The building is on five floors and does
have the outward appearance of being a school but those days have gone. The
building has four gable ends, each of which carries a plaque. Two further
plaques adorn the building between first and second floors.
Working across the gable ends from east
to west (left to right) the plaques read:
New
Wing
added
1887
J.T. Pedder Esq
Chairman
St.
Lukes
Parochial
Schools
Founded
1698
St. Lukes
School
moved
from this site
1972
Removed
from
Golden Lane
to this
site
1870
The two plaques at the lower level,
also reading from east to west, say:
The
Telfer
Wing
Erected 1887
J.T. Pedder
Esq
Treasurer
Erected
for 400
children
James Telfere
Esq
Treasurer
The AIM25 website (visit
link) has a brief history of the school:
"The School for Boys was instituted
in 1698, in Saint Giles, Cripplegate, and derived its name of 'Grey Coat School'
from the boys at that time being dressed in that colour. When the area was made
a district parish under the name of St. Luke, Middlesex, the School was called
the St Luke Charity School. The School was inaugurated and maintained by
voluntary subscriptions and donations - the subscribers being managers and
governors at the same time.
The Girls Schools was instituted in
1761 by voluntary subscriptions.
As time passed and the population
of the district grew, the Managers felt the Schools' accommodation was
insufficient for its requirements. Efforts to enlarge the premises by purchasing
adjacent properties were unsuccessful, and as the wealthy began to leave the
neighbourhood, support for the Schools dwindled.
The subscribers formed an
investment committee and gradually built up funds as well as purchasing in 1853
ground rents of property in Marylebone Lane and Holborn. By 1863 further
purchases were made in Cleveland Street, St. Pancras and Westmoreland
Place.
Now the School was in a position to
move from Golden Lane to a larger premises in Old Street on land owned by the
Ecclesiastical Commissioners.
Funds were sought for the erection
of a new school and in 1870 the foundation stone was laid for a building capable
of holding 400 children.
The School's name was later changed
to 'The Saint Luke's Parochial School' and by 1904 although the School was
parochial in nature it was not exclusively so, since many of the children
educated there, were not necessarily from the
parish."