The modern London borough was created in 1965 under the London Government Act 1963. It was a merger of the old borough of Lambeth and the Clapham and Streatham areas from the old Wandsworth borough.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
When the government was drafting the boundaries for the London boroughs in the early 1960s, it initially suggested that the Metropolitan Borough of Lambeth and the Metropolitan Borough of Southwark be merged into a new borough; the southern and eastern sections of the Metropolitan Borough of Wandsworth (including Clapham, Streatham and Tooting) would form another. South Shields town clerk R.S. Young was commissioned to make final recommendations to the government on the shape of the future London boroughs, and he noted that the Wandsworth council opposed the partition of its borough. However, Wandsworth's suggestion to merge Lambeth with the Metropolitan Borough of Battersea was rejected by both councils involved. Young believed that residents of Clapham and Streatham would be more familiar with Brixton than with Wandsworth, and recommended a new borough formed from the Metropolitan Borough of Lambeth and six wards and portions of two others from the Metropolitan Borough of Wandsworth.<ref>"London Government: The London Boroughs", Ministry of Housing and Local Government, HMSO, 1962. See in particular paragraphs 51–57.</ref>
The bedrock of the London Borough of Lambeth is London Clay Formation, clay and silt formed in the Palaeogene period between 56 and 47.8 million years ago (mya)<ref name="BGS London clay">Template:Cite web</ref> with one small arc of Lambeth Group clay, silt and sand (at the base of the London Clay Formation) of the same period, leading from the southeast of Brockwell Park and under Croxted Road, formed between 59.2 and 47.8 mya.<ref name="BGS Lambeth Group">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="BGS">Template:Cite web</ref>
There are a number of members of overlying superficial rocks from the Quaternary period. Close to the Thames, around Waterloo Station for example, the rock is estuarine alluvium made of clay, silt, sand and peat formed from 11.8 thousand years ago (tya) to the present.<ref name="BGS Alluvium">Template:Cite web</ref> South of that is a Kempton Park Gravel member, formed between 116 and 11.8 tya<ref name="BGS Kempton Park">Template:Cite web</ref> which extends south past Stockwell station approximately to Jeffrey's Road, with small areas of Langley Silt of the same age in the east and west.<ref name="BGS Langley Silt">Template:Cite web</ref> In the east, along Herne Hill and Denmark Hill is a Boyn Hill Gravel member, deposited between 423 and 126 tya.<ref name="BGS Boyn Hill">Template:Cite web</ref> Further south are areas of Head (poorly sorted clay, silt, sand and gravel laid up to 2.588 mya associated with slow-moving, waterlogged soil)<ref name="BGS Head">Template:Cite web</ref> e.g. from Clapham North station to Atkins road and Streatham Hill, Lynch Hill Gravel (sand and gravel, 326 to 126 tya)<ref name="BGS Lynch Hill">Template:Cite web</ref> under most of Clapham Commom, Hackney Gravel (sand and gravel, 326 to 126 tya)<ref name="BGS Hackney">Template:Cite web</ref> west of Clapham North station, Black Park Gravel (sand and gravel, 480 to 423 tya)<ref name="BGS Black Park">Template:Cite web</ref> making up the high parts of Streatham Hill and Knights Hill and Taplow Gravel (sand and gravel, 362 to 126 tya)<ref name="BGS Taplow">Template:Cite web</ref> under Brixton, the southern part of Stockwell Road and up to Camberwell New Road. In the very southeast and southwest is more Head, along with Hackney Gravel under Streatham Vale. In the south and southeast around Leigham Court Road, Crown Lane, Central Hill and Westow Hill are unnamed sand and gravel deposits.<ref name="BGS"/>
Elevations in Lambeth range from 0 metres at the intertidal area of the Thames, 3 to 4 metres in flat, built-on areas at the river bank up to 111 metres in the southeast by the junction of Westow Hill and Crystal Palace Parade.<ref name="BGS"/>
The local authority is Lambeth Council, which meets at Lambeth Town Hall in the Brixton area of the borough and has its main offices at the nearby Civic Centre.
Initial migration from the West Indies accounted for a significant part of the population since the 1960s onwards. Around 10,000 Afro-Caribbeans were apart of Lambeths population in 1963.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Lambeth is the local authority with the highest relative gay or lesbian population in the UK, at 5.5%, with the borough containing the gay village of Vauxhall and the area around Clapham Common.<ref name="hotspots">Template:Cite news</ref>
In March 2011, the primary forms of transport borough residents used to travel to work were the London Underground, metro, light rail or tram (21.4 percent of residents aged 16–74); bus, minibus or coach (10 percent); train (10 percent); automobile (8.6 percent); bicycle (5.7 percent), or walking (5.4 percent). A small percentage (3.2 percent) worked mainly at—or from—home.<ref>Template:Cite web Percentages are of all residents aged 16–74 including those not in employment. Respondents could only pick one mode, specified as the journey's longest part by distance.</ref>
The borough's coat of arms is that of the former Metropolitan Borough of Lambeth, with two gold stars (mullets) in the second and third quarters of the shield indicating the addition of the districts of Clapham and Streatham. Its motto is "Spectemur agendo" ("Let us be judged according to our conduct").
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