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Saint John's Wood
St. John's Wood High Street
Saint John's Wood Location within Greater London
OS grid reference	TQ265835
London borough	Westminster Camden
Ceremonial county	Greater London
Region	London
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	LONDON
Postcode district	NW8
Dialling code	020
Police	Metropolitan
Fire	London
Ambulance	London
EU Parliament	London
UK Parliament	Westminster North
London Assembly	West Central Barnet and Camden
List of places UK England London 51°32′10″N 0°10′30″W / 51.5361°N 0.1751°W / 51.5361; -0.1751Coordinates: 51°32′10″N 0°10′30″W / 51.5361°N 0.1751°W / 51.5361; -0.1751

St John's Wood is a district in the City of Westminster, London, lying about 2.5 miles (4 km) northwest of Charing Cross. Much of the neighbourhood is covered by a Conservation Area, a small part of which extends into neighbouring Camden.^[1]

Traditionally the northern part of the Ancient Parish and Metropolitan Borough of Marylebone, it extends east to west from Regent’s Park to the Edgeware Road, with the Swiss Cottage area of Hampstead lying to the north.^[2][3]

Once part of the Great Middlesex Forest, it was from 1238 a wooded farm of St John's Priory, Clerkenwell (the Knights of St John of Jerusalem) before Protestant Edward VI of England sold the farm to noblemen.^[3][4] It is an affluent neighbourhood,^[5] with the area postcode (NW8) ranked by Forbes magazine as the fifth most expensive in London based on average home prices in 2007.^[6] According to a 2014 survey, St John's Wood tenants pay the highest average rent in London, with rents averaging £1,889 per week.^[7]

History

The great landholding of St John's Priory (i.e. Clerkenwell Priory) lying nearest London until Protestant monarch Edward VI of England was St John's Wood Farm. This was equivalent to today's area in what was then the north of Marylebone. It had the estate farmed out on agricultural tenancies as a source of produce and income.^[8] Edward saw the farm divided and sold to wealthy noblemen.

A map showing the St John's Wood ward of St Marylebone Metropolitan Borough as it appeared in 1916.

St John's Wood developed from the early 19th century onwards. One of the first developers was James Burton.^[9] It was among the first London suburbs with lower-density villa housing and frequent avenues, but fewer communal garden squares. Most of the villas have since been subdivided and replaced by small apartment blocks or terraces.^[10] This pattern of development has made it one of the most expensive areas of London.^[11]

St John's Wood is the location of Lord's Cricket Ground, home of Middlesex County Cricket Club, the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), and the original headquarters of cricket. It is also famous for Abbey Road Studios and the street Abbey Road, where The Beatles recorded, notably the Abbey Road album, the cover of which features the band crossing the road.

The King's Troop, Royal Horse Artillery was formerly based at St John's Wood Barracks. The regiment moved to Woolwich on 6 February 2012; the barracks has been demolished and the site developed as upmarket housing.^[12]

The area is also home to St. John's Wood Church Grounds, which contains the only nature reserve in the City of Westminster.

Education

The area has various schools, both state and independent:

• 3 House Club


• Robinsfield Infant School


• Saint Christina's Primary School


• Barrow Hill Junior School


• George Elliot Primary School


• Quintin Kynaston Community Academy


• The American School in London


• Arnold House School

Places of worship

St John's Wood has a range of places of worship.

Christian

• Abbey Road Baptist Church


• 
  St John's Wood Church (Church of England)


• 
  St Mark's Church, Hamilton Terrace (Church of England)


• The Church of Our Lady (Roman Catholic)

Jewish

• St John’s Wood United Synagogue


• The Liberal Jewish Synagogue


• The New London Synagogue


• Saatchi Shul

Transport and locales

Neighbouring locations:

• 
  Belsize Park to the north-east


• 
  Hampstead to the north


• 
  Kilburn to the north-west


• 
  Lisson Grove to the south


• 
  Maida Vale to the south-west


• 
  Marylebone to the south


• 
  Primrose Hill to the east


• 
  Regent's Park to the south


• 
  Swiss Cottage to the north

The nearest London Underground stations are St John's Wood and Swiss Cottage on the Jubilee line; Maida Vale, Marylebone and Warwick Avenue on the Bakerloo line; and Baker Street on Bakerloo line, Jubilee line, Hammersmith & City line, Metropolitan line and Circle line.

The nearest London Overground station is South Hampstead.

Notable residents

Commemorative blue plaques

• 
  Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema OM (1836–1912), painter, at 44 Grove End Road^[13]
  


• 
  Gilbert Bayes (1872–1953), sculptor, at 4 Greville Place^[14]
  


• 
  Sir Joseph Bazalgette (1819–1891), civil engineer, at 17 Hamilton Terrace^[15]
  


• 
  Sir Thomas Beecham CH (1879–1961), conductor and impresario, at 31 Grove End Road^[16]
  


• 
  George Frampton (1860–1928), sculptor, at 32 Queen's Grove^[17]
  


• 
  William Powell Frith (1819–1909), painter, at 114 Clifton Hill^[18]
  


• 
  Guy Gibson V.C. (1918–1944), pilot and leader of the Dam Busters, at 32 Aberdeen Place^[19]
  


• 
  Thomas Hood (1799–1845), poet, at 28 Finchley Road^[20]
  


• 
  Thomas Huxley (1825–1895), biologist, at 38 Marlborough Place^[21]
  


• 
  Melanie Klein (1882–1960), psychoanalyst, at 42 Clifton Hill^[22]
  

Past and present residents

St John's Wood in literature, music and television

• Henstridge Place and Woronzow Road London NW8 featured in the “Give Us This Day Arthur Daley’s Bread” episode of the popular U.K. television series Minder.


• Count and Countess Fosco live at No. 5 Forest Road, St. John's Wood in Wilkie Collins's 1859 sensation novel The Woman in White.


• 
  Irene Adler lives there (in Briony Lodge on Serpentine Avenue) in Arthur Conan Doyle's 1891 Sherlock Holmes story "A Scandal in Bohemia".


• In the first instalment of John Galsworthy's The Forsyte Saga, The Man of Property (1906), Young Jolyon lives on fictional Wistaria Avenue with his second wife and family.


• St John's Wood is the home of fictional characters Bingo and Rosie Little in P. G. Wodehouse's Jeeves and Wooster short stories and novels, written from the early 1920s onward.


• Referenced in the Rolling Stones song, "Play with Fire", released in 1965.


• The protagonist of J.G. Ballard's novel Millennium People (2003), is a psychologist who lives in St. John's Wood, which he abandons to join a middle-class rebellion.


• Appears in two books by Howard Jacobson, as the setting for his 2004 book The Making of Henry, followed in his 2010 Man Booker Prize winning novel The Finkler Question as the planned location for the Museum of Anglo-Jewish Culture.


• Violet Hill, a street and area off Abbey Road with Violet Hill Gardens and Violet Hill Hospital, is the source of the name in Coldplay's 2008 song "Violet Hill".


• Due to the conveniently close location to Elstree Studios, (just over 10 miles), St John's Wood was used extensively for location shooting for many of the ITC adventure shows of the 1960s and 1970s, including The Saint (TV series), Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased), The Persuaders! and Return of the Saint.

References

External links

Media related to St. John's Wood at Wikimedia Commons

• History of St John's Wood


• Map of St John's Wood and the surrounding districts


• stjohnswoodhighstreet.co.uk & stjohnswoodhighstreet.com (advertising & marketing)