The
Soho Club and Home, 59 Greek Street W1. Maud Stanley founded the Soho
Club for Girls in 1880. It had originally begun in three rooms in Porter Street,
Newport Market. A refuge had been set up there in some old market buildings that
also provided training and meals for boys.
To the right of the door you can see a plaque unveiled in 1984:
59 Greek Street was built in 1883 as the Soho Club and Home for Working Girls. In the 1920s it became the Theatre Girls Club, a home for women working in the theatre and later a hostel for homeless women.
In some respects the Club and Home resembled the earlier efforts by workers at the Colonnade Home and Club (see above). However, the nature of much girls club work at that time tended to place an emphasis on relationships and gentle improvement so that girls may ‘ennoble the class to which they belong’ (Stanley 1890: 48). This could be contrasted with the talk of character-building and muscular Christianity that could be found around some boys work. The club was open every evening of the week. Its programme included classes in drawing, French, singing, needlework, music, gymnastics and mathematics. The club had a library, canteen and a low-cost medical dispensary for its members. The short and long-term lodgings it provided for 'Young Women engaged in business, and students' could be had for between 3s and 7s 6d per week (depending on whether they slept in a dormitory or had a private room). This price included the use of a sitting-room, gas fire and clean bed linen (see Summers 1989: 123-4).
Stanley’s significance for youth work is great. She wrote the first substantial text on clubs for girls (1890); and took some efforts to facilitate inter-club links - establishing the Girls Club Union in 1880. It later became known as the London Girls’ Club Union and, along with the Federation of Girls Clubs (run under the auspices of the YWCA) and the Social Institutes Union, was reconstituted in the late 1930s as the London Union of Girls (now Youth) Clubs.
Stanley, M. (1890) Clubs for Working Girls, London: Macmillan. (Reprinted in F. Booton (ed.) (1985) Studies in Social Education 1860-1890, Hove: Benfield Press.
Summers, J. (1989) Soho, London: Bloomsbury.
See, also: Maude Stanley, girls' clubs and district visiting
Note: This page is part of our virtual walk around the history of informal education (in central London).
Walking for real: If you would like to do the informal education walk for real then why not join us on our next scheduled walk. It's free! Follow the link for joining details.
© Mark K. Smith. First published August 7, 1997. Last update: April 25, 2008
