Hundreds of people thronged to Hush House Supermarket at the Bussey on Saturday, on three floors. In the courtyard all day, delicious enterprising savoury and sweet food was cooked on the spot. There were four packed out talks on key topics for small creative enterprises, alongside a wide variety of stalls with the output of many creative small businesses. Pop up opportunities like this are what Peckham micro enterprises need, as well as providing a good new shopping experience in Rye Lane.
Copeland Cultural Quarter full of life
Royal Court’s Theatre Local is having a very successful second season at the Bussey building. It is wonderful that the building and the Copeland site, saved from demolition by Peckham Vision’s campaign, are now the home to so many creative activities and enterprises – theatre, art, music, dance, studios, workshops, community meetings and more – with further potential. The Copeland Cultural Quarter, now organically materialising, must be nurtured and not destroyed by property development plans. This is a key for the town centre future. Read more…
Royal Court at the Bussey building, Peckham
From Sep to Nov 2011 the Royal Court theatre, based in Sloane Sq, brought its Theatre Local to the Bussey building in Peckham with two plays Truth and Reconciliation and The Westbridge . The two month run was so successful it caught the BBC News on 15th Nov 2011:
* BBC Breakfast Show – Radio with Paul Ross + Gabby Roslin
The plays were very topical, and thought provoking. Advance tickets were sold out: the 30 tickets kept back for local sale at the door from 5.30pm each evening were in great demand. The Westbridge which premiered at the Bussey has now transferred to Sloane Square.
It is wonderful to see our very own Bussey building showing how adaptable it is. A great place for theatre as we always knew it could be. The space was provided by the CLF Art Café in the Bussey working in partnership with Peckham Vision to encourage the Royal Court to come. We hope it will lead to continued work in the future with the Royal Court.
Introducing the new Montmartre: it’s Delboys manor, Peckham SE15
It’s not as odd as it sounds – the deprived south London area is rebranding itself as the capital’s contemporary art hub, much like the Parisian district during the 19th and 20th centuries By Simon Tait  27 March 2011
Scarred by tragedies like the murder of Damilola Taylor, and laughed at as the home of the Trotter family of TV’s Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em, Peckham, Southwark, is defying its image to become London’s new Montmartre.
Artists are the fulcrum of a ten-to-15-year plan to be launched in May for Peckham’s rebirth as the capital’s cultural heartbeat, perhaps an embodiment of the Big Society in which residents, businesses and the local authority have come together. “Peckham is the place†says gallerist Hannah Barry. “It’s where people are coming to find the best in international contemporary artâ€. read more Continue reading “Introducing the new Montmartre: it’s Delboys manor, Peckham SE15”
Major development Bournemouth Road / Rye Lane corner
Latest news 6th March: Planning permission refused. See decision here. See planning report here. Meeting Thursday 18th March 2pm at CLF Art Cafe, Bussey buildng, 133 Rye Lane, SE15 to seek better planning from the developers and owners of the land on the Copeland Cultural Quarter site (see here for more).
January 2010 – Developers sought permission to demolish what remains of the historic Holdron’s on the corner of Rye Lane / Bournemouth Road. It looks potentially as inappropriate and poor quality in design as the Wandle housing block next door to it. Also its design with cramped flats might exacerbate the social problems already experienced from the Wandle block after only two years. It is not integrated at all in the thinking of the developments that can happen now on all that big site behind, now that the tram depot threat is fully lifted.
For those not up to date on this – TfL consultants finally a year ago reported that that site was completely wrong on all counts for the tram depot and another different and appropriate site was found. This news got completely lost in the news of the tram project itself being suspended. This was a shame as it fully vindicated everything Peckham Vision had said including that it would be bad for the tram itself if the tram depot location plan was not thoroughly re-examined ASAP. Once TfL did review it, they conceded everything Peckham Vision had said about why it was a defective decision.

In spite of the blight caused by the TfL plan to locate the tram depot here, organic developments have continued in the Copeland Industrial Park, resulting in the growth of important cultural and small business enterprises. These have demonstrated the significant potential for this part of Peckham Town centre in the life of the town centre as a whole. In response to the Issues and Options report, Peckham Vision asked that the Preferred Option Plan should include an overall framework plan for the part of site 71P which lies between Copeland Road, Bournemouth Road and Rye Lane, including the applicant’s site which is an integral part of it. We submitted an indication of the outline of such a framework. This indicates that considerable progress has already been made in developing such an approach.
Peckham Vision believes that this needs to be completed as soon as possible to provide the right planning context for a redesigned development on the applicant’s site. We know that two major objectors to the current application – The Peckham Society and Peckham Business Park – both of whom are members of the Peckham Vision Consortium, are very ready to cooperate in the development of such an overall plan with the owners of this applicant site, and in liaison with the Council as appropriate both in terms of meeting the objections to the current application and also contributing to the development of an overall framework plan for site 71P in the PNAAP Preferred Options report.
Peckham Vision has therefore asked the Council to encourage the applicant to withdraw the current application and to work with the other property owners and occupiers on the adjacent sites, and to liaise with the Council on its work on the PNAAP. This would enable a redesigned proposal which meets the Council’s UDP criteria for developments in Peckham and enables this site to fit within the overall plans which are emerging for this important part of the town centre and Rye Lane. See Peckham Vision letter here. Failing that we have asked the Council to defer consideration of, or refuse permission for, the current application to enable this discussion and collaboration to take place.
See other objection letters here, from The Peckham Society, and the Peckham Business Park.
PLANNING APPLICATION INFORMATION
See all the details on the Council’s website.
All documents can be downloaded and saved. The main ones appear to be:
- Design and access statement – 1 OF 2Â 2009-11-25: There are 38 pages of pictures and diagrams of what the buildings will look like as well as details of design and access provisions, and of the site now.
- Planning statement (1)Â 2009-11-25: This covers their case for how it meets all the Council’s criteria and requirements. First 21 pages are the key ones.
Peckham’s art scene
by LAUREN HOUSSIN formerly on laurenetcaetera.blogspot.com 22 December 2009
From New York’s Meatpacking district to Berlin’s Mitte or Paris’ Montmartre, dirty corners of cities all face the same destiny: they are pioneered by young artists, and later colonized by the trendy bourgeoisie. The rents soar, and the starving bohemia has yet to migrate again. Take the case of London. After Ladbroke Grove in the 1970s and Camden in the 1980s, the East End was conquered in the late 90s. By the early noughties, Brick Lane, Shoreditch, even Dalston were out of price. Artists soon decided to move south of the river, to Peckham. Known to most people for its gang warfare and knife crime rates rather than its culture, Peckham is home to a burgeoning art scene. Because of its empty industrial spaces and proximity to art schools, the bloody district is now an area of choice for young up and coming artists.
“An advantage of working as an artist in Peckham is that there is an audience for art in the area,” said 26-year-old Bobby Dowler, whose paintings are currently showcased at the Hannah Barry Gallery, one of the great pioneers of the area’s scene and one of the most dynamic new art galleries in Britain. “There’s an extremely good dialogue between people,” the young artist added, “and a seriousness about what they’re doing, a kind of belief that it’s important.”
Located in a former cricket bat factory at the end of an industrial road populated by factories, the Hannah Barry Gallery was invited at this year’s Venice Biennale to stage the first Peckham Pavilion. Ms. Barry founded her eponymous gallery in 2008 with Sven Mündner, and works with 32 artists, all aged between 21 and 35. Whether they are showing paintings, installations or photographies, their aim is to always show the work in-depth, in order to best represent the progress of the artist.
“Peckham is the land of freedom and opportunity,” said Ms. Barry. A hallmark of the area’s art scene is its large-scale and high-reaching projects: the spaces available can accommodate shows and works that could not take place in typical West End or East End galleries.
“Everbody has their own possibilities,” she explained, “and for us the space that we have here allowed us to do the shows that we wanted to do. It would have been a different price in the West End, and perhaps not the kind of price that a young gallery can afford. Being in Peckham has enabled us to do things on a scale that we wouldn’t have been able to do over there.”
Although East London is an established part of the city’s gallery circuit and houses the highest population of artists in Europe, it is no longer what it used to be. Its charm and character seem to be lost since property developers have taken advantage of its popularity. As rents have rocketed, many younger artists have in fact headed south of the river in areas like Peckham, where rents are more affordable.
Situated inbetween two of London’s leading art colleges, Goldsmiths School of Arts and Camberwell College, plenty of young, artistic and imaginative people are challenging the negative stereotype that is still all too-often applied to the area. “A lot of students live in the area and continue living in the area after they graduate. I have done so and I graduated in 1998,” said Emily Druiff, Director of the arts initiative Peckham Space.
Through annual commissions, workshops and public events, Peckham Space supports art practice that forges sustainable links between the arts and the local community in south east London, and aims to provide professional development opportunities for artists. The organisation is also plans to open an art venue in a raw space in Spring 2010, showcasing artworks made in conjunction with and in response to the locals of Peckham.
Peckham is home to 25,000 people from all over the world, and has the highest proportion of people born elsewhere compared to the rest of Southwark. One of the best metaphors of Peckham is the Bussey building, that from the outside looks like a run-down factory in a dodgy back alley. But penetrating the almost historic monument -it was built in the early 20th century- and looking closer, it is occupied by an aggregate of over 60 artists, faith groups, exhibition spaces and small businesses, all existing and working happily alongside each other.
Turner Prize winner Antony Gormley and his fellow Royal Academician Tom Phillips, who both have their studios in Peckham, decided a few years ago with a clutch of others to do an artistic makeover of the run-down neighbourhood’s landscape. With this street art initiative, residents now enjoy some of the most original street murals, barcode-patterned pavements in the city and twisted or heart-shaped lampposts by the fashion designer Zandra Rhodes.
Just a step out of Peckham Rye station is a wooden sculpture of a phoenix with splatters of paint on it. According to legend, the Phoenix is reduced to ashes at the end of its life, from which a new, young phoenix is reborn to live again. Using the metaphor of destruction and creation, the sculpture aims to communicate a message of rebirth among the community and the role played by the young art scene in this rejuvenation.
Most people will hear the word ”Peckham” and they will just picture graffiti, dirty pavements and urinated phone boxes. But aside from the drama that the South London area evokes, a few pioneers have managed to raise up the profile and status of the place for everyone, bringing new audiences to the area, creating people of different ages and backgrounds mixing in the same place and causing the area to now easily betray people’s expectations.
The Art revolution starts in Peckham

from: ARTINFO 1st December 2009
How Hannah Barry has managed to take a group of unknown young artists from a Peckham squat to a Venice pavilion in just three years.
It was always likely that British art would recover from its post-YBA slump in a manner as radically refreshing, thrilling, and unforeseen as the arrival of Hirst, Emin, et al. had been at the beginning of the 1990s. But few could have predicted that the revolution would start in Peckham.Change is afoot in this corner of London, specifically behind the anonymous-looking doors of a particular warehouse in an industrial estate. Those doors lead to the Hannah Barry Gallery, one of the most dynamic new art galleries in Britain and home to some of the best young talent in the country. Read more
A Collision in the Bussey Building
On Sat 22 August 2009Â in the Bussey Building the fourth annual Collision event will be taking place including appearances by Genetic Moo.
“…a creative experiment in which artists and audience will simultaneously engage in a form of social interaction based on game theory… Alongside a collection of site specific works, artists and performers will facilitate altered versions of familiar social situations and games in which the audience is invited to participate…”
Peckham as London’s most current art area
Such is the context for Bold Tendencies III, [see details] the third and doubtless boldest of sculptural exhibitions by the brilliant Hannah Barry Gallery. The ambition, the sheer scope and the obvious media delight for this show have given it a somewhat mythical status. Attendees at the sunny launch have swollen from a probably conservative 700 to 1500 and The View is fast becoming the best in London.
Arriving on foot from the neighbouring Peckham Rye station (ten minutes / £2.40 Victoria or London Bridge) the entrance is a ropey elevator that smelled of somebody else’s urine. ‘Heaven’ was written on the stainless steel. It was so good I wondered if one of the curators had pissed in the corner themselves. … the pioneering role that this gallery, just returning from their Peckham pavilion in Venice, is playing in the emergence of Peckham as London’s most current art area. read more…
Peckham raises the roof
Move over Hackney! London’s next creative hotspot, signalled by this bold rooftop sculpture park, could be south of the river, reports Hermione Hoby, Observer
It’s a hot Tuesday night, and 1,000 twentysomethings have elected to spend it in a multi-storey municipal car park in Peckham. It’s a crowd impressive enough to match the big, bold artworks they’re here to see. A sculpture park on the roof of the 10-storey building in Rye Lane forms the highlight of the third Bold Tendencies exhibition from the Hannah Barry Gallery, which has joined forces with four local artists’ groups for a formidable show.
Coming so soon after the success of Barry’s Peckham Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, if anything can substantiate claims of an influential youthful art “scene” in Peckham, this is it. Among the works is James Balmforth’s Failed Obelisk, with its detached apex flailing on a spring, and a ziggurat-like piece from Molly Smyth called Motion Towards Collapse: both names suggest defectiveness but the pieces couldn’t look more assured of their own clout and strength. The rooftop also boasts a cafe and bar designed by recent architecture graduates Lettice Drake and Paloma Gormley – daughter of Antony Gormley, whose cast-iron bollards (part of Southwark council’s Peckham regeneration programme) grace the nearby Bellenden Road. read more…