Back to work. Back to school. Back to rain.
September is here but returning to routine does not mean giving up the fun. Book now for after-work entertainment close to home. Test your knowledge at Tuesday quiz nights at The Sun of Camberwell or the Grove House Tavern, or try the Wednesday quiz at the Joiners Arms. Prefer laughs without the questions? Comedy nights return to the Grove House Tavern.
Camberwell’s stages are busy too. Choose drama and comedy at the Golden Goose Theatre or family theatre, music and workshops at Longfield Hall. A few minutes’ walk can bring hours of entertainment.
Back to school comes with added value. Children can act, dance, sing and make music through Theatre Peckham Academy. At Burgess Park, they can try football, basketball, cycling and more, while the South London Girls Football Academy helps young players build skills and confidence. Art in the Park brings all ages and abilities together through art and nature. Check out all local events by downloading the free Camberwell Life app.
And the rain? Brilliant news for Camberwell’s trees and green spaces. Follow, or join, the Camberwell Society’s Trees & Green Spaces group and help our neighbourhood flourish.
Check out the Society’s website hereand use your password camberwell2026 to scroll through the autumn Camberwell Quarterly.
Become a member of the Camberwell Society
The Camberwell Society has been making headlines again-and this time the story comes with grapes. Hot on the heels of The Times celebrating the artworks at Denmark Hill station, another Nick Mair and Tony Coleman project has caught the media’s attention,Chateau Denmark Hill, the vineyard growing beside the railway tracks.
It began with the walks site Bowl of Chalk. The Drinks Business followed. The Sun and Daily Telegraph climbed aboard. Then BBC London took the story to radio television and on line Check out Nick and Tony’s appearance on You Tube here. Over a dozen pieces of coverage including Secret London piece here
Not bad for a few vines beside the railway tracks.
At the centre of the fuss sit some Bacchus grapes and a first harvest expected to produce some 22 bottles-none for sale. That may make Chateau Denmark Hill one of Britain’s least commercial vineyards, but it has certainly become one of the most talked about.
And that is the real story. Local people spot an unloved corner, bring imagination, energy and practical skills, and transform it.
Got your own passion project for Camberwell? Contact chair@camberwellsociety.org.uk and see whether the Society can help get it moving.
Four new hotels for Camberwell. Really?
Camberwell may be officially cool, but will we attract enough visitors to fill four proposed hotels?
Plans include a 300-bedroom hotel in the former magistrates’ court, with some rooms underground, eight bedrooms in the old police station on Camberwell Church Street, another eight squeezed into Milkwood Yard and a 101-bedroom hotel as part of the long-awaited Butterfly Walk redevelopment.
That scheme also promised 145 homes, shops, a cinema and new public space. Planning permission was granted, but progress has been slow. With building costs high and investment cautious, will any, or all, of these hotels actually open?
The Camberwell Society’s Planning Committee keeps watch over proposals like these. As Camberwell’s local amenity society, we scrutinise applications, raise community concerns and encourage development that makes the area better for everyone.
You do not need to be a planner to join, just interested in what is being built around you. Contact Tim Gaymer who chairs the planning sub-committee through planning @camberwellsociety.org.uk
For the latest planning developments, see page 20 of the new Camberwell Quarterly.
The London Forum of Amenity and Civic Societies brings societies like ours together across the capital. Its open meeting on 14 September will debate whether the new
London Plan can deliver the homes London needs, and how affordable they will really be.
The Camberwell Society helped defeat plans that would have turned Camberwell into another Hammersmith flyover. Today, we continue to champion development that improves the area for all of us. Camberwell’s future is still being written. Be part of it.
Unlock the written world
About 2.4 million adults in England cannot read at all or can barely read. That can mean struggling with a medicine label, a bus timetable, a job application, or a bedtime story.
Read Easy Southwark, the Camberwell Society’s Charity of the Year, is changing that one reader at a time. Trained volunteers offer free, confidential, one-to-one coaching, helping adults gain confidence, independence and new opportunities.
The Society’s Open Gardens Day has raised a further £2,000 for the charity. The money is already training new coaches and paying for books and learning activities. Many local readers meet their coaches at Camberwell Green Library.
The International Editor of BBC News, Jeremy Bowen, is one of Read Easy Southwark’s key supporters. His Camberwell Talk raised funds for the charity and you can now hear him in Episode 22 of the Southwark Cathedral Podcast. Jeremy explains why adult literacy matters, while Southwark team leader Simon Sheppard shares examples of lives transformed through reading.
Listen at: https://cathedral.southwark.anglican.org/about-us/podcast
Could you help write someone’s next chapter? Read Easy needs reading coaches and other local volunteers. Coaches usually give two half-hour sessions each week, with training and support provided.
Volunteer at: https://readeasy.org.uk/volunteer/
Camberwell bats move into National Trust homes
Camberwell’s bats are moving up in the world. Six new bat boxes carrying the National Trust logo will be offered to participants on the next walk organised by the Camberwell Society’s Trees and Green Spaces Group.
Join local ecologist Dr Iain Boulton at 7:45 pm on Thursday 3 September for a twilight walk through Green Dale and Dog Kennel Hill woods. Using special detectors, you will eavesdrop on pipistrelles, the tiny bats swooping through London’s night sky, and discover how they thrive in our city.
The free, family-friendly walk is limited to 35 people. It starts beside the noticeboard and picnic benches in Dog Kennel Hill Open Space and leaves promptly. Wear shoes suitable for muddy paths. Under-16s must come with an adult. Wet weather may force a postponement.
The boxes are funded by the Camberwell Society and environmental charity Hubbub, helping residents invite wildlife closer to home.
Want to do more for Camberwell’s trees, wildlife and 40 green spaces? Join the Trees and Green Spaces Group. You need no specialist knowledge, just enthusiasm. Help organise walks, planting, gardening, litter picks and biodiversity projects.
Find out more and join here:
https://www.camberwellsociety.org.uk/what-we-do/trees-and-green-spaces/
Openings
Two hundred pints sold, and Camberwell’s next mural is brewing. More than 200 drinks have already been bought in advance through the crowdfunder for Dorothy’s, the new sapphic pub taking over the former St Georges Tavern. Its future landladies, Beth and Molly, have been promised the keys in time for an October opening.
The couple are swapping television for taps. Beth has scouted locations for productions including Slow Horses and Wicked. Molly has worked in casting and welfare for reality television.
They chose this handsome Victorian pub because, as Molly says, “it is a bit of a mess, but it is a really great space”. The location also felt that it was meant to be: Molly once lived on Coleman Road, the pub stands just off Southampton Way and Beth comes from Southampton. Best of all, it is beside Rainbow Street, a fitting address for an LGBTQ+ venue.
Dorothy’s will be Camberwell’s first lesbian pub, but everyone who respects its welcoming ethos can come in. It will restore a meeting place to an area residents describe as a food and pub desert, serving coffee and hosting local groups during the day.
The building will become safe, accessible and quietly stylish. Outside, the faded mural will be reborn with a female St George slaying a dragon covered in silver, gold and multicoloured scales—a vibrant addition to Camberwell’s mural tradition.
Food will include gourmet pizzas from Tracks Pizza, rotating residencies and supper clubs. Camberwell Quarterly’s food writer Poppy Pearce will, of course, be first in the queue—ready to test the meals and perhaps a cocktail. https://www.instagram.com/dorothys.ldn
On the buses
Do you use the 42 bus? TFL is proposing to stop the route at Tooley St. Currently it crosses Tower Bridge and serves Liverpool St station.The Society is objecting, on the basis that many residents work in the City, including low paid jobs as cleaners or security staff often working late or early shifts. This change will make their journey more difficult.
You can make your views known by responding to the consultation here before 20 September.
