David Bowie's Childhood Home to be Restored to Its 1960s Condition

During most of the time Bowie lived at this house in south London, between the ages of 8 and 20, he was still David Jones.

David Jones, aged 8, sitting outside his childhood home | David Bowie Estate

The Heritage of London Trust recently acquired the small two-story property - located in Plaistow Grove, Bromley - and will turn the residence into Bowie’s House, a “living, creative space, part museum, part performance, part memory.” The objective is to restore it to the way it looked in 1963, when the musician was 16, and open it to the public in late 2027.

The star of the restored house will be Bowie’s 90-square-foot bedroom. It was in that small room that Bowie “evolved from an ordinary suburban schoolboy to the beginnings of an extraordinary international [star],” says project supervisor Geoffrey Marsh, who co-curated the Victoria and Albert Museum’s 2013 David Bowie Is exhibition. As the singer himself recalled in 1990, “I spent so much time in my bedroom. It really was my entire world. I had books up there, my music up there, my record player.”

The exterior of the house today | Bowie's House

Some of the inspirations behind Bowie’s success will be displayed in the restored bedroom. Bowie idolized early American rock and roll, and some of his vinyl Elvis Presley singles will be on view. Also returning to the bedroom is a photo of Little Richard that Bowie taped to his wall around age 10 or 11. Bowie later said the American musician was his “patron saint” when he was young.

The restorers will draw from the memories of some of Bowie’s childhood friends, who remember what the house looked like in their teen years from when they all used to hang out together and listen to music.

Born in January 1947, Bowie began playing music as a teenager. He fronted a few bands in the ’60s, taking on the name David Bowie to differentiate himself from Davy Jones, who would become the frontman for the Monkees. Bowie became a solo singer-songwriter, and released his debut album - David Bowie - in 1967, at age 20. This was around the time he moved out of his childhood home on Plaistow Grove.

A few years later, Bowie's first hit song Space Oddity stormed the UK charts and the rest, as they say, is history.

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