A developer is hoping to convert the ground floor of the Ravensbourne Arms pub on Lewisham High Street into a 10-room House in Multiple Occupation (HMO).
The ground floor of the pub which has been vacant for about eight years would be turned into a co-living space with 10 en-suite rooms, a shared kitchen and co-working space in the basement.
A move to turn the ground floor of the pub into four flats was blocked by the council on the grounds the Ravensbourne, on the council’s local heritage list, could be reopened and maintained as a working pub.
Five years ago, Sister Midnight, the music co-operative, ran a crowd funding campaign to buy the pub and turn it into a community-owned music venue.
But after a competing offer was made for the leasehold of the ground floor Sister Midnight focused its efforts on converting the former Brookdale Working Men’s Club into a music venue.
The Greenwich Wire reports that developer Eastfield Investments has agreed to buy the ground floor and basement of the Ravensbourned for £750,000 after no formal offers were made to retain it as a pub.
Eastfield said the pub had been on the market since 2018, with only three offers, including the one from Eastfield, the Wire says.
In planning documents (DC/26/142933) Eastfield says the long-term vacancy has resulted in an “underutilised frontage and a dead edge at street level … detracting from town-centre vitality outside peak hours”.
It says the HMO proposal aims “to bring existing vacant floorspace back into active use in a sustainable manner that is appropriate to its town-centre location.”
Sister Midnight has so far raised £400,000 through community shares and fundraising to fund conversion of the Brookdale Club. It hopes to open the music venue to the public later in 2026.