Bromley

Bromley High Street

The town has a large retail area, including a pedestrianised High Street and The Glades centre, the main shopping mall, which has a catchment of 1.3 million people.^[16] The shopping area includes retailers such as Gap, Oasis,Foot Locker and Waterstone's. Development at the nearby St. Mark's Square has seen further restaurants and a cinema established.

Bromley High Street is also the location for the Bromley Charter Market, which runs on a Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. King John granted a charter for the Market to be held every Tuesday in 1205, with Henry VI revising this charter to every Thursday in 1447.^[17][18] The Market sells food and confectionery items, clothing and other goods like jewellery.

Rail

Bromley is served by two main rail stations. Bromley South provides National Rail services to London Victoria (non stop, semi fast via Denmark Hill and stopping services via Herne Hill), London Blackfriars via Catford, Orpington, Sevenoaks via Swanley, Ramsgate via Chatham, Dover Priory via Chatham & Canterbury East and to Ashford International via Maidstone East.

Bromley North provides shuttle services to Grove Park, where onward connections can be made for services to London Charing Cross & London Cannon Street via Lewisham.

Finally, Shortlands railway station serves primarily residential areas immediately southwest of the town centre. Being one stop west of Bromley South, Southeastern and Thameslink services connect the station to London Victoria and London Blackfriars.

Buses

Bromley is served by London Buses routes 61, 119, 126, 138, 146, 162, 208, 227, 246, 261, 269, 314, 320, 336, 352, 354, 358, 367, 638, N3, N199, SL3 and SL5. These connect it with areas including Beckenham, Bexley, Bexleyheath, Biggin Hill, Catford, Chislehurst, Croydon, Crystal Palace, Downham, Elmers End, Eltham, Grove Park, Hayes, Lee Green, Lewisham, Locksbottom, Mottingham, New Addington, Orpington, Penge, Petts Wood, Sidcup, West Wickham & Westerham.

Festivals

Since May 1929, Bromley has had an annual festival of "dance, drama and comedy" in and around the town's venues.^[19] The South London Film Festival has been hosted annually in Bromley since 2022.

The large open spaces have lent themselves to outdoor concerts, festivals and outdoor screenings, as well in the venues such as Norman Park,^[20] Hayes Farm, Beckenham Place Park^[21] and Croydon Road recreation ground.^[22]

Theatres

Bromley has a number of theatres in the borough, in the town centre there are three, a professional, the Churchill Theatre, an amateur, the Bromley Little Theatre (close to Bromley North railway station) and an outdoor amphitheatre located in "Church House Gardens" behind the Churchill theatre.

The Churchill Theatre was opened on 19 July 1977 by the Prince of Wales, and seats 781.^[23] It is run on a contract currently held by HQ Theatres Ltd acting as both a receiving and producing house, with productions transferring to the West End or touring nationally. An example being recent tours of Club Tropicana The Musical.

Library

Bromley also has a central library in the same building as the Churchill Theatre with a large book stock, Internet and wifi access, reference library and local studies department. It functions as the central library of the broader Bromley Borough Libraries Service.

Cinema

Bromley Picturehouse was opened in June 2019 in the previous Empire theatre.^{[citation needed]}

Vue Cinemas own a nine-screen cinema, which is part of the Bromley South Central scheme at St Mark's Square, opened on 28 November 2018.^[24]

Dance

Bromley has its own team of Morris dancers, The Ravensbourne Morris Men, founded in 1947 as a post-war revival team following an inaugural meeting at the then Jean's Café, which was located opposite Bromley South Station.^[25]

Civic Society

Bromley Civic Society is a civic society for the historic centre of Bromley.^[26] It is a founder member of Civic Voice. It seeks to educate the public about the community's history and to preserve historical sites.

Popular culture

In the famous Monty Python "Spam" sketch Bromley was stated to be the location of the fictional Green Midget Café, where every item on the menu was composed of spam in varying degrees.^[6] In another Monty Python sketch, it was stated that all seven continents are visible from the top of the Kentish Times building in Bromley.

The Bromley Contingent was the name given to the entourage that followed the Sex Pistols and helped popularise the punk movement. It was so called because many of its members were from Bromley, some of whom later became famous as musicians in their own right, like Siouxsie Sioux and Billy Idol.^[6]

The 2018 humorous film, The Bromley Boys is set in Bromley and surroundings in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Based on a real-life memoir by Dave Roberts about following Bromley F.C., it includes many scenes filmed locally, although Crockenhill F.C. was used as a substitute for the Hayes Lane stadium.^[27]

Guitarist Billy Jenkins, born in Bromley, released an album titled "Sounds like Bromley" in 1982 and another in 1997 titled "Still Sounds Like Bromley". In a BBC Radio 3 interview he said that "if Kent is the Garden of England then Bromley is one of the compost heaps". He then moved to Lewisham.

Media

Local news is provided by the Bromley Times.

Football

The town has three Non-League football clubs, and one League Two club. Bromley F.C. play their home games at the Hayes Lane Stadium; as did Cray Wanderers F.C. from 1998 until 2024. The latter club is claimed to be the oldest football club in what is today Greater London.^[28] The other teams, Holmesdale F.C. and Greenwich Borough F.C., play at Oakley Road. Bromley F.C. are the only professional team in Bromley and play in League Two after being promoted from the National League in 2024.^[29]

Rugby

Five rugby clubs in Bromley are, Old Elthamians RFC (a National League 2 side),^[30] Park House FC (established in 1883),^[31] Bromley RFC (founded in 1886),^[32] Beckenham RFC (established in 1894),^[33] and Beccehamians RFC (founded in 1933) which plays competitive rugby at Sparrows Den at the bottom of Corkscrew Hill in nearby West Wickham.^[34]

Cricket

Bromley Cricket Club was founded in 1820,^[35] but evidence of cricket being played in Bromley dates to 1735.^[36] Bromley CC has a significant success record, with 9 Kent Cricket League championship titles to their name.^[37] Bromley field four senior teams. Three compete in the Kent Cricket League (a designated ECB Premier League^[37]) and one plays in the British Tamil Cricket League.^[38] They also have an established junior training section that play competitive cricket in the North Kent Junior League.^[39]

Life expectancy

The life expectancy in Bromley Town ward (which covers the town centre) was 79.3 years for males and 83.7 years for females, during 2009–2013. The highest in the town were in Shortlands: 86.1 years for males and 88.1 years for females. The lowest for both genders was in Plaistow and Sundridge: 77.5 and 82.1 years respectively.^[46]

Ethnic groups

In Bromley Town, 18.5% of the population was of minority ethnicity. The highest in the town was 19.3% in Plaistow and Sundridge, and the lowest was 8.3% in Hayes and Coney Hall.^[46]

House prices

The median house price in Bromley Town ward was £327,000 in 2014, compared to £295,444 in Plaistow and Sundridge, and £480,000 in Bickley. 37% of houses in Bickley were detached, more than other wards. In all wards, over 60% of houses were owned by households, peaking at 88.2% in Hayes and Coney Hall.^[46] In 2020, the average cost of a house was £519,619.^[49]

H. G. Wells

Noted author H. G. Wells was born in Bromley on 21 September 1866, to Sarah and Joseph Wells; his father was the founder of the Bromley Cricket Club and the proprietor of a shop that sold cricket equipment.^[53] Wells spent the first 13 years of his life in Bromley. From 1874 to 1879 he attended Tomas Morley's Bromley Academy, at 74 High Street.^[54] There was a 'H. G. Wells Centre' in Masons Hill near the southern end of the High Street which housed the Bromley Labour Club (the building was demolished in 2017).^{[citation needed]} In August 2005, the wall honouring Wells in Market Square was repainted; the current wall painting features a rich green background with the same Wells reference and the evolutionary sequence of Homo sapiens featured in Origin of Species by Charles Darwin, a former resident of nearby Downe Village.^[55]

Wells wrote about Bromley in an early unsigned article in the Pall Mall Gazette in which he expressed satisfaction that he had been born in an earlier, more rural Bromley.^[56] A blue plaque marks Wells' birthplace in Market Square, on the wall of what is now a Primark store.^[57] A marble plaque appears above the door of 8 South Street, the location of Mrs Knott's Dame school where "Bertie", as he was called as a child, learned to read and write.^[58] H. G. Wells featured Bromley in two of his novels: The War in the Air (which refers to Bromley as Bunhill) and The New Machiavelli (in which Bromley is referred to as Bromstead).

However, H. G. Wells refused the offered freedom of the town, stating:

"Bromley has not been particularly gracious to me nor I to Bromley and I don't think I want to add the freedom of Bromley to the freedom of the City of London and the freedom of the City of Brussels – both of which I have."

He described Bromley in one of his novels as a "morbid sprawl of population".^[59]

Other residents

This section needs additional citations for verification. (December 2023)

Owen Chadwick was born in Bromley in 1916. He was awarded the Order of Merit, was Vice Chancellor of University of Cambridge, Master of Selwyn Cambridge, Regius Professor of Modern History, Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History, Chancellor of University of Anglia, President of the British Academy, and was a Rugby Union International.

Other writers from Bromley include Captain W.E. Johns (author of the Biggles adventures), David Nobbs (author of The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin and writer for Les Dawson and The Two Ronnies), and Enid Blyton who wrote children's fiction. A blue historical plaque can be found on the external wall of her former home on Shortlands Road, Bromley.

Other notable people who lived in Bromley include David Bowie, Raymond Raikes radio producer director who produced Dick Barton special agent the precursor to James Bond. Talbot Rothwell, screenwriter of twenty Carry On films, Justine Lord, actress, Peter Howitt, Richmal Crompton, Pixie Lott, Matt Terry, Christopher Tennant, Hanif Kureishi, Peter Frampton, Aleister Crowley, bassist Steven Severin of Siouxsie and the Banshees, Fatboy Slim, Jack Dee, Tom Allen, D. Bernard Amos, Rob Beckett, Alexander Molony,^[60] Gary Rhodes, Pete Sears, singer Poly Styrene, Billy Idol, Brian Poole, (of The Tremoloes),Josh Beech, Ruthie Henshall, Trevor Goddard, actor, Billy Jenkins, Alex Clare, cricketer Jill Cruwys,^[61] the anarchist Peter Kropotkin,^[62] the former Clash drummer Topper Headon, illustrator Charles Keeping, Formula 1 test driver Gary Paffett, IndyCar driver Mike Conway, children's writer Andrew Murray, tenor Roland Cunningham, actor Michael York who attended Bromley Grammar School for Boys,^[63] clarinetist Chris Craker, Don Perrin, Canadian author who attended Burnt Ash School in Bromley, and Sir Thomas James Harper, an officer decorated in the Crimean War. The musical conducting brothers Stephen and Nicholas Cleobury were born in Bromley. Actor Jerome Flynn, who starred in Game of Thrones as Bronn, was born in Bromley. Gus Lobban and Jamie Bulled of the band Kero Kero Bonito grew up in Bromley: their music video for the song 'You Know How It Is' features several local landmarks.

Deborah Linsley, the victim of one of Britain's most high-profile unsolved murders in 1988, grew up in Bromley.

Richard Reid, also known as the "Shoe Bomber", was born and lived in Bromley. He is notable as the suspect for the 2001 shoe bomb attempt.

In the 20th century, the Parish Church of St Peter and St Paul produced, in quick succession, three Church of England Bishops: Henry David Halsey – Bishop of Carlisle, Philip Goodrich – Bishop of Worcester, David Bartleet – Bishop of Tonbridge. Sculptor Nicholas Cornwell and Maisy James the Big Brother 12 housemate. Sometime before 1881 the engineer and industrialist Richard Porter moved to Beckenham where he remained until his death in 1913. Hanif Kureishi, the writer and filmmaker was born here, and spent a significant part of his youth, here.^[6] His first novel The Buddha of Suburbia was loosely based on his life here and the people he lived and met here.^[6]

Comedian Frankie Boyle claims to be a former resident and has described Bromley as a 'lobotomy made out of bricks'.^[64] The comedian Chris Addison^[65] currently lives in Bromley, as does tennis player Emma Raducanu.

Wolverhampton Wanderers manager and former midfielder Gary O'Neil, former Millwall F.C. midfielder Tim Cahill, and former Blackburn Rovers striker Jason Roberts lived in Bromley. English darts player Les Capewell was born in Bromley.

Scottish education secretary Michael Russell MSP was born and spent the early years of his life in Bromley.