n 1619, James I granted letters patent to the famous Shakespearean actor-manager, Edward Alleyn, authorising the establishment of a college in Dulwich "to endure and remain forever".
Re-constituted by Parliament in the Dulwich College Act of 1857, Alleyn's College of God's Gift at Dulwich moved to the present site in 1866. The architect, Charles Barry, the son of Sir Charles Barry who designed the Houses of Parliament, was much criticised at the time for departing
"A fair candidate
for the wildest Victorian
building in the whole
of London, with a
crazy Dostoevskian
gleam in its eye."
Lawrence Durrell, novelist and poet (1912-90)