Brick Lane Reflections

March 6, 2011

tags: Brick Lane, Champagne, Depression, Margaret Thatcher, Monetarism, Off License, phil maxwell, photoblog, Poverty, Social unrest, Spitalfields, street photography, Unemployment, Whitechapel, Window reflections

Brick Lane reflection in a window, 2010

Sometimes reflections in a window reveal something you would not normally observe.

Brick Lane reflection in a window, 2010

This window of an off license in Brick Lane (below) is a metaphor for the direction in which the Lane has traveled in the last decade. I suspect we have reached the stage where all the champagne has been consumed. The sparkle has evaporated and the off license now has a less ostentatious display.

Brick Lane off license window, 2002

Going back in time the Lady walking on Brick Lane in 1982 is about to pass the former Taj Store shop displaying a healthy window of fruit. Many of the shops further down the street have been boarded up with corrugated iron. In a few years time they will disappear completely.

Lady walking down Brick Lane, 1982

Further up Brick Lane we see a wider view of boarded up buildings leading all the way to the bridge. With the election of Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Party in the 1970’s the UK became a laboratory for economic experimentation. The doctrine of Monetarism had a brief life under Thatcher but was at its end in 1982 when this photograph was taken. It was a time characterised by social unrest, unemployment and poverty for millions of families. The fabric of Brick Lane reflects the state of the economy at this time as well as the mood of depression.

Brick Lane, 1982

The Brick Lane of 2011 is entirely different from the depression above and caters for those with cash to spend. The former local shop (below) has become an Estate Agents.