The Word bookshop under threat as Goldsmiths sells off 6 New Cross Road buildings
As Goldsmiths faces continued financial pressures, it has abandoned its vision for an "Enterprise Hub" and is selling off the parade on New Cross Road, Deptford.
Halfway between New Cross Gate and New Cross stations sits a prominent gap in the high street in the Deptford Town Hall conservation area. But change may finally be coming.
At the tail end of 2019, a press release from Goldsmiths University went round touting the transformation of the row of shops, home to a variety of independent businesses, into a new “Enterprise Hub”.
The site was meant to open in 2021 and Goldsmith’s investment was due to be supplemented with more than £2m in funding from the London mayor.
Instead, the buildings sat empty until the project was officially cancelled in 2021. The existing enterprises had already been given notice to vacate, with the exception of The Word bookshop.
In June this year, the six buildings went up for sale for £3m and they are now under offer.
The buildings sit within a conservation zone, so external changes are likely to be minimal.
The sales brochure notes that even with ground floor commercial use, the site could fit 19 homes: four studios, seven one-bed units, four two-bed units, and four three-bed units, dependent on planning permission.
Previously, the upper floors were utilised as both classrooms and resident spaces.
The Word – last shop standing
After existing businesses were evicted in 2020, Prangsta found a new home on Lewisham Way, but Out of the Brew café was permanently shuttered. The shops sat empty and then were boarded up.
The Word had a different lease agreement from the other shops and was able to weather the initial plans. The new sales brochure notes that the business has a two year lease with 6 months' notice.
The independent bookshop is run by David Brett, and its website confirms that it was set up with the aim of “catering for the students and staff of Goldsmiths College, University of London, and the local neighbourhood”.
It has a local books and local history section; Brett notes he customised the inventory for the community, including a large political section. In 2018, it won the Lewisham mayor's New Business Award.
Brett says that he only became aware of the sale when a customer spotted the “for sale” sign outside the shop, Goldsmiths had not been in contact. He is unsure of the viability of keeping the shop in New Cross if the premises are lost.
The independent Word bookshop. Image: Tomilyn Rupert
What might have been
Goldsmiths’ 2019 planning application is filled with beautiful renderings by architects Morris+Company.
The application states: “The Hub will be a welcoming, highly visible facility that will signal that Goldsmiths is ‘open for business within the community’.”
It goes through the history of prior applications, ironically noting that “302-312 New Cross Road has a recent track record of planning applications for its refurbishment and conversion which have not been implemented, or only carried out in part, which has led to the ongoing vacancy of the buildings without viable proposals for their regeneration.”
The plan would have retained café and retail space at ground floor level and turned the shopfront nearest Deptford Town Hall into “flexible space” leading to the “Enterprise Zone”.
The new pavilion would have had a distinctive skylight and was envisioned as “incubation and innovation space for enterprise and entrepreneurship, support, networking and knowledge exchange”.
Mixed fate of businesses at the intersection
The businesses near the intersection of New Cross Road, Lewisham Way, Clifton Rise and Laurie Grove have seen a mix of fates post-Covid.
Some are thriving: New Cross Inn still runs regular shows, Planet Wax relocated from Deptford to New Cross in 2022 and is a record shop, bar, and venue. New Cross House regularly hosts life drawing and dance classes, in addition to its main business as a pub with classics menu.
Others show no sign of life: The iconic venue One For the Road sits empty. Originally a cinema when it was built in the 1920s, it had a long history of reinvention, functioning as an Irish dance club, a home to reggae nights, and even hosting concerts from Oasis and Blur. It shut down several years ago.
Next door at 329-331 New Cross Road, the handsome 1930s bank had planning permission granted in 2018 to transform it into a microbrewery and bar. Construction never started.
It now adjoins a student housing block, an infill development that replaced two single-story shops. But while students moved in over a year ago, the ground floor commercial unit was not let out. The rent was set at £22,000 per annum before completion, it is now listed as under offer.
Goldsmiths' finances
Goldsmiths has been in the headlines for the several years over its financial state. In its 2024 annual financial statement, the university reported a surplus of £1.6m, down £3.4m from the year before.
“Net assets increased by £37.5 million from £82.1 million to £119.6 million. This was mainly because of the underlying surplus above primarily resulting from a £41.9 million reduction in pension liabilities, partly offset by one-off staff restructuring costs”.
With £138m income in the previous financial year, the £3m selloff would contribute approximately 2%.
Although not nothing, the trade-off in permanently losing classroom space and a chance to integrate with the local community is a high price to pay.
Goldsmiths did not respond to a request for comment.
