The site is one of the borough's major areas for sport pitches
Barn Elms Playing Fields were formerly part of Church lands and the manor house, Barn Elms, was once the mansion of Sir Francis Walsingham, Secretary of State to Queen Elizabeth, which was demolished in 1949. In the 1770s the formal lake was enlarged into a serpentine shape. Some large plane trees date from the late C17th landscape, but otherwise all that remains is the ornamental pond, the ice house on an artificial mound, and a lodge and avenue in Lower Richmond Road. The grounds were acquired for playing fields in 1949.
