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Fulham () is an area of the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham in West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It lies in a loop on the north bank of the River Thames, bordering Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea, with which it shares the area known as West Brompton. Over the Thames, Fulham faces Wandsworth, Putney, the London Wetland Centre in Barnes in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames.
First recorded by name in 691, it was an extensive Anglo-Saxon estate, the Fulham Palace, and then a parish. Its domain stretched from modern-day Chiswick in the west to Chelsea in the southeast; and from Harlesden in the northwest to Kensal Green in the northeast bordered by the littoral of Counter's Creek and the Manor of Kensington. It originally included today's Hammersmith. Between 1900 and 1965, it was demarcated as the Metropolitan Borough of Fulham, before its merger with the Metropolitan Borough of Hammersmith to create the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham (known as the London Borough of Hammersmith from 1965 to 1979). The district is split between the western and south-western postal areas.
Fulham industrial history includes pottery, tapestry-weaving, paper-making and brewing in the 17th and 18th centuries in Fulham High Street, and later the automotive industry, aviation, food production, and laundries. In the 19th century, there was glass-blowing and this resurged in the 21st century with the Aronson-Noon studio and the former Zest gallery in Rickett Street. Lillie Bridge Depot, a railway engineering depot, opened in 1872, is associated with the building and extension of the London Underground, the electrification of Tube lines from the nearby Lots Road Power Station, and for well over a century has been the maintenance hub for rolling stock and track. Route and Track diagrams for West Kensington and Lillie Bridge , trainweb.org; retrieved 3 October 2016. "The Kensington Canal, railways and related developments" Pages 322-338 , Survey of London: Volume 42, Kensington Square To Earl's Court. Originally published by London County Council, London, 1986.
Two Premier League football clubs, Fulham and Chelsea, play in Fulham. Two other notable sporting clubs are the Hurlingham Club, known for polo, and the Queen's tennis club, known for its annual pre-Wimbledon tennis tournament. In the 1800s, Lillie Bridge Grounds hosted the first meetings of the Amateur Athletic Association of England, the second FA Cup Final, and the first amateur boxing matches. "Sport, ancient and modern: Athletics", in A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 2, General; Ashford, East Bedfont With Hatton, Feltham, Hampton With Hampton Wick, Hanworth, Laleham, Littleton , ed. William Page (London, 1911), pp. 301-02; accessed 15 October 2016. The Lillie Bridge area was the home ground of the Middlesex County Cricket Club, before it moved to Marylebone. "Sport, ancient and modern: Cricket, Middlesex County", in A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 2, General; Ashford, East Bedfont With Hatton, Feltham, Hampton With Hampton Wick, Hanworth, Laleham, Littleton , ed. William Page (London, 1911), pp. 270-73; accessed 15 October 2016.
In recent years, there has been a great revival of interest in Fulham's earliest history, largely due to the Fulham Archaeological Rescue Group. This has carried out a number of digs, particularly in the vicinity of Fulham Palace, which show that approximately 5,000 years ago Neolithic people were living by the riverside and in other parts of the area. Excavations have also revealed Roman Britain settlements during the third and fourth centuries AD.
The first written record of a church in Fulham dates from 1154, with the first known parish priest of All Saints Church, Fulham appointed in 1242. All Saints Church was enlarged in 1881 by Sir Arthur Blomfield.
Hammersmith was part of the ancient parish of Fulham up until 1834. Prior to that time it had been a perpetual curacy under the parish of Fulham.'Hambledon - Hampshire-Cross', in A Topographical Dictionary of England, ed. Samuel Lewis (London, 1848), pp. 387-391. British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/topographical-dict/england/pp387-391 accessed.Faulkner, Thomas. (1813) Historical and Topographical Account of the parish of Fulham, including the hamlet of Hammersmith By 1834 it had so many residents, a separate parish with a vicar (no longer a curate) and vestry for works was created. The two areas did not come together again until the commencement of the London Government Act in 1965.
The parish boundary with Chelsea and Kensington was formed by the now culverted Counter's Creek river, the course of which is now occupied by the West London Line. This parish boundary has been inherited by the modern boroughs of Hammersmith & Fulham and Kensington & Chelsea.
In 1642, Robert Devereux, 3rd Earl of Essex, withdrawing from the Battle of Brentford (1642), ordered to be put a pontoon bridge on the Thames to unite with his detachment in Kingston in pursuit of Charles I, who ordered Prince Rupert to retreat from Brentford back west. The King and Prince moved their troops from Reading to Oxford for the winter. This is thought to have been near the first bridge (which was made of wood). It was commonly named Fulham Bridge, built in 1729 and was replaced in 1886 with Putney Bridge.
Margravine Road recalls the existence of Brandenburgh House, a riverside mansion built by Sir Nicholas Crispe in the time of Charles I, and used as the headquarters of General Fairfax in 1647 during the civil wars. In 1792 it was occupied by Charles Alexander, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach and his wife, and in 1820 by Caroline, consort of George IV. His non-political 'wife' was Maria Fitzherbert who lived in East End House in Parson's Green. They are reputed to have had several children.Wilkins, F.H. (1905), Mrs Fitzherbert and George IV, London: Longman and Green. p. 23
The extract below of John Rocque's Map of London, 1746 shows the Parish of Fulham in the loop of the Thames, with the boundary with Chelsea, Counter's Creek, narrow and dark, flowing east into the river. The recently built, wooden, first Fulham/Putney bridge is shown and two Fulham village clusters, one central, one south-west.
In 1824 the Imperial Gas Light and Coke Company, the first public utility company in the world, bought the Sandford estate in Sands End to produce gas for lighting — and in the case of the Hurlingham Club, for ballooning. Its ornately decorated number 2 gasholder is Georgian, completed in 1830 and reputed to be the oldest gasholder in the World. In connection with gas property portfolios, in 1843 the newly formed Westminster Cemetery Company had trouble persuading the Equitable Gas people (a future Imperial take-over) to sell them a small portion of land to gain southern access, onto the Fulham Road, from their recently laid out Brompton Cemetery, over the parish border in Chelsea. The sale was finally achieved through the intervention of cemetery shareholder and Fulham resident, John Gunter. Meanwhile, another group of local landowners, led by Lord Kensington with Sir John Scott Lillie and others had conceived, in 1822, the idea of exploiting the water course up-river from Chelsea Creek on their land by turning it into a two-mile canal. It was to have a basin, a lock and wharves, to be known as the Kensington Canal, and link the Grand Union Canal with the Thames. In reality, however, the project was over budget and delayed by contractor bankruptcies and only opened in 1828, when railways were already gaining traction. The short-lived canal concept did however leave a legacy: the creation on Lillie's land of a brewery and residential development, 'Rosa', and 'Hermitage Cottages', and several roads, notably, the Lillie Road connecting the canal bridge, (Lillie Bridge) at West Brompton with North End Lane and the eventual creation of two railway lines, the West London Line and the District line connecting South London with the rest of the capital. This was done with the input of two noted consulting engineers, Robert Stephenson in 1840 and from 1860, Sir John Fowler. It meant that the area around Lillie Bridge was to make a lasting, if largely unsung, contribution for well over a century to the development and maintenance of public transport in London and beyond. Next to the Lillie Bridge engineering Depot, the Midland Railway established its own coal and goods yard.
In 1907 the engineering HQ of the Piccadilly Line in Richmond Place (16-18 Empress Place) oversaw the westward expansion of the line into the suburbs. At the turn of the century, the London Omnibus Co in Seagrave Road oversaw the transition of horse-drawn to motor buses, which were eventually integrated into London Transport and London Buses. This attracted a host of other automotive enterprises to move into the area.
With the growth of 19th-century transport links into East Fulham and its sporting venues by 'Lillie Bridge', along with the immediately neighbouring 24-acre Earl's Court exhibition grounds, and the vast the Empress Hall (see entertainment section below). During the First World War it would become accommodation for Belgian refugees. Meanwhile, the historic hamlet of North End was massively redeveloped in the 1880s by Messrs Gibbs & Flew, who built 1,200 houses on the fields. They had trouble disposing of the properties, so for public relations purposes, they renamed the area 'West Kensington', to refer to the more prosperous neighbourhood over the parish boundary.
The last farm to function in Fulham was Crabtree Farm, which closed at the beginning of the 20th century. A principal recorder of all these changes was a local man, Charles James Féret (1854-1921), who conducted research over a period of decades before publishing his three volume history of Fulham in 1900.
Other artists who settled along the Lillie Road, were Francesco Bartolozzi, a florentine engraver and Benjamin Rawlinson Faulkner, a society portrait painter. Henri Gaudier-Brzeska, the French expressionist painter and friend of Ezra Pound, lived in Walham Green till his early death in 1915. Glass production was, until recently, represented by the stained glass studio of the purpose-built and Grade II listed Glass House in Lettice Street and latterly, by the Aaronson Noon Studio, with the 'Zest' Gallery in Rickett Street, that was obliged to shut down in 2012, after 20 years by the developers of 'Lillie Square' and Earl's Court. Both glass businesses have now moved out of London.Cherry, Bridget and Nikolaus Pevsner "The Buildings of England. London 3: North West", Yale University Press, p. 249. Lowndes & Drury, stained glass workers: records, archiveshub.ac.uk; retrieved 12 September 2012.
The Art Bronze Foundry, founded by Charles Gaskin in 1922 operated in Michael Road, off the New King's Road, a short distance from Eel Brook Common until it gave way to an apartment redevelopment in 2017. It had produced works by Henry Moore, Elisabeth Frink, Barbara Hepworth and Jacob Epstein among others. Its work may be seen in public spaces all over the world. Art Bronze Foundry London Ltd ; accessed 22 October 2016.
Fulham remained a predominantly working-class area for the first half of the 20th century, with genteel pockets at North End, along the top of Lillie and New King's roads, especially around Parsons Green, Eel Brook Common, South Park and the area surrounding the Hurlingham Club. Essentially, the area had attracted waves of immigrants from the countryside to service industrialisation and the more privileged parts of the capital. With rapid demographic changes there was poverty, as noted by Charles Dickens (1812-1870) and Charles Booth (1840-1916). Fulham had its , and attracted several benefactors, including: the Samuel Lewis (financier) Housing Trust, the Peabody Trust and the Sir Oswald Stoll Foundation to provide low-cost housing. Charles Booth Poverty Map of London , London School of Economics Archives; accessed 29 July 2017.
The Metropolitan Asylums Board acquired in 1876 a 13-acre site at the bottom of Seagrave Road to build a fever hospital, The Western Hospital, that later became an NHS centre of excellence for treating Poliomyelitis until its closure in 1979. Bar one ward block remaining in private occupation, it was replaced by a gated-flats development and a small public space, Brompton Park.
Aside from the centuries-old brewing industry, exemplified by the Swan Brewery on the Thames, the main industrial activities involved motoring and early aviation — Rolls-Royce, Shell-Mex & BP, Rover Company, the London General Omnibus Company — and rail engineering (Lillie Bridge Depot), laundries — the Palace Laundry is still extant — and the building trades. Later there developed distilling, Sir Robert Burnett's White Satin Gin,The Gentleman's Magazine: and Historical Chronicle. For the YEAR MDCCXCV. Volume LXV, Part the first. London. p. 344 food processing, e.g. Telfer's Pies, Encafood and Spaghetti House, and Kodak's photographic processing. This encouraged the southern stretch of North End Road to become Fulham's unofficial High Street, almost a mile from the actual Fulham High Street, with its own department store, F.H. Barbers, along with Woolworths, Marks & Spencer and Sainsbury's outlets, all long gone. The second ever Tesco shop opened in the North End Road. The UK's reputedly oldest independent health-food shop, opened in 1966 by the Aetherius Society, still trades on Fulham Road.
Allied to these developments, the postwar period saw the extensive demolition of Fulham's early 19th-century architectural stock, replaced by some Brutalist architecture — the current Ibis hotel — and the Empress State Building in Lillie Road that in 1962 replaced the declining Empress Hall. The London County Council and local council continued with much-needed council-housing development between World War II and up to the 1980s.
Fulham has undergone significant gentrification since the late 20th century, when professionals and families—drawn by its Victorian housing and riverside setting—began arriving. This early wave of change gained momentum through the 1990s, and by the 2000s Fulham had firmly established itself as one of London’s most desirable Zone 2 neighbourhoods, combining a village‑like character with upgraded housing stock, affluent amenities, and well‑regarded schools.
Fulham has in the past been solid Labour territory. Michael Stewart, one time Foreign Secretary in the Wilson government, was its long-standing MP, from 1945 until he stood down in 1979. It became a politically significant part of the country, having been the scene of two major parliamentary by-elections in the 20th century. In 1933, the Fulham East by-election became known as the "peace by-election". The 1986 by-election following the death of Conservative MP, Martin Stevens, resulted in a Labour win for Nick Raynsford on a 10% swing.
With "gentrification", Fulham voters have been leaning towards the Conservatives since the 1980s as the area underwent huge demographic change: the tightly packed terraced house which had housed working-class families employed in trade, engineering and the industry that dominated Fulham's riverside being gradually replaced with young professionals.
In the 2005 General Election, Greg Hands won the Hammersmith and Fulham Parliamentary seat for the Conservatives, polling 45.4% against Labour's 35.2%, a 7.3% swing. In the 2010 General Election, he was re-elected this time for the newly formed Chelsea and Fulham constituency. In the 2015 General Election he was returned with an increased share of the vote. In the 2024 General Election Ben Coleman defeated Greg Hands by 151 votes to retake the seat for the Labour Party.
Hammersmith and Fulham is currently controlled by Labour. At the 2014 local elections, Labour won 11 seats from the Conservatives, giving them 26 councillors and control of the council (said to have been the then Prime Minister David Cameron's "favourite") for the first time since 2006.
Public tennis courts are located in Bishops Avenue, off Fulham Palace Road and on Eel Brook Common. Rugby is played on Eel Brook Common and in South Park. Normand Park in Lillie Road is the entry into the Virgin Active-operated Fulham Pools swimming facilities and neighbouring tennis courts.
Fulham has five active Bowls clubs: The Bishops Park Bowls club, The Hurlingham Park Bowls Club, Normand Park Bowls Club, The Parson's Green Bowls club and The Winnington in Bishops Park.
No trace is left today of either of Fulham's two theatres, both opened in 1897. The 'Grand Theatre' was on the approach to Putney Bridge and was designed by the prolific WGR Sprague, author of venues such as Wyndham's Theatre and the Aldwych Theatre in London's West End. It gave way to office blocks in the late 1950s. The 'Granville Theatre', founded by Dan Leno, to the design of Frank Matcham, once graced a triangle of land at Walham Green. After the Music hall era had passed, It served as a film and television studio, but was finally demolished in 1971. It too has been replaced by an office block in Fulham Broadway.
The performing arts continue in Fulham, like the notable Fulham Symphony Orchestra and the successful Fulham Opera. St John's Parish Church, at the top of North End Road, stages choral and instrumental concerts as do other churches in the area.
There is a cinema complex as part of the Fulham Broadway Centre. Fulham Town Hall, built in 1888 in the classical renaissance, was used as a popular venue for concerts and dances, especially its Grand Hall. Behind Fulham Broadway, the heart of the original village of Walham Green has undergone pedestrianisation, including the spot once occupied by the village green and its pond next to St. John's Parish Church and bordered by a number of cafés, bars, and a dance studio in the old Fulham Public Baths. The largest extant supermarket in Fulham, is located on the site of a cinema later converted to the iconic "Dicky Dirts" jean store with its sloping shop-floor, at the top of North End Road's Street market. It started a new trend in how retail was done.
The debut albums by 1970s new wave bands The Stranglers ( Rattus Norvegicus) and Generation X ( Generation X) were recorded at TW Studios, 211 Fulham Palace Road. The Greyhound music venue at 176 Fulham Palace Road hosted up and coming punk, post-punk and indie bands in the late 1970s and the 1980s. Film music creator, Hans Zimmer double Academy Awards winner, launched his career in a studio behind the Lillie Langtry public house in Lillie Road in the 1970s.
Gin distilling came to the remnants of the North End Brewery in Seagrave Road after a brief period of service as a timber works in the 1870s and lasted for almost a century. The premises were taken over by distillers Vickers who at the outbreak of the First World War sold out to Burnett's, producers of White Satin Gin, until a 1970s take-over by a Kentucky liquor business. None of the breweries remains.
With its long history of brewing, Fulham still has a number of pubs and . The oldest tavern is the Lillie Langtry in Lillie Road, originally the Lillie Arms named after its first freeholder, Sir John Scott Lillie, who built it in 1835 as part of the 'North End Brewery' complex, run from 1832 to 1833 by a Miss Goslin.Féret, Charles. (1900) Fulham Old and New, volume II, p. 271-73. It was intended originally to service the Kensington Canal workers and bargees. Later, it was the watering hole of the new railway builders, motor and omnibus company staff and latterly Earl's Court exhibition and Chelsea F.C. visitors. Of the three popular neighbouring pubs acquired by developers during 2014–15, the Imperial Arms and the Prince of Wales were forced to shut; only the Atlas, reconstructed after bomb damage in the Second World War, has been reprieved.
The White Horse in Parsons Green is colloquially known by many as the "Sloaney Pony", a reference to the "" who frequent it. Pubs which are Grade II listed buildings include the Duke on the Green and Aragon House both facing Parsons Green, the Cock in North End Road, and the Temperance in Fulham High Street. Other pubs include the Durrell in Fulham Road, the locally and Michelin Guide listed 1866 Harwood Arms in Walham Grove and the Mitre on Bishops Road. UK historical street directory of London and the UK , pubshistory.com; accessed 29 July 2017.
Among the other spaces are Normand Park, the vestige of a convent garden with a bowling green, Lillie Rec with its gym facility and Brompton Park in Seagrave Road. The Thames riverside walk in Bishop's Park was historically interrupted by the Fulham football ground, but with the completion of the Fulham Pier extension it is now continuous as part of the Thames Path, continuing past the neighbouring flats, the Crabtree pub and The River Cafe (London) towards Hammersmith Bridge, affording views of the river and rural scenes on the opposite bank.
The ancient buildings and estate of Fulham Palace, the seat of the Bishops of London until 1973, remains the outstanding asset with its Grade I listed medieval and Tudor period buildings including a small museum, 13 acres of grounds, walled garden, and the part-excavated longest moat in England. The gardens are Grade II* listed. The further original grounds are now divided between a park by the riverside, All Saints’ Primary School and The Moat School, and public allotments.
Church Gate to the south of Fulham Palace, is the approach to All Saints Church, with its 14-15th-c. tower and 18th-c. tombs in the churchyard including those of a number of the Bishops of London. The Roman Catholic Relief Act 1791 led to a gradual reintroduction of Catholic worship in the parish, but not until 1847 was the foundation stone laid for a church. This was St Thomas of Canterbury Church, Fulham, with its presbytery, churchyard and school, off Lillie Road, designed in Gothic Revival style by Augustus Pugin. It is his only complete church and associated buildings in London and is Grade II* listed.
There are a number of other statutorily and locally listed structures strewn across Fulham. Worthy of note is the last remaining conical kiln of the Fulham Pottery. Broomhouse Lane has a number of structures of interest, ranging from the Broomhouse draw-dock of medieval origin to 18th-c. cottages (Sycamore and Ivy) and the Gothic revival Castle Club. The Vineyard in Hurlingham Road is of 17th-c. origin with later 19th-c. additions such as the stable buildings. The Hurlingham Club and grounds are of 18th-c. origin and Grade II* listed. The winding North End Road had several buildings of note. What remains are 'Crowthers' at no. 282, first built in 1712 with its extant 18th-c. gate-piers and the Modernism (1938) Seven Stars public house, acquired by developers in 2014 and now converted into flats.
The New King's Road contains several 18th-c. and early 19th-c. residences, namely, Northumberland House, Claybrook House, Jasmine House, Belgrave House, Aragon House, and 237–245 New King's Road, all Grade II listed.Hammersmith and Fulham Historic Buildings Group, 2004, Local List. Ed. Angela Dixon, Fourth Edition; revised September 2004. Much of the stock in Fulham attests its vigorous 19th-c. industrial and urban development, most of it, 'low-rise', and benefiting from the brick-fields that abounded locally at the time. An unlisted vestige of the early industrial era is the 1826 remnant of Gunter's canal bridge, still visible from platform 4 at West Brompton station.
Fulham has been featured in films including The Omen and The L-Shaped Room. Fulham Broadway Underground station was used in Sliding Doors.
Esther Rantzen, presenter of long-running BBC One TV magazine, That's Life! frequently used North End market to gauge public opinion ( Vox populi).
(accessed 29 April 2019) To cater for the large French-speaking population in the area, a French language primary school, 'Marie d'Orliac', has opened in the Grade II listed former Peterborough School near Parsons Green tube station. It is a feeder school for the Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle in South Kensington.
The London Overground West London Line stops at , just inside the Fulham borough boundary, and at in Fulham, Sands End. Until 1940 there was a Chelsea and Fulham railway station on this line, close to Stamford Bridge Stadium on Fulham Road, but this was closed following the Blitz.
By rail:
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