Chapel
Chapel
Abney Park, in Stoke Newington, can be reached from Stamford Hill / Stoke Newington High Street, N16, to its east, and from Stoke Newington Church Street to its south. It is bordered by residential properties on all other sides.
This historic cemetery is also called Abney Park Cemetery. It, first opened in 1840, and fell out of use as a cemetery in the late 20th century. It is now fairly densely wooded, with numerous pathways between graves, and is of high interest for nature conservation and for its history.Abney Park is a former overgrown cemetery, which is now an outstanding example of wilderness in the built up inner city. When the site's cemetery use ceased, so did its maintenance, and vegetation started to take over. In the last twenty years of the 20th century, it has been gradually being cleaned out and brought back into some kind of order, much of it by volunteer labour.
It has now a significant inner city nature reserve. It is being restored sensitively with respect to its original use as a cemetery, its tatus as a nature reserve, and also with a view to both being attractive and useful to the area. The new undergrowth is being thinned out, and some arboretum replanting is taking place. Much of the work today is undertaken by volunteers.Some trees from the original plantings still survive. Limited use as a cemetery still continues. There is an indexing project for the tombs.
Abney Park today still has a number of monuments, including a chapels and statues. Some funds have been raised, some renovation has taken place, including a rebuilt formal entrance facing the High Road. The visitor centre is well-equipped, and there is a nearby workshop, story telling area, and children's garden.In its earlier history, it had been Abney Park, a parkland estate, dating from the early 1700s. It was then developed into one of the first 'garden cemeteries'. In the later 19th century, it was important both as an early London cemetery, and was also at the same time an arboretum and a park. At this time it became known as Abney Park Cemetery. It had some of the first examples of some types of cemetery architecture.
Being run by a commercial company which went into liquidation in the 1970's, it was allowed to fall into disuse and become un-maintained. It became overgrown by trees and other vegetation, which led to it later becoming one of London's innermost nature reserves.It was taken over by Hackney Council and then leased to the Abney Park Trust.
The park is managed by the Abney Park Trust, with the help of Hackney Council. They can be contacted at the visitor centre at 020 7275 7557. There is additional information on the trust's website.
Children should generally be accompanied when walking through inner parts of the grounds.