Saturday, 24 August, 2019
I live in Hackney Central, the centre of London’s largest borough. It’s in Zone 2. If you look at a transport map of London zone 1 is the centre and each zone forms a radius around that zone, up to zone 6. So Zone 2 is just outside the centre.
Hackney was once voted the least desirable place to live in the UK. That’s all changed. Gentrification has turned it around with increasing speed. Now it just might be the most desirable instead. In fact, there have been polls about the coolest neighbourhoods to live in the world and I’ve lived in numbers 1 and 2 – Queen Street West in Toronto, and Hackney. Crazy!
Although Hackney has a reputation of being a rundown, dirty and dangerous area, it’s actually quite diverse. Within its limits there’s industry, commerce, cultural centres, many markets, churches, artist communities, housing estates, beautiful old homes, trendy new flats, fancy restaurants, very old greasy spoon cafes, canals, tiny and huge parks, and even vast areas of wild land. And there are many cultures – in this specific area there are many Afro-Caribbean, African, Turkish, Vietnamese…and so on. Hackney has also long been somewhere independent thinkers felt safe to be themselves – the feminists, the political activists, the poets, the dreamers… it can be wacky!
Hip Hackney. Or is it?
One thing Hackney is to me is community. People pulling together to make things happen. There are always plays, concerts, workshops, courses, parades, groups…street parties and projects. Right now there’s a cool project right opposite the house.
There have been two shuttered business premises for years – more than a decade for sure. We have no idea why they are sitting unused for so long. Mystery! When we came back from Toronto – maybe the first day, in fact, we saw some activity outside so I went to check it out. A group of neighbours had set up a couple of tables – one with plants and one with baked goods. They were busy stacking and securing wooden crates to one of the shutters and were planting a sort of living wall.
I bought some cake and chatted with them. They said that it was for the community and, in part, a protest against buildings sitting unused when there is so much homeless and need for affordable housing.
Now, this is Hackney and, despite my protests to contrary, the neighbours can be rough. Vandalism is pretty common. Krish and I talked about betting on how long this project would stay unharmed. The initial building and planting was at the end of June, beginning of July. It’s now 24th August and the planters and plants are flourishing.
And there’s more. Since then, two benches were added and, soon afterwards, planters on top of the benches got some plants too! There are even plans to add a couple of ‘tables’ in the centre. What a great neighbourhood addition and incentive.
