During this guided walk, we uncover the ruins of a demolished workhouse that once inhabited the meadows of Hillside Park, north London. As we map out the workhouse rooms’ siting in the park and listen to stories of the workhouse’s inmates, we listen to the sounds of the park’s trees and long grasses and their story of resilience. With trees dropping their leaves months earlier in 2022 to survive the prolonged drought and heat, we rustle through the park’s heaps of early leaf fall and connect this warning of our overheated world with the opportunism that earlier shaped Victorian workhouses. The sound of participants’ movements and voices amidst long grasses and tree leaves are being recorded, to commemorate this walk in 2022.
Walk through a workhouse / walk through a park
Public domain: CHarrington
MAP OF WALK 2022