition - in fact signs around the site say that it demolition was due to start in summer 2025.

The two-storey building was built in around 1935 to occupy the square in front of the Victorian train station. It was designed by Scottish architect John James Joass who was also responsible for some of the buildings at London Zoo and for Whiteley's department store in Bayswater. Its demolition is part of a plan to reinstate the original square, so that the grand main station building can be seen from Rye Lane (architect's impression below). 

I can't say the Arcade has particularly happy memories for me, the many hours I spent there were mainly in the dentists chair, though there were some really nice dentists there over the years.  Others have had more pleasant experiences, including in recent years some great soul and jazz nights at the CLF Art Cafe & Roof Garden upstairs.

'Brotherhood of Breath' at CLF Arts Cafe, Station Way in 2022

While I might not be going to the barricades to save it, I think in its final days we can certainly celebrate its features and history. There is a faded art deco grandeur to the place and in its current state of graffiti'd dereliction it is the classic example of a kind of early 21st century Peckham grime that is gradually being cleaned up and swept away.

In its earlier life the Station Arcade hosted an Irish dance hall, the Brian Boru Social Club, in the late 1930s:

James Power was the proprietor of the Brian Boru Social Club

During the Second World War the Camberwell district of the Young Communist League had its HQ at 1a Station Approach 

Stalin was right say the YCL in 1943! At this time of course, the USSR was a key ally in the war against Hitler, so such praise was not that unusual in Britain at the time.

'Young Communists' Talent Contest', South London Observer, 23 April 1943

After the war the London County Council ran one of its Civic Restaurants there, one of a chain aiming to offer affordable food. With Jenny's cafe in the arcade in its later years, many thousands of meals must have been eaten in the arcade, and many cups of tea drunk.