Open House Weekend

The Portico Building A History

TIMELINE

Dr Newcome’s Academy sat amidst eight acres of land, and accommodated 80 boys.

It opened in 1685, and was closed in 1815.

1815

By the 1860s, the surrounding area had been built up, surrounding the orphangage with factories and housing.

1860

1825

HISTORY

The London Orphan Asylum purchased the site to create a permanent building for its charges.

1910

The Salvation Army Con Hall opened in 1882 and officers trained there for years.

The Portico building, with its classical columns topped by a dramatic pediment, occupies a site with a rich history stretching back to the seventeenth century.

Sitting in the heart of Lower Clapton, this extraordinary building has had a varied life, narrowly escaping bomb damage during World War II and housing both an orphanage and a boys’ school in its earlier years. Most of the building was demolished in the 1970s, the remnants forgotten and languising in disrepair for almost 25 years, despite the building having been listed by English Heritage in 1951. The unique portico colonnade has remained intact and more recently the building has been renovated and is part of Clapton Girls’ Academy.

EARLIEST BEGINNINGS The first structure to appear on the site was a girls’ boarding school, built in the 1630s and run by one Mrs Elizabeth Salmon. The building then became a famous boys’ private school, Dr Newcome’s Academy, or Hackney School. This school was established by Benjamin Morland in 1685 and later passed to his son-in-law, Henry Newcome, in 1721; it closed in 1815 and was largely demolished a few years later.

A HOME FOR CHILDREN The London Orphan Asylum bought the sight in 1821 and held an architectural competition for the design of a new building to school and house the city’s orphans. Mr Inman of Lincoln’s Inn Fields won the commission and the foundation stone was laid in 1823 by the Duke of York. The buildings were completed two years later, at a cost of £25,000, and the London Orphan Asylum remained on site until 1867, when they moved to a new building in Watford

The Congress Hall narrowly survived World War II. The neighbouring houses in Linscott Road were not so lucky.

ngress d 48

1941

Martin Creed’s ‘Work No. 203’ ran the full 13 metres of the Portico’s facade.

1999 1965

2006 Brady Mallalieu Architects reinvented the building for the 21st century.

Celebrating the Centenary of the Salvation Army, a huge procession arrived at Congress Hall in 1965.

due to overcrowding. Up to 1860, the curriculum included reading, writing, arithmetic, history, and geography, and the building was fronted by formal gardens, which reached Lower Clapton Road.

THE CLAPTON CONGRESS HALL In 1882, the building was sold to the Salvation Army, which demolished the chapel that stood on the site and excavated the quadrangle, roofing it over to create a huge hall able to seat over 4,500 people. The building’s wings were used as training barracks for 300 cadets, with classrooms on the ground floor, workrooms below, and bedrooms above.

The Clapton Congress Hall was used by the Salvation Army for 87 years until 1970, when a new citadel was built on Lower Clapton Road. The Portico building was then bought by the London Borough of Hackney for school expansion, and in 1975 the majority of the building was demolished, leaving only the portico and colonnade wings.

THE PORTICO CITY LEARNING CENTRE What remained of the portico was then added to the national Buildings at Risk register, and the structure sat unused for over 25 years. In 1999, a temporary installation by Turner-Prizewinning artist Martin Creed stimulated public interest in the building. His Work No. 203, a large neon text installed on the portico’s front, read ‘Everything is Going to Be Alright’.

In 2003, the Learning Trust was awarded funding from the Department for Education and Skills, as well as the Heritage Lottery Fund, and was able to restore the portico and build the Portico City Learning Centre, a place where students and teachers would access the most up-to-date computer technology to aid their learning. The new building, designed by Brady Mallalieu Architects, was opened by the Rt. Hon. Estelle Morris, Baroness of Yardley, in April 2006. The Portico building is now used by CGA for teaching Sixth Form students. It also houses the Hackney Teaching Schools’ Alliance, a project which partners twleve primary schools, one special school, and two secondary schools. These schools work together to support each other and develop cutting-edge educational practice.

Laura Place London, E5 0RB Tel: 020 8985 6641 Fax: 020 8986 4686 Email: cga@clapton.hackney.sch.uk www.clapton.hackney.sch.uk