IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Highbury Hill, LONDON, N5 1AU

Redevelopment of Highbury, the 'old' football ground of The Arsenal. Photo taken from the East Coast main rail line.

Looming over the buildings at the end of corner of the street, the former Highbury stadium of Arsenal FC, now converted into flats.

The two modern houses are interesting redevelopment/infill. They're primarily in London brick, and respect the roof line; but the rectangular bay windows extending upwards to the first floor are inappropriate, as are the modern windows. See also Image

The station frontage appears incongruously perched between Victorian terraced houses in Gillespie Road, N5. In fact it was opened in 1906 as Gillespie Road station and there is a photograph of it, a hundred years ago in 1907, shortly after it opened, in the London Transport Museum archive here http://photos.ltmcollection.org/images/max/73/9887773.jpg Arsenal Football Club started using nearby Highbury as their ground in 1913, and their former manager, Herbert Chapman, was instrumental in getting the name of the station changed to the name of the club. In 1932 it was renamed to Arsenal (Highbury Hill), but the extension was rapidly dropped. Highbury Hill is the name of the road leading down to the station from which the photograph was taken. Some Gillespie Road nameplates remain on the tiled walls inside the station today. In the 1930s too the station frontage was widened with the demolition of some houses; hence the discrepancy between the widths of the frontage in the 1907 and 2007 images. In 2006 Arsenal FC moved to the new Emirates Stadium, and local residents began a campaign to get the name of the station changed back to Gillespie Road. However the station is still within easy walking distance of the new stadium so the name appears to be here to stay. Am I alone in thinking that the original 1906 Edwardian façade appears more in tune with the surrounding buildings than the current one?

The entrance to Arsenal's Emirates stadium on Highbury Hill. The stairs on the right lead to a bridge which carries fans across the Finsbury Park to Canonbury railway line into the stadium complex.