Living in Wembley: area guide to homes, schools and transport

The crowds will throng down Empire Way’s wide boulevard towards Wembley Stadium, and anyone who hasn’t visited for a few years will see the transformation of a place once dominated by car parks and tired industrial buildings.

Wembley began to change in 2002 when developer Quintain bought large tracts of land around the old stadium and arena. Building homes for sale started in 2006 but the financial crash brought a change of direction.

A new masterplan was agreed with Brent council in 2016 to make this the country’s largest ever build-to-rent project, with 5,000 homes promised.

Progress to date includes 1,750 new homes plus a new town hall and library for Brent council, the renovation of what is now called The SSE Arena, the London Designer Outlet discount shopping centre, four hotels including a Hilton and a Premier Inn, student accommodation, and a Boxpark to add to those in Shoreditch and East Croydon, offering more than 20 street food vendors.

The plan is to build 7,500 new homes, a seven-acre new park and a primary school. Quintain’s rental arm, Tipi, promises a new dawn for renters with a no-fees, no-deposits, utilities-and-broadband-included deal on its flats in three blocks called Landsby, Montana & Dakota and Alto.

Bold red banners along Empire Way, reminiscent of Russian constructivist art, exhort people to “Join the rental revolution.”

The development which began as Wembley City was rebranded Wembley Park, echoing Wembley’s past as a 19th-century pleasure garden built in a landscape created by Humphry Repton, the great landscape architect (1752-1818).

One of the pleasure gardens’ most bizarre episodes was Sir Edward Watkin’s desire to build a tower to rival the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

Sir Edward chaired the Metropolitan Railway Company, which built the pleasure garden to encourage tourists to use the railway.

The tower failed to capture the public’s imagination and was mocked as “Watkin’s folly”. In 1902, the year after his death, it was declared unsafe and was demolished three years later.

Wembley is 10 miles north-west of central London with Kingsbury and Queensbury to the north; Neasden and Dollis Hill to the east; Stonebridge and Alperton to the south and Sudbury and Northolt to the west.

The property scene

There are Victorian and Edwardian homes but the predominant style is Metro-Land Twenties and Thirties detached, semi-detached and terrace houses. There are many new flats in Wembley Park and the town centre.

The two most desirable areas of Twenties and Thirties houses are in the Barn Hill conservation area north of Wembley Park station and in the Sudbury Court conservation area west of the town centre between South Kenton and North Wembley stations.

Both conservation areas have detached houses, often with Mock Tudor exterior detailing. The most expensive house currently for sale in Wembley is a newly renovated seven-bedroom chalet-style bungalow in Barn Hill, priced at £1.5 million.

More typical are a three-bedroom semi-detached house in Oldborough Road in the Sudbury Court estate for £699,950 and a four-bedroom semi-detached house in Wykeham Hill in the Barn Hill estate for £695,000.

The new flats in Wembley Park are similarly priced to some of the most desirable houses. A three-bedroom new flat in Exhibition Way is on sale for £555,000, while a three-bedroom semi-detached house in St Michaels Avenue is priced at £559,950.

New-build homes

The tower blocks of Wembley Park have little connection with the surrounding streets of simple, low-rise family houses. The planners are tackling this incongruity with new flats in the town centre.

Wembley Central is a completed development of new homes and shops around Wembley Central station.

Now Henley Homes is in a joint venture with housing association Notting Hill Genesis to build 248 new homes with shops and restaurants on the ground floor at Wembley Place in the High Road on the site of demolished former council offices. For more information ring 033 3000 4000.

Developer The Hub is building 239 new homes in Chesterfield House and two new tower blocks of 21 and 26 storeys, designed by Maccreanor Lavington, on the site of a former office block on the corner of High Road and Park Lane.

The same developer has now been given the go-ahead for Wembley Link, a new scheme of up to 500 homes on land that has been acquired from Network Rail behind Chesterfield House.

There is planning permission for the first 256 homes in two blocks designed by Glen Howells. The aim is to provide a link between Wembley Park and the town centre.

First-time buyers and Shared Ownership

Network Homes has 13 shared-ownership flats at Scala in Wembley Park.

Two-bedroom flats start at £118,750 for a 25 per cent share of a home with a full market value of £475,000, while three-bedroom flats start at £140,000 for 25 per cent of a flat with a market value of £560,000.

There are 27 flats coming soon at Casa in the Vista complex in Exhibition Way.

One-bedroom flats will be priced from £138,000 for a 40 per cent share of a home with a full market value of £345,000, while two-bedroom flats will start at £174,000 for a 40 per cent share of a home with a market value of £435,000.

Three-bedroom flats will start at £220,000 for a 40 per cent share of a home with a full market value of £550,000. Call 020 3376 6455 for further information.

At Vibe in Wembley Central on Wembley High Road, Network Homes has 12 one- and two-bedroom shared-ownership apartments for sale.

One-bedroom flats start at £128,000 for a 40 per cent share of a home with a full market price of £320,000. Two-bedroom flats start at £166,000 for 40 per cent of a home with a market value of £415,000. Call 0300 373 3000 for details.

Rental homes

Tipi, Quintain’s rental arm, has flats to rent in Wembley Park. Prices range from £1,825 a month for a one-bedroom flat; £2,325 for a two-bedroom flat and £3,090 for a three-bedroom flat. Call 020 3918 7350 for information.

The Assembly in the High Road is a development of 148 one-, two- and three-bedroom flats to rent. One-bedroom flats start at £1,495 a month; two-bedroom flats at £1,665 a month and three-bedroom flats at £2,090 a month. Call 0333 210 0043.

Transport

Wembley Park Tube has fast trains to Baker Street on the Metropolitan line, plus Jubilee line trains; Wembley Central, a major hub on the Bakerloo line, also has the Overground to Euston, and National Rail services to Euston and Shepherd’s Bush for Westfield.

Wembley Stadium station has trains to Marylebone. North Wembley commuters use Preston Road on the Metropolitan line or Wembley North on the Bakerloo.

All stations are in Zone 4. An annual travelcard costs £2,020.

Staying power

The arrival of the all-through French lycée has caused many French families to settle in the area. There is also a long established south Asian community.

Postcode

HA9 is the main Wembley postcode and covers Wembley Park, the eastern section of the town centre and the Preston and Tokyngton areas. HA0 covers west of the town centre and stretches to include Alperton and Sudbury.

Best roads

Any roads in the Barn Hill and Sudbury Court conservation areas. Also The Paddocks and Greenhill off Forty Lane.

Up and coming

Tokyngton, south of the town centre, has smaller Thirties semi-detached and terrace houses and access to walks along the River Brent. Roe Green in nearby Kingsbury is a little-known garden suburb built for aviation workers during the First World War.

Council

Brent council is Labour controlled. Band D council tax for 2019/2020 is £1,582.85.

Shops and restaurants

London Designer Outlet in Wembley Park has 70 stores including Gap, H&M, Jack Wills, M&S and Superdry, plus chain restaurants Zizzi, Wagamama, Nando’s, Prezzo and Pizza Express.

The town centre along the High Road has a much more humdrum London high street feel with branches of Wilko, Superdrug, Boots, Poundland, Primark, TK Maxx and Sports Direct, although there is an independent fishmonger.

Masti in the High Road is an Indian restaurant with a bar and dancing. Ealing Road has fashion and jewellery shops serving the south Asian community, the jewellery shops selling delicate filigree gold pieces.

IKEA, on the North Circular Road, was the first branch of the Swedish flatpack furniture giant to open in the UK.

Open space

At Wembley Park, developer Quintain is promising that at least 45 acres of the 85-acre site will be dedicated to parks and open space.

King Edward VII Park in Park Lane, once part of Read’s Farm, was bought from Edward Spencer Churchill by the local council in 1913 and laid out as a public park in memory of the late monarch, and to compensate for the loss of Wembley Park as public open space.

It has a bowling green, sports pitches, tennis courts and a children’s playground. Fryent Country Park and adjacent Barn Hill Open Space off Fryent Way to the north has the remnants of Humphry Repton’s landscaping scheme.

The park has over 250 acres of fields, woods and ponds.

Leisure and the arts

Some seven million visitors pour into Wembley every year to events at the stadium and The SSE Arena. Wembley Stadium is the country’s leading sporting venue and a top music venue and in June alone will be hosting the Spice Girls reunion, Fleetwood Mac, Bon Jovi and the Eagles. Forthcoming concerts at the Art Deco SSE Arena include Alice in Chains, Jack Black’s band Tenacious D, Julio Iglesias, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Janelle Monáe.

There is a nine-screen Cineworld multiplex cinema in London Designer Outlet, and a new flexible 1,000 to 2,000 seat theatre, Troubadour Wembley Park, opens in the f

ormer Fountain Studios in the summer with the National Theatre’s War Horse due for an outing later in the year.

This summer there will be free outdoor cinema screenings in Arena Square in front of The SSE Arena, while July 20 has been designated International Busking Day with a day-long celebration of street performance.

Next year Brent council is London Borough of Culture and Wembley Park is expected to play a key role in a year-long programme of arts activities, most of which will be free.

The local council-run swimming pool is at the new Wembley Leisure Centre in Empire Way.

The establishment of a new French government lycée, Lycée International de Londres (co-ed, ages five to 18) in the Modern Movement former Brent town hall in Forty Lane has brought a lot of French families to Wembley, although if these families want to test the English education system there are three state schools which get the “outstanding” from the Ofsted schools watchdog: the all-through Ark Academy (co-ed, ages three to 18) in Bridge Road; Michaela Community School (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in North End Road and the nearby Wembley High Technical College (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in East Lane.

Primary schools

State primary schools which get the “outstanding” rating are: St Joseph’s Infants RC (co-ed, ages three to seven) in Waverley Avenue; St Joseph’s Juniors RC (co-ed, ages seven to 11) in Chatsworth Avenue and Oakington Manor in Oakington Manor Drive.

The Noam Primary School in Forty Avenue is a former private Jewish school which became a state school in January but will eventually move to a new site in Burnt Oak.

Comprehensive

All-through and comprehensive schools rated “good” are Preston Manor (co-ed, ages four to 18) in Carlton Avenue East, and Alperton (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in Stanley Avenue.

Private

The private primary schools are: St Christopher’s (co-ed, ages two to 11) in Wembley Park Drive; Buxlow (co-ed, ages two to 11) in Castleton Gardens and St Nicholas (co-ed, ages 0 to 11) in Salmon Street in nearby Kingsbury.

John Lyon (boys, ages 11 to 18) in Middle Road in Harrow-on-the-Hill is a private day school with links to Harrow School, the famous boys’ boarding school nearby.