CLAPHAM SCHOOL OF ART

1884 - ?

Clapham School of Art originated in 1884 when a small group of residents formed a Company with the wish for arts and crafts to be taught in the Clapham area. It was originally in Edgeley Road, Clapham, under the direction of Leonard Charles Nightingale, an artist who had already had many years' experience in teaching at the Lambeth School of Art and Chiswick School of Art. Fine Art was the main subject taught there but also on the curriculum were wood carving, sculpture, gilding, embroidery, pottery, and textiles. Its chief area of success was book illustration which produced such exponents as Margaret Tarrant, other alumni include Mary Kessell, Sam Haile, Leonard Fuller and James Stroudley. The last principal of the School was Joseph Ridley Radcliffe Mcculloch and appears to have closed at the outbreak of the Second World War.