London’s most urban riding school transforms lives through horses
- Last updated: March 14, 2026 | 10:14 ..
Sandwiched between social housing blocks and busy train tracks in south London is Britain’s most urban riding school, where children from disadvantaged backgrounds learn to ride horses as part of a project aimed at improving their wellbeing. About 160 children each week attend the Ebony Horse Club, a 30-year-old charity in the Brixton area of the capital which ranks amongst the most deprived in England and is a hotspot for knife crime.
Outside the stables, opened in 2011 by Queen Camilla, nine-year-old Matthew Sanchez shovelled horse dung into a wheelbarrow before his lesson. Like many of the children who come for classes, he had never encountered a horse before. But riding teacher Rachel Scott-Hayward, 37, said the children grow in confidence over weeks, learning to ride, grooming the animals and mucking out the stables.
Nylah Murray Charles, aged nine, said she was nervous before trotting on a horse for the first time. “I got scared a bit, but I was like maybe I should just give it a try... when I tried, it was actually great and I had fun,” she said.
The club is an oasis of rural charm in Brixton, about three miles (5 km) from central London, where the smell of hay hangs in the air. Lessons are free — a contrast to similar stables in wealthier parts of the city, where a 30-minute class can cost around 50 pounds ($67).
Scott-Hayward said while horse riding was traditionally “a white, upper-class hobby”, the charity made it accessible to local children, about 45% of whom identify as being from an ethnic minority. The stables have become a home-from-home for Shanice Reid, 29, since she first learnt to ride with the project as a schoolgirl. She now teaches at the club, and said it offers “somewhere to escape” for those with difficult home or school lives.
Between 2010 and 2019, about a third of London’s youth clubs closed due to cuts to public funding, shrinking services for young people just as the pandemic hit.
Scott-Hayward said that horse riding can also be an antidote to the anxiety that she increasingly sees in children who spend a lot of time on screens and social media. “When you’re on a horse, you can’t really think about too much else,” she said.
Meanwhile, top Irish trainer Willie Mullins threatened on Thursday to stop bringing his best horses to the Cheltenham Festival after taking issue with the quality of the ground.
The most successful trainer in the history of the event withdrew odds-on favourite and last year’s winner Fact to File shortly before the day’s Ryanair Chase feature race after finding the conditions too hard.
“In jumps racing we would like soft in the description of the ground and we think good ground is not good enough for the type of individual we are buying and trying to race,” Mullins told Racing TV. “You want to have the top horses at the best Festival but if the ground is like this, we are not going to bring them.”
Mullins said watering of the course had been promised but he was not sure it had been done, with forecast rain also holding off.
“This isn’t good for the type of horses we are bringing over here and I know it suits some horses but for the majority of the good, big, National Hunt horses we would like it a little softer,” he added.
Jon Pullin, clerk of the course, told the BBC that most of the ground was watered the day before.
“After racing concluded on Wednesday, selective watering took place on the majority of the new course to maintain the going description of Good, Good to Soft in places,” he said.
“Our focus is on producing safe jumping ground for all our participants and that has been provided today.” Mullins had five winners on the first two days of the festival but none on Thursday. Heart Wood, a 9-2 shot trained by Henry de Bromhead and ridden by Darragh O’Keeffe, won the Ryanair Chase ahead of 2-1 favourite Jonbon.
Reuters