For more than 50 years, a hidden chamber in Peckham Rye station has slumbered, its fine Victorian plasterwork crumbling and its woodwork rotting, but now is reopening this May, reports Timeout.
image: for illustration – by Sunil060902 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4631806
Timeout writes:
… It used to be the station’s waiting room, a key part of architect Charles Henry Driver’s flamboyant vision for this 1865 building. Each morning, it would fill up with bowler-hatted nineteenth-century commuters killing time in its comfortable grandeur. Peckham Rye station’s long-lost waiting room is reopening this May. A new art exhibition will bring it back to life
It fell out of use in the early twentieth century and became a hangout for station staff, who’d play billiards there in quiet moments. Then there was a big platform reshuffle in the 1960s and it was closed for good, with most passengers passing through the station completely unaware that there was a huge hidden space right above the ticket hall.
Now, it’s finally reopening, and it’s totally free to visit, as long as you don’t mind taking in a bit of art while you’re there…
