Sandwiched between the yummy mummies of East Dulwich and the hipsters of Peckham, the south London neighbourhood of Nunhead has at its heart a village green and a shopping street where many new shops, bars, cafés and restaurants have opened in recent years.
Young families are drawn to Nunhead by the good schools and the village-style atmosphere, along with the green spaces of nearby Peckham Rye and the local nature reserve that is Nunhead Cemetery. With its spooky overgrown gravestones and mausoleums, this was one of London’s “Magnificent Seven” Victorian cemeteries built on the outskirts of the capital. It retains its village vibe and has a close-knit community with beautiful architecture, plenty of amenities, good schools and lots of green space.
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Trains from Nunhead station to Victoria and Blackfriars take around 18 minutes, with services from Nunhead to St Pancras via Farringdon taking about 27 minutes. The No 78 bus, which runs along Evelina Road, is a useful commuter service travelling to Shoreditch via Tower Hill. Nunhead is in Zone 2 and an annual travelcard to Zone 1 costs £1,364.
Primary school
All but one of Nunhead’s state primary schools are rated “good” or “outstanding” by the Government’s education watchdog Ofsted. The “outstanding” school is John Donne in Wood’s Road; the “good” schools are: Rye Oak in Whorlton Road; St Mary Magdalene CofE in Brayards Road; Hollydale in Hollydale Road; Bellenden in Dewar Street.
Comprehensive
The following state comprehensives are rated “outstanding”: St Thomas The Apostle RC (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in Hollydale Road; Harris Girls’ Academy East Dulwich (ages 11 to 18) in Homestall Road; Harris Boys’ Academy East Dulwich (boys, ages 11 to 18) in Peckham Rye; Haberdashers’ Aske’s Hatcham College (co-ed, ages three to 18) in Pepys Road in New Cross, and The Charter School (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in Red Post Hill in North Dulwich. The Charter School East Dulwich, a new Free School which opened in September 2016 now has new premises in East Dulwich Grove and is yet to be rated by Ofsted.
Private
The Villa (co-ed, ages 2 to 7) is a nursery and pre-preparatory private school in Lyndhurst Grove in Peckham. The Dulwich private schools are nearby; they are: Alleyn’s (co-ed, ages 4 to 18) in Townley Road; James Allen’s Girls’ (4 to 18) in East Dulwich Grove and Dulwich College (co-ed, ages 0 to 7; boys ages 7to 18) in Dulwich Common.
Shops, pubs, bars, cafés and restaurants are clustered around Nunhead Green, along Evelina Road and Nunhead Lane. Almost all the shops are independent and include fishmonger FC Soper, which dates from the end of the 19th century and attracts customers from all over south London. There’s also HA Smith the butcher; greengrocer R Beaumont, and Ayres, an old-fashioned baker.
More recent arrivals include The Good Cup, a coffee shop and brunch and lunchtime bistro; modern British bistro The Habit; sourdough pizzeria Four Hundred Rabbits; El Vermut tapas and wine bar, specialising in Spanish Vermouth; Bambuni Wine & Grocery, and Portuguese restaurant Napura. The Old Nun’s Head pub has a revolving menu of street food including burgers, Nigerian and Mexican with roasts on Sunday; Babette, in the former Edinburgh Castle pub in Nunhead Lane, serves sharing boards and small plates.
Peckham Rye Park combines a park, including a Victorian formal garden, with the wilder open spaces of a common. There are 113 acres in total. The park has two children’s playgrounds, an adventure playground and a café; it has enjoyed Green Flag status since 2007. Nunhead Cemetery, one of the Magnificent Seven cemeteries the Victorians built in a ring around London, is now a nature reserve. This hauntingly beautiful place with its crumbling mausoleums and gravestones is a favourite with dog walkers and is open for guided tours on the last Sunday of the month.
The Ivy House pub in Stuart Road has its own little theatre which plays host to music events. Space at 61 is a multi functional events and arts space and has hosted art exhibitions, theatrical performances, live music and supper clubs.
The Peckham & Nunhead Free Film Festival ran this year from August 31 to September 16 — the last event was a showing of Charlie Chaplin’s The Circus in the Big Top at Zippo’s Circus on Peckham Rye Common.
