Carshalton Park

The park is about one tenth of its original size, sold off for housing development starting in 1892.

Until 1898, there were deer in Carshalton Park. In the early 18th century, Venetian architect, Giacomo Leoni, was to have designed a mansion and landscaped the grounds, however only the Orangery was built. The park gates, made in 1711, are now installed in a public park on Long Island, New York.

A grotto was built in about 1724 with a canal extending to Carshalton Place. The structure has fallen into a state of disrepair and the canal is dry – though, following heavy rains in 2014, it flowed with water once more, fed by an underground chalk chamber beneath the grotto, one of the sources of the River Wandle.

The so-called Hog Pit Pond, now dried out, was used as a mill pond reservoir at the end of the 18th century.

In 2012, a forgotten Second World War air raid shelter was discovered, which accommodated up to a thousand people, used by the nearby cottage hospital. Carshalton was bombed a number of times.

The park today has a children’s playground and tennis courts.