The college has particularly strong ties to public service, as well as academia, having educated many prominent dissenting thinkers, educationalists, politicians, and missionary explorers.

At that time, it produced some of the nation's foremost dissenting figures, many closely involved in the movements opposed to the slave trade and the Corn Laws.

John Harris DD was the Congregationalist Principal, and by extending and rebuilding the old mansion house and 1820s buildings of the academy, at a cost of £10,000.

Then Principal John Horobin called an end to mixed education in 1896, shortly after the move to Cambridge, and the college remained all-women for 80 years thereafter.

[9] Towards the end of the century, the growth of industry had turned the village of Homerton into a manufacturing centre, lowering the quality of life of the students and, between 1878 and 1885, there were seven deaths from tuberculosis, smallpox and typhoid.

[citation needed] In 1881, former students of Homerton College who were members of Glyn Cricket Club formed a football section to help keep their players fit during the winter months.

All its estates and furniture were bought for £10,000 by the Congregational Board, and students and staff moved from the old Hackney premises into the vacant college buildings at Cambridge.

[11] The first woman to head the college was Mary Miller Allan, who was responsible for Homerton's national reputation as a trainer of women teachers.

[13] Dame Beryl Paston Brown was Principal in the 1960s, at a time when Homerton's numbers doubled after the introduction of three-year training courses in 1960.

[14] In December 1976, under the headship of Principal Alison Cheveley Shrubsole,[15] Homerton was accepted as an Approved Society of the University of Cambridge following a 3–1 vote of the Regent House in favour of its admission.

It was after the shake-up and governmental criticisms of teacher training in the early 1970s that the university admitted Homerton because, by then, all of its students were doing four-year honours courses.

The original Victorian Cavendish College buildings were constructed in 1876 in the Gothic Revival style, using a combination of red Suffolk brick and Bath stone dressings.

[6] Several years later, the Cambridge architect William Wren designed additions to the eastern end of the college buildings in the Neo-Gothic style – now occupied by the Principal's office.

[6] The castellated tower is the tallest part of the original college buildings, and it is possible to see the spires of Ely Cathedral on a clear day from its uppermost floor.

[19] It now houses one of the college's most notable works of art – the celebrated Pre-Raphaelite piece by Jane Benham Hay known as 'The Florentine Procession', painted in the 1860s and winning 'Picture of the Year' in the 1867 Saturday Review.

An example of arts and crafts style architecture, its present-day Combination Room was probably the only grade two listed gymnasium in the world.

[7] Also of interest is Trumpington House (completed in 1847, and which once held the college's wine collection in its basement) built in the style of classical revival and currently leased to the Faculty of Education.

In its grounds are several rare examples of wild orchids and over 150 species of plants, which act as a rich habitat for various forms of wildlife – including grey squirrels, carrion crows, woodpeckers, stock doves, rabbits, the 'College fox', and in the summer a small colony of swifts, which nest under the eaves of the roof of the Cavendish building after their return from Africa.

[citation needed] From 2015 until 2020 the HUS organized an annual and immensely popular Harry Potter Formal Hall, at which students and staff would dress as characters from the books, sketches would be acted, and live owls were brought in for entertainment.

[32] Homerton's Harry Potter Formal Halls were discontinued in 2023 when an incoming HUS president allegedly objected to their connection with J. K. Rowling and her gender critical views.