Open Days - 17 May: Prep (4-13) / 18 May: Senior & Sixth Form (13-18)
LIMITED SPACES AVAILABLE - The perfect opportunity to gain an insight into the school, view the facilities and gather all the information you need.Until the 1970s the majority of this floor of the main building was occupied by pupil accommodation.
Initially this area now used by Modern Foreign Languages was known as the Junior Landing. King’s took boys of prep school age (8-13) from its beginnings in 1880 and housed them in separate accommodation at the top of this staircase. It was not until 1952 that the Juniors got their own school on the opposite side of Taunton at Pyrland Hall (now known as King’s Hall).
The accommodation they left behind was taken over by Woodard House. The photograph here is of ‘Big Dorm’ which slept 38 Woodard boys and was typical of dormitories in the early 1960s. Each bed had limited hanging space for clothes and a bedside cupboard. Pupils also had a locker or ‘scob’ in their common rooms where much of their school equipment could be kept. Here pupils are pictured on their beds during the compulsory quiet period after lunch.
By the mid-1970s open dormitories were broken up with low partitions to create smaller ‘rooms’ of beds with greater privacy. Personal study areas also started to replace the communal prep-common rooms.