#lillesden

Photos of my best mate Gareth in Lillesden. Really don’t like the exaggerated vignette I put on one. Aww at Gareth pre beard. 

(Image: howzey, cc-nc-nd-4.0)

Since its closure in 1999, the derelict Lillesden School for Girls has become an urban exploration hotspot. The abandoned building and surrounding grounds have appeared before on Urban Ghosts in our round-up of abandoned schools and universities, but as the year draws to a close we felt the mysterious institution needed revisiting.

(Images: Blunders 500 (website: markblundellphoto.com), reproduced with permission)

Located in a quiet corner of rural Kent, England, the disused boarding school occupies the former Lillesden Estate Mansion, built in 1855 by banker Edward Lloyd who was co-founder of the Lloyd Entwistle & Co bank which ultimately became the National Westminster (Natwest).

(Images: Blunders 500 (website: markblundellphoto.com), reproduced with permission)

The abundance of thistles within the mansion’s decorative stonework and motifs suggest a strong Scottish connection, which, as ghost-of.org writes, is somewhat intriguing due to Lloyd’s Welsh origins and the fact that his wife Caroline Foster was born to a distinguished family in Jamaica at the height of the British Empire.

(Images: howzey, cc-nc-nd-4.0)

The post-World War One era was a time of decline and changing fortunes for many country estates and the mansion passed into the hands of the Lillesden School for Girls around that time. Later becoming Bedgebury Public School for Girls, the estate and its grand mansion remained an educational institution until 1999.

(Images: howzey, cc-nc-nd-4.0)

The fact that the school upheld high standards of education, was popular with its pupils and sat amid 200 acres of gardens and forests with ponies stabled in the grounds has led some to express surprise that Lillesden had to close, adding to the air of mystery surrounding the abandoned school.

(Image: howzey, cc-nc-nd-4.0)

Since 1999 the neglected structure has deteriorated considerably, a ghostly relic of its prosperous past amid the overgrown Lillesden Estate. More recently used to films scenes for 28 Days Later and Dr Who, the old school is reportedly set to be turned into apartments, and a Facebook page has been set up in recognition of its iconic local status.