Cliftonville
Encyclopedia
Cliftonville is a coastal area of the town of Margate
, situated to the east of the main town, in the Thanet
district of Kent
, South East England
, United Kingdom
. It also contains the area known as Palm Bay
.
The original Palm Bay estate was built in the 1930s as a number of large, wide avenues with detached and semi-detached houses with driveways, garages and gardens . This land was sold by Mr Sidney Simon Van Den Bergh to the Palm Bay Estate Co on 23 June 1924. Such avenues include Gloucester Avenue and Leicester Avenue.
The eastward expansion of Cliftonville has included much of the former parish of Northdown including Northdown Park and House .
complex. Some hotels remain: Smiths Court Hotel
overlooking the sea, and the Walpole Bay Hotel. There are also a number of restaurants including The Orangery, which is next to Smiths Court Hotel.
The Bandstand and oval lawns host a monthly farmers market (the last Sunday of every month) and during the summer there are a number of activities and events, including musical shows, held on weekends.
, a number of family run specialist shops including an award-winning art gallery, a post office, several pubs, many coffee shops and cafes, two churches and a number of estate and letting agents as well as an award-winning media company all along its two-mile length.
.
spent a period of convalescence at The Albermarle Hotel, Cliftonville. His widow has confirmed that he found inspiration for, and wrote significant sections of The Waste Land
in the Grade II-listed Nayland Rock promenade shelter.
The spirit of early twentieth century Cliftonville was caught by John Betjeman
in his poem "Margate 1940".
Margate
-Demography:As of the 2001 UK census, Margate had a population of 40,386.The ethnicity of the town was 97.1% white, 1.0% mixed race, 0.5% black, 0.8% Asian, 0.6% Chinese or other ethnicity....
, situated to the east of the main town, in the Thanet
Thanet
Thanet is a local government district of Kent, England which was formed under the Local Government Act 1972, and came into being on 1 April 1974...
district of Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
, South East England
South East England
South East England is one of the nine official regions of England, designated in 1994 and adopted for statistical purposes in 1999. It consists of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, East Sussex, Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Kent, Oxfordshire, Surrey and West Sussex...
, United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. It also contains the area known as Palm Bay
Palm Bay, UK
Palm Bay is an area within Cliftonville, a suburb of Margate. It is in South East England and it is in the county of Kent in the United Kingdom....
.
The original Palm Bay estate was built in the 1930s as a number of large, wide avenues with detached and semi-detached houses with driveways, garages and gardens . This land was sold by Mr Sidney Simon Van Den Bergh to the Palm Bay Estate Co on 23 June 1924. Such avenues include Gloucester Avenue and Leicester Avenue.
East Cliftonville
The estate covers the eastern part of Cliftonville and was fields when the first was built. It extends east beyond Northumberland Avenue and has been developed in phases. An earlier phase covered the northern ends of Leicester and Gloucester Avenues and the whole of Clarence and Magnolia Avenues; the later phase extending eastwards of Princess Margaret Avenue is a Wimpy-style housing estate with small houses largely identical in appearance and of less substantial build quality than the original 1930s estate.The eastward expansion of Cliftonville has included much of the former parish of Northdown including Northdown Park and House .
West Cliftonville
West Cliftonville as originally developed was largely small private hotels and guest houses which catered for the many visitors to what was in the first half of the twentieth century the thriving holiday resort of Margate but is now a less affluent area with the hotels converted to flats and bedsits. Thanet Council has recognised this and is offering grants to improve housing quality (2006) and restricting planning permission for one bedroom flats (2007). The seafront area once included many large hotels, including at one time a large ButlinsButlins
Butlins is a chain of large holiday camps in the United Kingdom. Butlins was founded by Billy Butlin to provide affordable holidays for ordinary British families....
complex. Some hotels remain: Smiths Court Hotel
overlooking the sea, and the Walpole Bay Hotel. There are also a number of restaurants including The Orangery, which is next to Smiths Court Hotel.
The Bandstand and oval lawns host a monthly farmers market (the last Sunday of every month) and during the summer there are a number of activities and events, including musical shows, held on weekends.
Facilities
The shopping area of Cliftonville is called Northdown Road and includes a number of main banks and building societies, larger corporate concerns including Boots and TescoTesco
Tesco plc is a global grocery and general merchandise retailer headquartered in Cheshunt, United Kingdom. It is the third-largest retailer in the world measured by revenues and the second-largest measured by profits...
, a number of family run specialist shops including an award-winning art gallery, a post office, several pubs, many coffee shops and cafes, two churches and a number of estate and letting agents as well as an award-winning media company all along its two-mile length.
Entertainment
Cliftonville also has an indoor ten-pin bowling alley and sports bar, tennis courts, a bandstand with regular events including a farmers market, a crazy golf course, a pitch and putt course, bowling green and the famous Winter Gardens theatre . There is also a nightclub. Cliftonville is the home of local radio station KMFM ThanetKMFM Thanet
KMFM Thanet is an Independent Local Radio serving the Isle of Thanet and the surrounding areas in Kent, South East England. It is part of the KMFM group of radio stations in the county, which are part of the KM Group.-History:...
.
Writing and poetry
During the first half of the twentieth century Cliftonville was considered the fashionable hotel quarter of Margate. It was during the autumn of 1921 that T. S. EliotT. S. Eliot
Thomas Stearns "T. S." Eliot OM was a playwright, literary critic, and arguably the most important English-language poet of the 20th century. Although he was born an American he moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 and was naturalised as a British subject in 1927 at age 39.The poem that made his...
spent a period of convalescence at The Albermarle Hotel, Cliftonville. His widow has confirmed that he found inspiration for, and wrote significant sections of The Waste Land
The Waste Land
The Waste Land[A] is a 434-line[B] modernist poem by T. S. Eliot published in 1922. It has been called "one of the most important poems of the 20th century." Despite the poem's obscurity—its shifts between satire and prophecy, its abrupt and unannounced changes of speaker, location and time, its...
in the Grade II-listed Nayland Rock promenade shelter.
The spirit of early twentieth century Cliftonville was caught by John Betjeman
John Betjeman
Sir John Betjeman, CBE was an English poet, writer and broadcaster who described himself in Who's Who as a "poet and hack".He was a founding member of the Victorian Society and a passionate defender of Victorian architecture...
in his poem "Margate 1940".