LONDON, UNITED KINDOM
by Shanice Goodridge
In reference to our post prior to this, we have been in our offices researching the current 'real estate problem' we have in our home town Hackney. Over the years we have seen a lot of developmental change happen within the London Borough and after much thought we have come to the conclusion that there are (as always) a two fold affect that has happened to this part of the city, in other words there is good news and bad news. The bad new is that on one hand there is the growing sense of Elitism in the borough. Having all been residents of Hackney it is safe for us to say that the new influx of non Hackney residents into the new fashion forward east London town has created a culture clash that is felt by the "newbies" and the locals alike. ''People watching' does not go down oh so well with many people rendering the 'newbies' as rude, stuck up snobs who, quite frankly, haven't anything better to do than spend their time sitting around pretentiously drinking barista style coffee, staring at people and pressing buttons on their Apple MacBooks', one source tells us. Well hey, don't shoot the messenger right?
Another problem we have found lies within the title of this post. REAL ESTATE. It is clear to us and most probably the majority of the British population that plans backed and based around revenue will prevail. An example of this can be seen within the residential side of the property market. Homes are selling for £300,000.00-£500,000.00+ a price that is just unreachable for most of the locals. Flats that hold history and modern families are no more, families driven out of their homes to make way for the 'New World' of accommodation that is slowly forming in Hackney. Many wonder: just what is beneficial to the people that live in, and have always made up Hackney, about the change that is happening? What about improvements for our accommodation and society issues? We can use the individuality speech all we want but obviously all is not good about the recreation of Hackney's street.
The Hackney Fashion Hub as stated down below generates this same problem.
We hope to see some Legislation on this (which we most likely will). You must have legal permission to force people away from businesses and homes if you haven't yet been granted the planning permission. You just must.
The good news is, FINALLY, that this is a very good look for what once was a borough of almost solely bad press. People feel that they can actually come to Hackney and feel safe and be amongst other civilised people no matter what the news may say. The new fashion rap, artistic, retro vibe to Hackney is a refreshment on our end and many others, and the new east end has created a vast range of jobs although not always so blatantly advertised, for many locals and we have all reaped the rewards of this mini city. The atmosphere, though pretentious, is quite exciting. It's like being back in high school with that 'cool kid' theory. This time it isn't so negative.
Let's not forget why we are here! T H E F A S H I O N. Hackney and the East End are really the new hosts of existing and emerging artists ranging from fashion to music and graphic design. The architecture you see nowadays is breathtaking, and the shop fronts??? TO DIE FOR! Literally, Hackney and East London is on the come up. It's like the new Portobello Road and is central to everything in London. We love the idea over here. But we do feel we have to stress: Is this the right time?
Yes fashion is cool and everything but Hackney is not free of it's problems and sniff sniff we smell government assistance with this. If this is true we ask the big guys if they have their priorities in the wrong place (finance), with all of the problems we have just here alone in small little old hackney in HUGE London, lightly speaking, shouldn't your attention be focused on getting things right? We're sure there is enough money to go to this. We guess it isn't really that important to them.
Thank you for reading!
THE FASHION TIMES TEAM
No comments:
Post a Comment