EAST LONDON ARTS AND CULTURAL GUIDE
Explore these historically-informed arts and cultural heritage guides of Newham and Hackney designed to familiarise UCL East students with their surrounding environment.
A Guide to Newham: Culture, Creativity and Community in a Site of Ongoing Gentrification
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Newham is a borough rich in history, industry, and creativity. Once a hub of manufacturing and trade, it has evolved into a vibrant cultural district while maintaining its working-class roots and diverse community. This guide explores the must-visit places in Newham, from performing arts venues to historical landmarks, arts and crafts spaces, and the best spots for nightlife and food. Here's the links to the locations we mention in our vlogs! https://sugarhouseisland.com/ https://hyphastudios.com/ https://www.udmusic.org/ https://www.eastlondondance.org/ https://www.udmusic.org/talent-house/ https://www.visitleevalley.org.uk/three-mills https://3mills.com/ https://thebcc.ac.uk/ https://www.docklandsettlements.org.uk/stratford.html https://www.abbeygardens.org/ https://www.stratfordeast.com/ https://stratfordshopping.co.uk/stores/5-continents/
A Guide to Hackney: History, Culture and Community
This historic borough in London, home to many migrant groups throughout history and the industries they brought with them, is one of the most culturally rich areas of the city. However, the borough has been facing ongoing gentrification attempts, with redevelopments, newbuilds and the inevitable displacement of the local communities due to soaring rent prices in the area. This being said, Hackney still has a lot to offer culturally. From local food, to music venues, small clothing stores and all the way to museums, the borough is definitely a must visit if you want to have a good time. Check out the websites for the spots we mention in our vlog! https://www.vam.ac.uk/east https://hackney.gov.uk/hackney-marshes https://www.hackneyandleytonleague.com/ https://hackneybridge.org/ https://streetartcities.com/markers/4df72359-3f84-4650-bd8b-0c599efe59b0 https://hackneybridge.org/retail/ https://www.queenelizabetholympicpark.co.uk/eat-drink/badu-cafe https://rawmaterials.bowarts.org/collection/site-of-parkesine-works/ https://www.hta.co.uk/75-wallis-road/ https://www.hwklondon.com/ https://urchinstudios.co.uk/ https://www.theyardtheatre.co.uk/ https://www.cafemai.co.uk/
Blog Posts
Want to learn more? Come to our event on 21/03/2025!
We are running an event to screen our vlogs showcasing our historically informed guides of Newham and Hackney.
The event will also have food and drink from small local businesses to highlight the cultural richness of the area
Make sure to RSVP if you want to attend as capacity is limited!
This arts and culture guide has been created by UCL East students, for UCL East students. All five of us – Carmen, Rory, Janice, Kat, and Arthur – are studying for a Public History MA at UCL East. As part of our programme, full-time and final year (part-time) students are tasked with creating a group project in collaboration with designated clients. Our client was Anna Fineman, Outreach Programme Manager at UCL Special Collections, and our task was to put together a historically informed arts and culture guide to Stratford and/or adjacent areas within east London. Since this project was undertaken in collaboration with UCL Special Collections, we went searching for East London in the archives, and uncovered some fascinating insights which we have woven into our blog posts. It was clear that industrial history is central to the story of East London and has underscored so much of its landscape and development, and this was evident once we got out into our locations to film. Special Collections gave us a lot of creative license regarding the form our guide would take. We decided that, given our target audience is students at our campus, a website would best accommodate the kind of content we wanted to produce. Above all, we wanted the guide to be a current, accessible and engaging showcase of the amazing things to do on our doorstep, and the history which has shaped them. With this in mind, we populated our website with a mixture of visual and textual content, specifically vlogs and blog posts. By vlogging our experience, we aimed to convey a sense of each location’s physical site and a taste for the kind of day or itinerary you might plan for yourself when exploring, as well as a feel for how long this would take. Our knowledge of Stratford and Hackney Wick is owed in part to an amazing group of people who grew up in and around those areas. Felicia Mascarenhas, Hamish White Henderson, Lola Fayokun, Charlie Beetle Campbell Wright, and Jelani Ruddock kindly gave up their time to meet with us, hear about the project, share what they know, and answer our questions. We are incredibly grateful to them and for the insights they imparted; we wouldn’t have known about Sweet Toof’s street art, for example, without a heads up! We hope that you enjoy browsing our website as much as we loved creating it. But more than anything, the joy we derived from the project came from getting out and spending time in Stratford and Hackney Wick, and we implore you to follow our footsteps and see everything they have to offer for yourselves.