Streatham Common’s huge open-air paddling pool dates back to 1938 – and was a natural pond before that. It’s a big part of Streatham’s heritage, and the source of many memories – of childhood, parenthood and grandparent-hood – for generations of Streathamites.
We are PLUG (the Pool Lovers and Users Group) and as our name suggests, we’re dedicated to keeping the water in this apparently simple hole in the ground, which has managed to act as playground, community space, and essential child-cooling facility for nigh on ninety years.
PLUG is a group of volunteers who took over the day-to-day running of the pool in summer 2024. We work with the Streatham Common Cooperative (SCCoop), the not-for-profit that runs the Rookery gardens opposite and which took over the operatorship of the pool some ten years ago, when Lambeth Council decided it could no longer afford to run it.
SCCoop has itself become increasingly stretched in recent years, amid more funding cuts and inflationary pressures.
So now – although we do still get some much-appreciated help from Lambeth Council, with our utility bills and water testing – we are almost entirely community-operated, and community-funded.
In 2024, the emphasis was on getting the pool watertight – which required replacing all the seals in the concrete base – and making sure it was open daily for the summer holidays.
In 2025, we managed to open the pool for the whole of our scheduled season, from late-May to mid-September.
And we made big improvements too. We gave the pool its first proper paint job since 2021 (and at 30 metres across, or some 700m², that’s a lot of painting). A chunk of grant funding helped us to install planters that were full of flowers for the second half of the summer.
Local artists and volunteers meanwhile covered the 100 metres of grey concrete that rings the pool with an inspirational community-designed mural – at a cost of their time and planning and effort, and only about 300 quid.
New volunteers came on board to help us get through the summer holidays, and to help run fundraising events. The traditional “Doggy Splash Day” at the end of the year got an upgrade, drew an audience from several miles around, and raised thousands to boost our funds (also supported by the generous donations of the community and local businesses).
So we’ve taken big steps towards getting the place firmly back on its feet, into a position where we can be confident it can stand up to the next few years and march towards its centenary.
Our (mostly glowing, but also honest!) 2025 reviews are testament to the work that the community has put in, and the impressive results of that work.
But there’s more to do, of course. There’s always jobs to be done, things to be fixed, and improvements to be made – as well as stuff to learn, about how we try to set our pool up for a genuinely sustainable future.
In 2026, we’d like to install new equipment to give us even better, more consistently-high water quality. That’s so it’s an even nicer place to be; so we use less water over the season; and to take some of the pressure for manual labour off our volunteer team.
We’d like to improve the pool surrounds. More plants, more grass, and hopefully new tables and seating, all making the place more comfortable and more accessible.
And with those fundamentals in place, we’d love to see more events. The pool is already a great community space, which brings together people from every demographic from Streatham, and beyond. Can we now use it as a place for local cultural events, with music, food and theatre - or educational workshops, on nature and art?
If you have any ideas for uses for the space, let us know. If you can help us look after it – we are always short of people! – let us know.
If you just want a splash around in it, that’s fine too - no need to let us know… but reviews and donations are always welcome!