Liverpool : 1972 – 2025 Volume 1
CLICK ON THE COVER IMAGE ABOVE TO BUY
Gentrification in East London: A Photographic Study
The photographs above depict the same stretch of Commercial Street in East London, taken almost three decades apart. Together they provide a visual study of continuity and change in one of London’s most rapidly transformed neighbourhoods.
The first photograph documents the area in 1990, when Spitalfields was still marked by the effects of economic decline following decades of deindustrialisation. Much of the surrounding district retained its traditional working-class character, and only a few years after this image was taken the historic Spitalfields fruit and vegetable market closed and relocated to Leyton, bringing to an end more than three centuries of trading on the site. The closure marked a significant turning point in the area’s economic and social history.
By contrast, the second photograph, taken in 2019, juxtaposes a passer-by with a large fashion advertisement, reflecting a neighbourhood increasingly associated with design, creative industries, boutique retail and affluent consumers. Commercial Street has evolved into a place where global brands and lifestyle marketing occupy spaces that once served working-class communities, local workshops and independent businesses.
Together, the photographs chart a profound transformation in the area’s social identity. The 1990 image belongs to an East End still characterised by relatively affordable housing and long-established immigrant communities, particularly those of Jewish and later Bangladeshi heritage. By 2019, the same streets had become emblematic of London’s wider process of gentrification, attracting professionals, technology companies, galleries, restaurants and rapidly rising property values.
The two photographs therefore raise important questions about who ultimately benefits from urban regeneration. While investment undoubtedly brought improvements to the physical environment and generated new economic activity, these gains were accompanied by escalating rents and house prices that made it increasingly difficult for lower-income residents and independent traders to remain. House prices in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets increased by well over 300 per cent between the mid-1990s and the late 2010s, while commercial rents followed a similar upward trajectory. At the same time, census data show that the proportion of residents employed in professional and managerial occupations rose substantially, reflecting a marked shift in the social composition of the neighbourhood. The fashion poster in the second image becomes more than an advertisement: it symbolises a consumer economy increasingly directed towards a different demographic from the communities that historically gave the East End its distinctive character.
Urban renewal is rarely a straightforward story of progress or decline. Instead, it is a story of competing interests, changing identities and the continual reshaping of place. The transformation of Spitalfields undoubtedly created wealth and restored much of the built environment, yet it also displaced many long-standing residents, small businesses and traditional street markets. Although developers and often the local Council promoted regeneration as a process that would benefit the wider community, the evidence suggests that its rewards were very unevenly distributed.
Exploring East London’s Social Contradictions
The luxury boutiques and wellness clinics of Canary Wharf are only a short walk from neighbourhoods facing persistent deprivation. This photograph is less about one individual than about that uneasy coexistence: conspicuous wealth and entrenched poverty occupying the same landscape, separated by little more than glass, polished stone and the illusion of accessibility.
I took the above photograph recently in the underground shopping mall at Canary Wharf. Whether you visit during the day or late at night, the lighting never changes. It feels detached from the outside world—an underground bunker where capitalism is permanently illuminated, insulated from the rhythms of daylight and the weather.
The subject is absorbed by his phone, seemingly oblivious to the oversized skincare advertisements competing for his attention. The image captures a familiar feature of contemporary urban life: our attention is increasingly drawn to digital screens, even as commercial imagery relentlessly vies for it.
Canary Wharf has evolved from a predominantly financial district into a destination for shopping, dining and leisure. Yet this transformation sits alongside one of London’s starkest social contradictions. Tower Hamlets, the borough that surrounds Canary Wharf, has some of the highest levels of child poverty in the country, with around half of all children living below the poverty line after housing costs. Around three in ten households receive Housing Benefit, highlighting the extent of low-income households despite the immense wealth generated nearby.
Exploring Travel Underground: Moments in Time
This photograph feels less like a picture of the London Underground than one about emotional isolation within a crowded city. Although there are many people using the London underground there’s usually little communication between strangers on the train.
It speaks to the paradox of metropolitan life: being surrounded by strangers while experiencing something deeply personal.
The mood of passengers on the underground changes at different times of day. At night after the pubs have shut passengers are boisterous in the morning they’re quiet.
Mile End: A Tapestry of Change in East London
This recent photograph was taken on Mile End Road, a place I know well and have been photographing for many years. This lively urban scene—with two men in conversation, a dog, graffiti, and layers of weathered posters—appeals to me because it feels so full of life. There is a sense of humour and familiarity in the exchange between the two men, while the dog is happily following the scent trails left by others who have passed before him. The graffiti and torn posters form an ever-changing visual footprint of the city: an organic, unplanned piece of collective street art that even the weather has helped to create.
Mile End sits within a part of East London that has experienced repeated waves of social, economic, and cultural change. The layered wall, covered with posters, paint, and graffiti, functions almost like an archaeological surface, recording those changes over time. There are two conversations taking place simultaneously: the everyday dialogue between the dog walkers and the silent, accumulated voices embedded in the wall itself, inviting passers-by to stop and decipher its messages.
Mile End has always been a place of transition, where different communities, histories, and cultures intersect. A short walk away (above), on Southern Grove, lies Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park, one of London’s magnificent Victorian “Magnificent Seven” cemeteries. Established in 1841, it is now a thriving urban nature reserve where woodland has gradually reclaimed the historic graves and monuments. The contrast between the urban energy of Mile End Road and the quiet, overgrown cemetery offers a poignant reminder of the many layers of life, memory, and change that define this part of East London.
Capturing Time Through Mixed Media Art
I photographed this woman recently as she walked slowly through Euston Station. The five sequential images were taken over a period of approximately fifteen seconds. I later combined them with a background photograph made from a moving car on the same evening, then developed the final collage by hand using a variety of media.
In the 1990s, I frequently experimented with sequential repetition. At that time, I would cut and reassemble black-and-white darkroom prints into collages, hoping to encourage viewers to engage with an image in a different way. The repeated figure here suggests how a person leaves traces of themselves through time. Rather than disappearing with each step, every moment remains visible, accumulating within the frame.
Among the hundreds of people moving through the heat and bustle of the station, this woman stood out. I was drawn to her demeanour and the quiet determination of her stride. In this image, she evokes ideas of accumulated experience, life’s journey, and the simultaneous visibility and invisibility of older people in public space.
The blurred city background contrasts with her repeated presence. The environment appears fast-moving and chaotic, while her expression and pace seem detached from the rush around her. She occupies a different rhythm, carrying her own sense of time through the city.
I have titled the work On My Way because it is concerned with transition rather than arrival. It is a meditation on movement through urban space and through time itself. The piece reflects my belief that there is a poetic potential embedded within everyday encounters on the streets of London.
on Whitechapel High Road in the 1980s.
