The Bill

MERTON, LONDON
PHOTOGRAPHED IN 2015

Known by fans as Sun Hill MK1, MK2 and MK3, The Bill‘s police station set had three iterations.

Mark 1 (1984-1986) – 2 Artichoke Hill, London E1W 2DE

The first set used industrial buildings in Tower Hamlets, East London for both interior and exterior filming. However, production was disrupted by the 1986 Wapping dispute at the adjacent News International buildings which resulted in altercations between striking print workers and actors who the workers believed to be real police. As a result, the first series of The Bill was cut short by an episode and forced relocate for the following series. The buildings were demolished in the early 2000s to make way for an apartment complex.

^{The original cast at Artichoke Hill, courtesy Facebook/The Bill tv series}

Mark 2 (1987-1989) – Clement House, 135 Dalgarno Gardens, London W10 5JB

By March 1987, The Bill had set up base in the office building of an old car factory turned record distribution centre, which had been acquired by Thames Television as part of their wider site at 85 Barlby Road in North Kensington.

^{The 1988 cast stood outside Clement House ©Douglas Doig/Getty Images}

For the third series in 1987, external shots of the police station’s frontage were actually of an office building at 119-121 Freston Road. Council archives show 1986 plans for a purpose-built film/TV studio on the land opposite (125-135 Freston Road), however this never went ahead. Perhaps Barlby Road was a plan ‘B’?

^{119-121 Freston Road on screen during series 3 ©ITV}

Thames Television left Barlby Road in 1989 so that it could be redeveloped into social housing (which it was in the mid-90s), as well as a Channel Tunnel train depot at the north end of the site, although this ended up being built without needing to extend the existing railway land.

^{_{Thames TV’s Clement House, courtesy Facebook/The Bill TV Police Drama & Memorabilia}}

Mark 3 (1990-2010) – Bosun House, 63 Windsor Avenue (1 Deer Park Road), London SW19 2RR

The Bill‘s final resting place was a converted wine warehouse on an industrial estate near Wimbledon, known as Merton Studios. The Windsor Avenue side of the building was dressed as both Sun Hill police station and St. Hugh’s Hospital (with a false wall added in 2007 acting as a partition between), with the inside of the building fitted out as a police station and hospital (again, these areas were separated). You can see filming taking place outside the ‘hospital’ here.

^{The false wall (inside is scaffolding) viewed from the opposite side of Windsor Avenue}

^{A 2006 plan of Merton Studios, courtesy Merton Council (click to view full size)}

The studios were also home to Channel 5’s Family Affairs since 1999, which resulted in a set for ‘Stanley Street’ being built on the studio’s backlot at 5 Deer Park Road in the early-mid 2000s. The Street set, as it was since advertised, has been used for several productions since The Bill ended in 2010 and was refurbished in 2017 to appear more generic and therefore more suitable for a broad range of uses (a demonstration of a smart zebra crossing being one!).

Other popular uses for The Street include music videos and TV trailers.

^{The Street set in 2013, prior to refurb ©Wimbledon Studios}

^{The Street set during refurb ©Supersets}

^{The Street set post-refurb ©Supersets}

The St. Hugh’s Hospital set was also reused (appearing in the aptly-named Peep Show episode, ‘St Hospitals’) – as well as Sun Hill police station, sporting a modified frontage for the 2012 documentary-style crime drama, Crime Stories.

The 2012 Danny Dyer film, Run for Your Wife, was also filmed on the Sun Hill set.

^{Photo courtesy Fictional Police Forces in UK Media wiki, used under CC BY-SA 3.0}

The studios were later sold to a property investment company for £4.75 million and rebranded Wimbledon Studios which went into administration in 2014. However, the studios still exist under new ownership and have been leased to Marjan Television Network who use the site for the Manoto Persian TV channel.

Gallery

More pics from Wimbledon Studios below:

UPDATE: The studio site is now available to let. Could Sun Hill be revived?