Wanstead Library, a prize-winning 1969 building with a hall for hire
Wanstead Library, on Spratt Hall Road, is open six days a week, has a hall for hire and an award-winning 1969 building. Here are the hours, how to join and what you will find inside.
Wanstead Library sits on a corner plot beside Christ Church Green, run by Vision Redbridge Culture and Leisure (Vision RCL) for Redbridge Council, six days a week. Beyond books you get computers, free WiFi, a children's library and a community hall, the Churchill Room. The building itself won a Civic Trust Award in 1970, not bad for a branch library.
Practical details first, then the history, all drawn from Vision RCL, Redbridge Council and architectural sources. Hours and prices change, so check before you go.
At a glance
- Address: Spratt Hall Road, Wanstead, London E11 2RQ
- Phone: 020 8708 7400
- Email: wanstead.library@visionrcl.org.uk
- Run by: Vision RCL, for Redbridge Council
Vision RCL and Redbridge Council give the same regular hours:
- Monday and Tuesday: 10am to 6pm
- Wednesday: 10am to 8pm
- Thursday and Friday: 10am to 6pm
- Saturday: 10am to 5pm
- Sunday: closed
Bank holiday and special closures aren't listed on these pages, so check with the library before a special trip.
Joining and what's inside
Use Redbridge Council's "Join the library" page. Register online and choose a library to collect your card, bringing one form of ID showing your current name and address (a driving or TV licence, say). Or join in person with one form of ID, such as a bank statement or bill, and get a card ready to use. Redbridge libraries belong to the London Consortium, so a card from a partner borough, including Waltham Forest, Newham, Barking and Dagenham, Havering and Tower Hamlets, works here too.
Per Vision RCL, you'll find:
- Children's library: borrow up to 20 books for three weeks, and reserve online.
- Computers: for browsing, working, printing and scanning, plus free WiFi for your own device.
- Hublets: tablets to borrow for up to two hours, for social media, video and online newspapers and magazines via PressReader.
- Audiobooks and the Virtual Library: reserve audiobooks online 24 hours a day; the Virtual Library has eBooks, audiobooks, online learning resources and news archives.
- A library app to manage your account, search, reserve and use the virtual library.
Next door, the Churchill Room is a recently refurbished hall that Vision RCL says holds up to 110 guests, suitable for community events, fairs and talks. Hire enquiries start on the library's page. When the library opened in 1969, Joshua Abbott's architectural history Modernism Beyond Metro-land describes the room as having space for 150, with cooking facilities, storage, offices and changing rooms.
Vision RCL lists car park prices: up to one hour £1.80, one to two hours £3.10, all day £6.40. It doesn't say who runs the car park or when charges apply, so check signs on arrival. Coming by Tube? See our Wanstead station guide.
The 1969 building
Wanstead was part of Essex until 1965, when it joined the new London Borough of Redbridge. The library opened on 4 October 1969, replacing a smaller High Street branch from 1944, according to Joshua Abbott's Modernism Beyond Metro-land. It was designed by Redbridge Council's architects' department, with D Meyer and B Ettridge (Etteridge in some accounts) overseeing, and opened by Patrick Jenkin, then MP for Wanstead and Woodford.
The site is small, squeezed between Spratt Hall Road and Woodbine Place. Abbott writes that the northern end is glazed floor to ceiling with thin vertical strips of window, and triangular north-facing roof lights give even light for reading. Inside, adult, children's and reference areas shared one column-free space under a timber-clad ceiling.
It won a Civic Trust Award in 1970. Wanstead Architecture quotes the citation, which called it "dignified without being monumental" and praised the small module of windows and roof lights that keeps the scale intimate. The same site says it isn't listed nationally or locally. Vision RCL says the library and the Churchill Room were refurbished in 2017, with redecoration, new furniture and shelving, a new floor and a flexible layout.
Vision RCL also runs Wanstead Leisure Centre on Redbridge Lane West. And Redbridge Council says green garden waste bags are sold from libraries; our bins guide has the rules, including proof of residency.
Facts checked on 28 October 2026.
