Vestry House Museum
This house, built in 1730, and situated in an area of Walthamstow that still retains its original, rural south vibe, was originally used as a workhouse, and a meeting place for the local government, known as the Vestry. At the time, it contained a bakehouse for keeping the inmates fed, and a brewery to provide them with their allotted one pint of beer a day (any children residing there received a half pint – it was safer than the water). The paupers and officials were later joined by the local Watch, a forerunner of the police.
The Met moved into Vestry House in 1840, and one of their cells remains to this day. After they departed, the house became, in succession, an armoury, a builders’ store, a literary and scientific institute, then a private house, before Walthamstow Borough Council took over and turned it into a museum of local antiquities – the forerunner of today’s establishment, which displays items associated with the history of the Waltham Forest area.
The collection is quite varied, including everyday domestic items such as irons and clothes pegs, a fancy hand-painted tea service where each piece depicts a local landmark, period costumes, and novelty postcards. One room is given over to Walthamstow’s toy making industry – a lot of tin figures and trains!
An extensive garden to the rear displays plants that the workhouse inmates would have grown for culinary and medical purposes, and a memorial to a much-loved local cat, Tetley. The highlight of the entire collection though is the Bremer Car, believed to be the first British-built internal combustion engine car.
