Discover 20 hidden attractions, cool sights, and unusual things to do in Warlingham (United Kingdom). Don't miss out on these must-see attractions: Fairfield Halls, The Spread Eagle Theatre, and Croydon Cenotaph. Also, be sure to include Millers Pond in your itinerary.
Below, you can find the list of the most amazing places you should visit in Warlingham (England).
Table of Contents
Fairfield Halls
Conference centre in Croydon, England. Fairfield Halls is an arts, entertainment and conference centre located in Croydon, London. It opened on 2 November 1962 and contains a theatre and gallery, and the large concert hall has been regularly used for BBC television, radio and orchestral recordings. Fairfield Halls closed for a £30 million redevelopment on 15 July 2016, and reopened on 16 September 2019. As part of the building's re-opening it was also announced that Talawa Theatre Company would relocate to the building, taking up a 200-seat theatre space and offices.
Although the venue has been a major venue for professional music, plays, musicals, stand-up comedy and classical music, a significant proportion of Fairfield's programme has been for community events. It was frequently used by local schools as the venue for their annual choral concerts, as well as being regularly used by local music, opera, amateur dramatic and religious organisations. The Concert Hall features a cinema with Croydon's largest cinema screen.
From January 2021 to July 2021, the Fairfield Halls was being used as a mass vaccination centre as part of the COVID-19 vaccination in the United Kingdom.[1]
Address: Park Lane, Croydon, CR9 1DG, Warlingham (Croydon)
The Spread Eagle Theatre
Theatre in Croydon, England. The Spread Eagle Theatre is a 50-seat capacity studio theatre situated above the Spread Eagle pub in Croydon, England. Opening in October 2013 in response to the closure of the Warehouse Theatre in 2012, the pub transformed its upstairs function room into a theatre space.
The Spread Eagle Theatre supported and hosted the campaign to save the David Lean Cinema, the nearby arthouse cinema which later reopened. The theatre works closely with its sister venue, the Old Joint Stock Theatre in Birmingham, on co-productions with professional theatre companies. Both venues champion "big plays for small spaces", with an emphasis on supporting new writing.[2]
Address: 39-41 Katharine St, Croydon, CR0 1NX, Warlingham (Croydon)
Croydon Cenotaph
Monument in Croydon, England. Croydon Cenotaph is a war memorial, in Croydon, London, England. It is located outside the Croydon Clocktower arts complex, on Katharine Street in Croydon.
The cenotaph, made from Portland stone, was designed by James Burford ARIBA and was unveiled on 22 October 1921, to commemorate local victims of the First World War.
It is framed by two bronze statues of seated figures by Paul Raphael Montford, cast at the M. Maneti foundry. One depicts a soldier of the East Surrey Regiment, dressing his own wounded arm; the other a woman holding a child in her left arm and a letter in her outstretched right hand: her distress is evident, and "e must presume that the news of her husband's perhaps fatal wounds has just reached her". The figure of the soldier was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1921.
The cenotaph's inscription reads:
The dates "1939 ⋅ 1945" were added after the end of the Second World War. The lines "AND IN MEMORY.. SINCE" were added in 1997.
The cenotaph was granted Grade II listed status on 19 November 1973, both in its own right and as part of a group of municipal buildings, legally protecting it from unauthorised modification or demolition. Its status was upgraded to Grade II* on 27 July 2017.
A roll of honour is kept in the library.[3]
Millers Pond
Park in Croydon, England. Millers Pond is a small park in the Spring Park area of the London Borough of Croydon, England.[4]
Shirley Windmill
Mill in Croydon, England. Shirley Windmill is a Grade II listed tower mill in Shirley, in the London Borough of Croydon, England which has been restored to working order.[5]
Address: Postmill Close, Warlingham (Croydon)
Croydon Town Hall
City or town hall in Croydon, England. Croydon Town Hall is a council building in Katherine Street, Croydon which serves as headquarters for Croydon London Borough Council. It is a Grade II listed building.[6]
Selsdon Wood
Park in South Croydon, England. Selsdon Wood is a woodland area located in the London Borough of Croydon. The park is owned by the National Trust but managed by the London Borough of Croydon. It is a Local Nature Reserve. The wood has a Friends group - the Friends of Selsdon Wood - who have their own website.
Sir Julian Huxley (a zoological scientist) was one of the main backers of the Selsdon Wood Nature Reserve.[7]
Roundshaw Downs
Roundshaw Downs is a 52.7 hectare Site of Metropolitan Importance for Nature Conservation Roundshaw in the London Boroughs of Sutton and Croydon. An area of 19.6 hectares in Sutton is also a local nature reserve. In the nineteenth century the area was farmland, and in the first half of the twentieth it was Croydon Airport.
Most of the site is a mixture of chalk and neutral grassland. Areas of unimproved chalk grassland have species typical of this habitat such as common quaking grass, wild carrot and bird's-foot-trefoil. A grassland flower species is greater yellow rattle, which is nationally protected, and Sutton and Croydon are its national strongholds. The wasp spider Argiope bruennichi builds web in the grasslands. Birds include kestrels and skylarks. the latter a Red List species due to its sharp decline in Britain.
The site also has areas of woodland, which have great spotted woodpeckers, blackcap and chiffchaff. There are common whitethroats in scrub areas.
There is access from Plough Lane.[8]
Ashburton Park
Park in Croydon, England. Ashburton Park is a park located in Woodside, in the London Borough of Croydon, and takes its name from nearby Ashburton.
The park is located close to Woodside tram stop, where Tramlink services the park. It is on the junction of Lower Addiscombe Road and Spring Lane. The park covers an area of 18.5 acres (7.5 ha) and includes a village green, pétanque terrain, bowling green, tennis and basketball courts and a café.[9]
Saffron Square
Saffron Square is a town square and high-rise building in Croydon, United Kingdom. The purple and red Saffron Tower is currently the second-tallest building in Croydon.
Saffron Square is part of the Croydon Vision 2020 regeneration plan for the London Borough of Croydon to add to its goal of being London's Third City. The area was developed by Berkeley Homes. Planning permission for the tower was given in April 2008, and construction began in 2011, with completion in 2016.[10]
Ashburton Playing Fields
Park in Croydon, England. Ashburton Playing Fields is a playing field located in Woodside, London. It is managed by the London Borough of Croydon. The fields are bordered by Bywood Avenue in the north, Chaucer Green in the west and Woodville Avenue in the east. Stroud Green Way backs onto the western boundary. Tramlink services for the park are Arena and Woodside. It covers an area of 49.5 acres.
Facilities include football and cricket pitches, changing rooms, and children's playground. The fields are open 24 hours per day throughout the year, although pitches and use of changing rooms have to be booked in advance.[11]
Coombe Wood
Coombe Wood is a small woodland and garden area in the old village of Coombe, South Croydon near the junction of Coombe Lane and Conduit Lane. The Coombe Wood Gardens are divided into a series of rooms which together give an all-year-round display of shrubs and plants set against a woodland backdrop.[12]
Colonnades Leisure Park
The Colonnades Leisure Park is an out-of-town leisure park located in the Purley Way retail and industrial district of the London Borough of Croydon, South London. It opened in the late 1990s on the former site of the Croydon Water Palace, an indoor water park complex that operated from 1990 to 1996. It lies alongside the Purley Way Playing Fields, and opposite the former Croydon Airport site.
The site is currently owned and operated by Croydon Council who finally completed the purchase in August 2019 at a cost of more than £50m.[13]
Addington Park
Park in Croydon, England. Addington Park is a park situated in Addington in the London Borough of Croydon. The park covers an area of 24.5 acres.[14]
Littleheath Woods
Littleheath Woods is the collective name for Littleheath Wood, Foxearth Woods, part of Queenhill Shaw and part of Gee Wood in Selsdon in the London Borough of Croydon. It is a Site of Borough Importance for Nature Conservation, Grade I, with an area of 64 acres. It is owned by Croydon Council and the Friends of Littleheath Woods assist with the management.
The woods have tall oaks above a layer of sweet chestnut, rowan and birch, and there are several areas of grassland. Plants include wood anemone, bluebell and greater stitchwort and at the southern end there is a small pond with amphibious bistort and brooklime. In the north there is acid grassland.
There is access from neighbouring roads including Croham Valley Road, Littleheath Road, Edgecoombe and Foxearth Road.
The wood was once used for shooting and a pheasantry was established on part of the land. Much of the low-level planting was established to provide cover for the game-birds.
The soil (soft sand) is of a type suitable for badgers and there are active setts within the woodland.[15]
David Lean Cinema
Cinema in Croydon, England. The David Lean Cinema is a small cinema established in Croydon, London. It is accessed from the Croydon Clocktower arts complex on Katharine Street.[16]
Address: Katharine Street, Warlingham (Croydon)
Nestlé Tower
St George's House is a 79-metre office tower located in Croydon, United Kingdom. It was occupied by the Swiss multinational food and consumer goods company Nestlé as the headquarters of Nestlé UK & Ireland until September 2012.[17]
Bethlem Museum of the Mind
Museum in Beckenham, England. Bethlem Museum of the Mind is a museum focusing on the history of Bethlem Royal Hospital, its programme of care, and its patients. Opened in 2015, the museum is housed in an Art Deco building shared with the Bethlem Gallery, which hosts exhibitions of contemporary artists who are current or former patients.
The museum's displays include work by artists who have suffered from mental health problems, such as former patients William Kurelek, Richard Dadd and Louis Wain. Another work is a pair of statues by Caius Gabriel Cibber known as Raving and Melancholy Madness, from the gates of the 17th century Bethlem Hospital. Other displays illustrate the history of mental healthcare.
The museum is a member of the London Museums of Health & Medicine.[18]
Addiscombe Recreation Ground
Playground in Croydon, England. Addiscombe Recreation Ground, commonly known as Bingham Park, is a park situated in Addiscombe, London. The park is managed by London Borough of Croydon. Addiscombe tram stop is located just next to the recreation ground and is served by Tramlink. The area covers 8 acres.[19]
House of Reeves
House of Reeves is an independent family-run furniture store in Croydon, southern Greater London, England, founded in 1867. It is located in the Old Town area, and gives its name to Reeves Corner, a road intersection between Church Street and Roman Way, and so to Reeves Corner tram stop.
The company came to widespread national public attention in August 2011, when one of its two adjacent buildings was destroyed in an arson attack during the 2011 England riots. Images of the furniture store on fire, with firefighters unable to tackle the blaze because police could not protect them, became symbolic of the violence that spread across the country during several days of rioting and looting. Despite this setback, the company is still trading.[20]