Chelsea FC stump up for arts facility in park

Mae has won planning for an arts and community centre in a former park lodge in west London.

The scheme, called Sands End Arts & Community Centre, is being funded by £2m from Thames Tideway and £1.6m from Chelsea FC as part of their community obligations for, respectively, the super sewer and Herzog & de Meuron’s new stadium in the borough of Hammersmith & Fulham.

It will open up a neglected corner of South Park in Fulham with a new entrance to the park via a sequence of open spaces and buildings including converting Clancarty Lodge, a 1902 former gardener’s facility. The site used to be leased to an eminent 19th-century horticulturalist. James Veitch cultivated orchids and monkey puzzle trees, and Mae’s design includes roofs that reference his greenhouses.

Mae's Sands End Arts & Community Centre in South Park, Fulham

Mae’s Sands End Arts & Community Centre in South Park, Fulham

A modern pavilion extension to the lodge will be demolished to open up views through the site and into the park.

The scheme includes a hall and café which can be configured in three different ways for different uses plus a nursery.

The buildings will frame several different outside spaces, including what is dubbed an arts courtyard, paved with clay bricks with pockets of gravel, leading to an existing walnut grove.

Mae’s Sands End Arts & Community Centre in South Park, Fulham

Mae’s Sands End Arts & Community Centre in South Park, Fulham