Living in Bromley: area guide to homes, schools and transport links

Happy families are made in south London, with grammar schools, a fast commute, good-value homes and great shopping.
Daniel Lynch
Anthea Masey19 February 2020
With a surprisingly quick 20-minute commute into central London, Bromley is a big draw for families looking for affordable houses close to good schools.

This south London town also has the advantage of being close to the countryside made famous by Charles Darwin (1809-82) who studied nature around Down House, his home for 40 years in the village of Downe.

In Kent during Darwin’s lifetime, Downe has been part of Bromley borough since April 1965.

Bromley town centre has undergone a recent facelift with a new ribbon of greenery and seating running down High Street and Market Square and the surrounding warren of small streets that make up Bromley North, designed by award-winning architects Studio Egret West.

It has thrown into relief the town centre’s many fine buildings, and it is worth looking up to see what sits above the ground-floor shops.

Some, such as the listed Royal Bell hotel in High Street, are the work of architect Ernest Newton, who built many houses in the Arts and Crafts style in nearby Bickley and Chislehurst. The Royal Bell is one of Bromley’s most important buildings.

With a long history as a coaching inn, an earlier building is name-checked in Jane Austen’s novel Pride and Prejudice.

The current Jacobean-style building, with leaded lights and bow windows, was built in 1898, when Bromley was developing as a popular commuter town.

Empty and semi-derelict for many years, it is on Historic England’s Heritage at Risk register. But new owners have planning permission to convert it into a boutique hotel with a craft beer pub, The Bell Tap, on part of the ground floor.

Further up the High Street is the Star & Garter, a listed Arts and Crafts pub that has benefited from a fresh lick of paint, and the pretty Art Deco cinema which reopened last June as a six-screen Picturehouse.

For many centuries Bromley was linked with the Bishop of Rochester who had a palace there.

In 1666, one such bishop, John Warner, endowed a home for “twenty poore widows of orthodox and loyall clergymen”.

Now a series of Grade I-listed buildings, Bromley and Sheppard’s Colleges on the corner of London Road and Tweedy Road is Bromley’s most notable and historic building.

Still serving its original purpose, it contains 40 homes for retired vicars or their widows, some enjoying flats overlooking a red-brick courtyard with a picturesque colonnade, which until recently were thought to be the work of Sir Christopher Wren.

The Bishop’s Palace itself dates from a century later with extensive remodelling in the early 20th century by Arts and Crafts architects Richard Norman Shaw and local hero Ernest Newton.

The building in Stockwell Close houses Bromley Civic Centre and a number of its historic rooms are popular places to get married.

Bromley is 12 miles south-east of central London with Downham to the north, Chislehurst and Orpington to the east, Hayes and West Wickham to the south and Beckenham to the west.

The property scene

Families from areas closer to London who are looking to trade up from a flat to a house with a garden find Bromley a magnet, says sales director Emily Williams at the local Kinleigh Folkard & Hayward branch.

“The drivers in Bromley are affordable family houses, good schools and the quick commute into central London.” The entry price for a three-bedroom terrace house is about £500,000.

Bromley has a wide range of homes, everything from small Victorian cottages to large, detached, Edwardian houses; from Twenties detached houses to Thirties semis, period conversions and new-build flats.

Here is Williams’s expert property guide to the different areas of Bromley: find Victorian houses and cottages in Bromley North Village, sometimes referred to as Old Town; large Edwardian houses in Sundridge Park; even larger detached houses in Bickley between Bromley and Chislehurst, and Victorian and Edwardian houses in Shortlands bordering Beckenham.

Then there are small Victorian terrace houses in Chatterton Village, south of the town centre; Twenties and Thirties terrace and semi-detached houses in the wide tree-lined streets of the Palace Estate close to Bromley South station; and finally there’s the triangle north of Westmoreland Road which is popular with parents who want to be in the Highfield primary school catchment area.

One of the most expensive houses currently for sale is Crosshand House in Chislehurst Road, Bickley, designed by Ernest Newton. With nine bedrooms and 7,500sq ft, it’s on the market for £2.6 million.

New-build homes

Bromley is embracing the idea promoted by the Mayor of London that the suburbs need to be building more town centre flats.

On a former car park site, St Mark’s Square at the Bromley South end of the town centre has brought new flats, a cinema, a hotel, a new public square and restaurants.

The sloping roof adds a new dimension to the skyline and the shiny shapes adorning the Premier Inn exterior are a reference to broom flowers, the bright yellow spring blossom that gave Bromley its name.

Churchill Quarter, off Market Square next to Churchill Theatre and overlooking Church House Gardens, is a joint venture between Bromley council and housebuilder Countryside.

Proposed is a 16-storey tower with 407 new homes, shops and restaurants overlooking the library and theatre entrances.

Locals complain the scheme intrudes on the view from Queen’s Mead and have criticised plans to compulsory purchase local homes.

Under way beside Bromley South station is Perigon Heights, a 17-storey rental-only tower block from developer Purelake with 52 flats that will be ready in the autumn. For more information call Acorn on 020 8315 6917.

Remaining for sale at St Mark’s Square are 14 one-, two- and three-bedroom flats, plus a pair of two-bedroom duplexes and two penthouses, all of them ready to move into.

The one-bedroom flats start at £380,000 with two-bedroom flats at £450,000 and three-bedroom flats at £555,000.

The two-bedroom duplexes are priced from £500,000, with two-bedroom penthouses at £775,000. Call Stone Real Estate on 020 7043 8888 and CBRE on 020 7519 5900.

The Mansion at Sundridge Park is the conversion of a grand listed John Nash-designed house on the edge of Bromley into 22 apartments with two or three bedrooms, from developer City & Country.

The scheme includes some of the most sumptuous flats to be found anywhere in London’s suburbs, with the largest of the homes extending to 3,435sq ft.

Two-bedroom flats range from £525,000 to £2.5 million and the one remaining three-bedroom flat is £1.35 million. Call 020 8712 6895.

First-time buyers

Help to Buy is available at Glassworks, a scheme of 28 flats in a former warehouse and office building in Liddon Road.

One-bedroom flats start at £240,000 and two-bedroom flats at £370,000. Call Kinleigh Folkard & Hayward on 020 3993 9328.

Help to Buy is also available at St Mark’s Square (as before).

Renting in bromley

Victoria Saunders, lettings branch director at Kinleigh Folkard & Hayward says the St Mark’s Square development is popular with renters and she has a waiting list of people wanting to rent there.

One-bedroom flats in St Mark’s Square rent for between £1,200 and £1,300 a month and two-bedroom flats for between £1,400 and £1,500 a month.

Families are keen to live near good schools, with three- and four-bedroom houses close to the popular Highfield primary school renting for between £2,200 and £2,500 a month.

Staying power

Bromley is a family area with a loyal following, although some families move to West Wickham, Sevenoaks or Tunbridge Wells for the secondary schools.

Postcode

BR1 is the Bromley postcode that covers Bromley North Village, Sundridge and Bickley; BR2 the Bromley and Keston postcode covers a large area including Bromley town centre, Bromley Common and Shortlands and extends south to Keston; BR3, the Beckenham postcode, strays into Shortlands.

Best roads

Garden Road, Lodge Road and Edward Road close to Sundridge Park Golf Club have detached Edwardian and Twenties houses.

Rodway Road in Bromley North Village has detached Edwardian houses.

On the Palace Estate there are Twenties and Thirties detached houses, some with mock-Tudor detailing, in Hayes Road, Beadon Road and Stone Road, with the advantage of being in walking distance of Bromley South station.

A four-bedroom detached house in Cameron Road is for sale for £950,000.

Up and coming

Chatterton Village, an area of small Victorian terrace houses off Bromley Common to the south of the town centre, has its own little shopping centre along Chatterton Road.

It is a favourite with young families buying their first house. A two-bedroom house in Victoria Road is for sale for £450,000.

Lifestyle

Shops and restaurants

Bromley has a busy town centre with not too many empty shops or charity shops.

Debenhams department store survived the recent cull that closed 19 branches.

There are large branches of Waitrose and Sainsbury’s.

The Glades covered shopping centre has a good choice including upmarket brands Massimo Dutti, The White Company, Jo Malone and Bobbi Brown.

Other chain stores in The Glades are: Oliver Bonas, Zara, Joules, White Stuff, Fat Face, Phase Eight, Whistles, Waterstones, New Look and H&M. There is a food court overlooking Queen Gardens with branches of Wagamama, Byron and Carluccio’s.

Elsewhere in the High Street are branches of Wilko, Poundland, TK Maxx, Laura Ashley, Lidl, Primark and M&S, and a newcomer, an Ikea Planning Studio, one of only two in London so far, the other being in Tottenham Court Road. Studio Gusto is a long-standing and popular Italian restaurant.

In the small streets of North Bromley, new restaurants have sprung up in response to the much-improved public realm.

In High Street there is popular Turkish restaurant Havet and the newly redecorated Star & Garter. In Market Square, there is Café Rouge; in East Street is Ask, and also Bird & Bun for rotisserie chicken and burgers; and in Widmore Road there’s Franco Manca, Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Nando’s and Pizza Express.

St Mark’s Square has further branches of Nando’s and Pizza Express but some of the other promised restaurants have been slow to arrive.

Open space

Bromley has two fine town centre parks — Bromley Palace Park in the grounds of the former Bishop of Rochester Palace, a Grade II-listed mansion built in 1775, now the local civic centre; and Church House Gardens, occupying a steeply hilly site, which has rose beds, formal gardens, a rockery, lake and amphitheatre, children’s playground, tennis courts and skateboard park.

The borough looks after three country parks: High Elms in Farnborough; Jubilee in Petts Wood and Scadbury Park in Chislehurst.

Leisure and the arts

The Churchill Theatre is a leading suburban producing theatre.

The Bromley Little Theatre in North Street is a busy amateur theatre company.

The newly reopened Art Deco six-screen Picturehouse cinema is in High Street and the nine-screen Vue multiplex is in St Mark’s Square.

The Pavilion in Kentish Way is the local council-owned swimming pool.​

Schools

Primary

Homes in the Highfield primary school catchment area, with the infant school in Highfield Road and the junior school in South Hill Road, are particularly sought after; both schools are rated “outstanding” by Ofsted.

Also “outstanding” are Harris Primary Academy Shortlands in Kingswood Road; and Parish CofE in London Lane.

All Bromley’s primary schools are rated “good” or better by the official watchdog.

Grammar

Bromley has two selective grammar schools, both “outstanding”: Newstead Wood (girls, ages 11 to 18) in Avebury Road and St Olave’s and St Saviour’s (boys, ages 11 to 18) in Goddington Lane, both in Orpington.

Comprehensive

All the local comprehensive schools are judged to be “good” or better.

Rated “outstanding” are: Bonus Pastor RC (co-ed, ages 11 to 16) in Winlaton Road; Harris Girls’ Academy Bromley (ages 11 to 18) in Lennard Road in Beckenham; Bullers Wood (girls, ages 11 to 18) in St Nicholas Lane in Chislehurst; Hayes (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in West Common Road and Harris Academy Beckenham (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in Manor Way.

The following local comprehensive schools are “good”: Bishop Justus CofE (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in Magpie Hall Lane; Langley Park School for Girls (ages 11 to 18) in Hawksbrook Lane and Langley Park School for Boys (ages, 11 to 18) in South End Park Road, both in Beckenham; Ravens Wood (boys, ages 11 to 18) in Oakley Road, and The Ravensbourne School (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in Hayes Lane.

Haberdashers’ Aske’s Knights Academy (co-ed, ages three to 18) in Lancelot Road is an all-through school which is judged to be “good”.

London South East Colleges (co-ed, ages 14 to 18) in Rookery Lane is the local Further Education College. It also has campuses in Bexley, Greenwich and Orpington, and it is judged to be “good”.

Private

Bromley has a wide choice of private schools.

The primary and preparatory schools are: Ashgrove (co-ed, ages three to 11) in Widmore Road; Breaside (co-ed, ages two to 11) in Orchard Road; Bickley Park (boys, ages two to 13) in Heath Lane; and St Christopher’s The Hall (co-ed, ages two to 11) in Bromley Road.

There are also a number of all-through private schools.

These are: Bishop Challoner RC (co-ed, ages three to 18) in Bromley Road; Bromley High (girls, ages 11 to 18) in Blackbrook Lane; Babington House (co-ed, ages three to 18) in Grange Drive; Eltham College (boys, ages seven to 18 with girls in the sixth form) in Grove Park Road in Mottingham.

Farringtons (co-ed, ages three to 18) in Perry Street is a Methodist school in Chislehurst.