Roupell Street

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Nineteenth-century cottages
Roupell Street
Southwark
London, September 2014

“I first came across this beautiful street while a tube strike was in progress – disruption to my usual route to work meant that I had travelled on a National Rail service into Waterloo, and had then covered the rest of my journey to work on foot. Turning off the busy Waterloo Road into a maze of residential streets, following the people heading in the direction of the City, I found myself on Roupell Street and felt as though I had stepped back in time. Described by Time Out as ‘an impossibly handsome street of nineteenth-century workers' cottages’, Roupell Street was first developed in the 1820s. The land was owned by John Roupell, whose family lived in nearby Cross Street (now called Meymott Street). The Roupells were a wealthy family, whose money had been made in lead smelting and scrap metal. Clearly John Roupell saw an opportunity to add to his income by building properties on his land and renting them out to local people.” (Discovering the ‘impossibly handsome’ Roupell Street, Flickering Lamps)