A visit to Harrow School

Let's try and keep this mostly pictoral. A tour of Harrow School buildings with The London Appreciation Society. 

Arrive Harrow-on-the-Hill station, turn right, buy a Tesco meal deal, pass 1970s shop with moulded cement brick façade on upper floor. 

There are few examples of these across London, such as in Portobello Road market which is now a Tesco store.

Up Petersborough Rd. Literally 'up' – it's a hill. The hill. Harrow Hill. Sat on a bench for a lunch munch and admired the view. Near the top, on the left, there's an in-wall GR post box. 

Most in-wall boxes I've spotted are Victorian era and much smaller in size. I wonder if this one was replaced because it wasn't big enough to cope with all the letters sent home by the boys who boarded here. At the junction with the high street there's a Capital Ring signpost and, round the corner, on the school side there's a milestone set within the wall. Love a milestone.

Opposite the milestone there is an acanthus pillar box:

As per the mark at the base, this is a replica. Nice though.

Joined the tour. We were first taken to the old schoolroom and I noticed that the naughty boys had carved their names into the exterior. 

Much of it is very well rendered. But this was merely a taster to the interior which is slathered in carvings, these having become a sort of rites of passage such that every boy in attendance here, including some very well known names such as Churchill and Byyon have literally made their mark here. Much of it is beautifully achieved, but other works are poorly-planned where the lads hadn't realised that their long name wouldn't fit into that space.

Almost every little space has been used, with some names running along edges and reveals:

Into the other buildings. I do love site-specific toilet signs. 

Then into the Speech Room...

The organist's shoes

... and across to Sir George Gilbert Scott's gorgeous multi-faith chapel:

An example of ensample, above, and a wall of memorial commemorating children who died whilst at school here, below, looking like a patchwork quilt or an oversized stonemason's swatch book

Stunning views back to central London from the gardens at the rear, hard to capture, better viewed in person.

By the time I returned to the main street the tour group dispersed so I went to investigate the village where West Street meets High Street near the old Kings Head Hotel. There are some wonderful old Georgian houses here giving it a very out-of-town countryside feel. Many shops retain their old façades shop fittings such as this one shown below, which used to be reTouch lighting store. I wonder what it was in the past – with the fittings and mirrored display areas I'd guess it was originally a drapery store or a tailors.

A bus came along with South Harrow on its blind so I headed back to Holloway the long way via the Piccadilly line.