United Kingdom · London
A large boys’ campus on Dulwich Common, with a co-ed early-years house and boarding from Year 9. The 2026–27 fee table lives on the college’s own page. We will not guess the numbers the site keeps behind a script.
Dieses Porträt steht noch auf Englisch. Die anderen Sprachen kommen Schule für Schule.
Curriculum laut Schule:GCSE · A-Level
Unterrichtssprachen:English
Dulwich College is a selective boys’ day and boarding school on Dulwich Common, London SE21 7LD. Edward Alleyn founded it in 1619 to educate and lodge twelve scholars. The college’s boarding page says today’s boarding community is about 140 boys from the UK and around the world, across four houses, “twelve minutes from Central London” in the college’s own phrase.
This is a south-London village weather, not an Abbey courtyard and not a St John’s Wood American campus. Families who walk Westminster or St Paul’s in Barnes often also walk this gate because the commute, the Saturday, and the sixth form feel different. Alleyn’s School sits on Townley Road in the same neighbourhood — same founder’s name, a co-ed day house, not this campus.
The useful questions are: Do you want a boys’ senior school with a real boarding corridor from Year 9, or a mixed day house ten minutes away? Can you live with Dulwich Common on a dark January morning? And will you read the live fees page instead of asking us to invent a termly number?
The admissions pages describe an academically selective school for day pupils and boarders from Year 9. Entry doors the college names: DUCKS kindergarten from 6 months, DUCKS infants from 3+ / 4+ to Year 2, Year 3 (7+) to Year 6, Year 7 (11+), Year 9 (13+), and Year 12 (16+). Overseas applicants have their own page.
DUCKS — Dulwich College Kindergarten and Infants’ School — is co-educational from 6 months to 7. From 7, the college is a boys’ house. Do not tour DUCKS and assume the Year 9 corridor is mixed.
It will not suit a family looking for a girls’ or fully mixed senior school on this site, or a boarder younger than Year 9. Full, weekly and occasional boarding are the published options. Ask which of those three you actually need.
Entrance is from Dulwich Common (the South Circular, A205) only. Visitor parking on campus is limited. Reception numbers the college prints: main 020 8693 3601; Junior School 020 8299 9248; DUCKS 020 8693 1538. The registrar for 11+ and 13+ is reached on 020 8299 9263.
The boarding houses sit around the green campus. Blew House and Ivyholme each house about 40 Year 12 and 13 students in en-suite study rooms. Old Blew and The Orchard sit adjacent to the campus, in gardens, for about 60 boys from Years 9 to 13 — a mix of weekly and full boarders. The college says more than 20 nationalities board.
Ask to see a Year 9 boarding room and a day-boy house, not only the James Caird and the lawn. Time the South Circular at the hour you would actually drive.
Think in the college’s own names.
DUCKS — 6 months to Year 2, co-ed, its own reception and forest-school language.
Junior School — Years 3 to 6, boys, its own head, curriculum and day houses.
Lower, Middle and Upper School — the senior college. Year 7 is an 11+ door. Year 9 is the 13+ door, when boarding begins. Year 12 is the 16+ door. GCSE and A-level results pages exist on the college site; we will not reprint a percentage as if it were a promise.
Michaelmas term 2026, on the published calendar, begins teaching on Monday 7 September 2026, with induction for Years 7, 9 and 12 on Friday 4 September. Middle School boarders have named exeat weekends. Confirm the live term dates page; calendars move.
Day boys belong to day houses. Boarders belong to the four boarding houses above. Boarding is from Year 9: full, weekly, or occasional. The admissions page repeats that language.
This is not Westminster’s weekly-only Yard, and it is not St Paul’s 41-bed Thames pair. It is a larger boarding community on a south-London campus. Visit on a Sunday evening if you can, not only on a Saturday match.
Read the door that matches the age.
11+ (Year 7) and 13+ (Year 9) share a registrar line. 16+ (Year 12) is a separate page. DUCKS and Junior School have their own. The college publishes scholarships and a bursaries page. We will not invent a 2027 closing date the admissions pages did not print in the extract we could read as text. Confirm the live Year 9 entry page and the current registration window before you diary a test.
Bursaries are means-tested. The college’s bursary pages are the only place we will send you for income guidance and travel-time rules. Those figures move. Read them there.
The college publishes a 2026–27 fees page at dulwich.org.uk/admissions/fees. The table is delivered in a way that does not reliably appear as text. We will not invent a day or boarding figure. Open that page, note the VAT line, and ask the registrar if a number is unclear.
Ask what the published fee includes — lunch, buses, public exams, the occasional-boarding night rate. Ask what a first year actually costs once the deposit and extras sit on the bill.
Ask whether this child would be a day boy in Dulwich or a boarder from Year 9. Ask which boarding house a Year 9 would actually join — Old Blew and The Orchard are the younger houses in the college’s own copy. Ask how DUCKS boys move up, and how many Year 9 places are truly external. Ask Alleyn’s on Townley Road the same week if a mixed day house is also on your list. Ask to see an ordinary Tuesday, not only the close.
We are not ranking Dulwich against St Paul’s or Westminster. We are not publishing a 2026–27 fee we could not read from the official table. We are not guessing how many boys join Year 9 from outside. Read the current fees, admissions and boarding pages before you resign a flat. This is a map. The college still has to be the right Tuesday.
Offizielle Seiten und Dokumente, die wir gelesen haben. Wenn eine Zahl für Budget oder Bewerbung zählt, öffnet den Link und prüft, ob er noch gilt.
Freundliche Orientierung, kein Antrag. Termine, Gebühren und Programme ändern sich. Alles bei der Schule prüfen.
The useful London map is not a league table. It is which river, which leaving paper, and a commute you should time in January rain, not on Open Morning.
14 minManche Kinder blühen an einem Flur aus Koffern und Kakao. Manche brauchen das eigene Zimmer und den Hund. Beides ist erlaubt. Der Schulweg ist auch eine Art Internat.
16 minDie Buchstaben auf dem Abschlusszeugnis zählen. Sie sind nicht das ganze Kind. So unterscheidet ihr sie ohne Kopfschmerz — und ohne so zu tun, als bliebe jede Tür offen.
16 minIhr braucht keinen perfekten Algorithmus. Nur ein paar wahre Dinge über euer Kind, eine langweilige Liste am Kühlschrank — und den Mut, einen schönen Campus zu ignorieren, der nicht passt.