Man Realises he is Gentrification

south_to_north

<div><font face="Arial, Verdana"><span style="font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: normal;">Saw this and it made me laugh:</span></font></div><font face="Arial, Verdana"><span style="font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: normal;"><div><font face="Arial, Verdana"><span style="font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: normal;"><br></span></font></div>http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/society/man-realises-he-is-gentrification-20151203104414 </span></font><div><font face="Arial, Verdana"><span style="font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: normal;"><br></span></font></div><div><font face="Arial, Verdana"><span style="font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: normal;">Thought I'd post it seeing as gentrification is a hot topic on this board (along with pizza); and given the tension that occurs between not liking the idea of gentrification, whilst simultaneously enjoying the better amenities that it brings...</span></font></div><div><font face="Arial, Verdana"><span style="font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: normal;"><br></span></font></div><div><font face="Arial, Verdana"><span style="font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: normal;">I'll be the first one to admit that I see more than I hint of myself in this....</span></font></div>

HolbornFox

It wasn't very gentrified in The Boston last night, although I had one on the way in St John. My misses noticed that a blokes wallet was nowhere near him on the bar but could have easily been taken by us / anyone. When she told him he proudly replied that things like that don't happen in St John, at that moment I wished that I had simply snaffled it. Also noticed the lion at Archway is now a starbucks (teeth gritting smiley). Not sure what gentrification brings to normal people, apart from thinking gawd blimey my house is now worth a million bucks and they're shutting my bowling alley...?

south_to_north

Depends on how you define "normal people". The pretty wide variety of shops, bars and restaurants we have is definitely a result of people in the area having higher than average incomes. I'm sure you definitely make use of some of them....<div><br></div><div>I wince writing this because I know how it comes across, but hopefully you get what I mean. The reason I said there's a hint of myself in the article is because I like to get coffee from vagabond sometimes, I like the bread from Blighty, and I like to pop into the hopsmiths. Does that make me not "normal"? In the grand scheme of things spending a bit more on beer, coffee, and bread doesn't require a bankers salary..... (Godfrey's and the organic shop though, now that's a step too far for me....)<br><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div></div>

CityOfSin

What have you started? <div><br></div><div>Reminds me of a tongue-in-cheek comment I saw on twitter recently:</div><div><br></div><div>"Gentrification is great, just wait a few years and the area you could afford turns into the area you really wanted."</div><div><br></div><div>I can imagine some of the regulars on this forum bristling at that idea...</div>

HolbornFox

Wouldn't call The Hopsmiths a symptom of gentrification, that's like calling Banners a symptom of gentrification which it obviously (obvs) ain't, the people I see in there are not the same people that are too scared to go into a 'normal' pub / bar / cafe and everything new is not necessarily 'hipster' IMO. Same argument as when people say why do you care if a pub shuts and is turned into flats when you didn't drink there... FFS I can only visit so many places in any given week...!

CityOfSin

The use of the word 'normal' is useless here. A smart, upscale gastropub may be 'normal' to some, while a spit-and-sawdust old school boozer may be 'normal' to others. Perhaps people aren't scared to go to some places, they just prefer elsewhere?<div><br></div><div>Agree with your comment that not everything new is automatically 'hipster', though.</div>

HolbornFox

For me the word 'hipster' refers to someone who doesn't have the ability to go into a normal* pub but is quite happy to take take take from an area in their glass block of flats while giving nothing back. * normal = the pubs that were ok for me and my whole social / family circle for as long as I can remember.

south_to_north

Bearded fellas selling beers on tap mostly from east london, none for under 4 quid (and most for around 5), with not a recognisable lager in sight .... to a lot of people that symbolises at least one element of gentrification. The same people driving up rent prices are the same people who are far more likely to demand a craft beer bar in their area and actually use it.<div><span style="font-size: 10pt;">You don't find that sort of place in Seven Sisters if you catch my drift.</span><br></div><div><br></div><div>Hopsmiths, Blighty, and Vagabond are archetypal hipster places. If they aren't I have no idea what is. But all that's fine with me, because honestly hipsters make nice stuff.... </div><div><br></div><div>Regarding crouch end, I remember hearing that long ago people once referred to it as "crack end". Certainly isn't like that now....</div>

south_to_north

(Full disclosure: I also have a beard, and I actually really like the bar staff at the hopsmiths... )

miss annie

<p>Banners is not a sign of gentrification, it's been in the 'End for at least 20 years, before Crouch End was any kind of fancy!</p><p>Same with Godfrey's - it's been around for over 100 years, not posh or hipster, just very good family butchers. </p>

south_to_north

I take the point re Banners. But godfrey's is a Highbury institution, which is traditionally a much more wealthy area. The fact that it now sells in Finsbury Park is a sign of the rising average income in the area. (19 pounds for a chicken..... 19 pounds!!!)

Mimsy

Banners is indicative of the 90s and (early) 00s New Agers who got so mashed on E they forgot about their lives and became waitresses for ever. Smug beyond belief...<br><br>Now Vagabond - that is hipster beyond belief.... achingly so...<br><br>p.s. - 'crack' end .... previously known as 'Crouch End Tiger Chasing Dragon' has moved on. It's pram pusher by day... and Barry White at night.<br>

miss annie

Highbury hasn't always been a wealthy area. It was genteel shabbiness at best in the 70s & 80s, although nowhere near as rough as Finsbury Park was. Remember the old Highbury stadium was round the corner and houses near there were not in high demand. It's hard to explain to newcomers to Islington that Camden and Kentish Town used to be the places for fashionable young people to live - not this part of town, and everyone could afford to rent there. Most people I know eat meat only once a week and would be happy to spend a lot, less often, on better quality instead of eating every day.

south_to_north

Places change I guess, and they always have. Covent Garden was once effectively a slum remember.... (My Fair Lady anyone?) Arguably, it's part of the trade off you make in living in a dynamic city....

miss annie

<p>Covent Garden was a desolate wasteland more recently that that - in the late 70s, early 80s after the fruit & veg market moved it was cheap with loads of empty and boarded up properties - that's why places like Blitz Club moved there. Warren Street and Fitzrovia was mostly squats and you would not have wanted to live in Shoreditch if someone paid you - I still wouldn't actually. </p><p>My Nan could never believe that anyone would consider actually choosing to live in Hoxton as she remembered it as a rat infested slum of tenements when she lived there as a child in the early 1920s. She went to school in the church there.</p>

Mimsy

Hoxton was great in the 1980s... Bass Cleff and cheap pubs. Oh, what the hipsters have wrought... but not nearly as bad as what the big bucks from Reading did to once beautiful Westbourne Grove. Where has all that creative music gone now? Its just not made any more, I think.<br>

Ali

Blitz Club was in Greta Queen Street at the Holborn end 2mins from Holborn Station so I would say it was in Holborn.

HolbornFox

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">I remember when Leisure Lounge was on High Holborn and Turnmills was just around the corner in Farringdon, cracking times... Bagleys and The Cross as well.</span><br><br><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Miss Annie, it surprises them people even more when you tell them what Camden and Kentish was like before the luvvies moved in, i guess it will be the same for Brixton in the next few years. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small; line-height: 1.7em;">Actually i looked at a flat in Waterloo in the late 90's and that was only about 70K, not that i could afford it at the time!</span><br></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small; line-height: 1.7em;">Someone told me once that it was all started round here by Bob Dylan when he moved to Crouch End and discovered Banners!</span><br></p>

Ali

That would have been Paul Simon who started the Bob story once lazy summer time

Mimsy

He was in Crouch End prior to that... recording at the Church with Dave and Annie (Eurythmics)... in 1986. Long before Banners<br>

miss annie

@Ali You might say it's Holborn but you are wrong - west of Kingsway is Covent Gdn. Did you ever go? We may have met!

Sutent

The criticism of hipsters makes me very uncomfortable here. Young creative people have always come to London for opportunities for many generations. They will always be welcome here. These "hipsters" not only generate ideas and wealth and are more likely to pay their taxes and be socially and environmentally conscious. <div><br></div><div>Gentrification is a whole different issue and is not caused these young people. As usual the dog whistlers love they fact they can get away with it</div>

miss annie

They may come but they won't be aw to stay unless they are rich. Where are the cheap places to rent a crappy old studio that you could paint in and also sleep in, or the scruffy little room down the road from the pub that will let you band do a showcase? And then your mates all move in nearby too and you start projects together. Where are those hubs of creativity now? What we think of as hipsters tend to be people who have made a bit of cash doing something before their hipster business, or people being funded by someone. Rents are too high (thanks buy to let vultures), for young people to live in the centre of town and the hubs of things like the music industry and nightlife have been knocked down or closed down. I bet all the young actors, musicians, designers and artists you like have come from either public school or wealthy families.

south_to_north

You don't need to be rich so long as you cohabitate. Average rent round here is something like 600 to 650 a month per person. A 25 thousand pound a year job more than covers that.... I know not everyone has those but it's certainly not "rich".... But young people moving in and making an area more "bohemian" is a key aspect of the modern trend of gentrification. They move in because rents are cheap, they make the place "cool". This coolness is used to market the property to people with higher salaries who want somewhere vibrant to live. Then the people who initially moved in can't live there anymore, so they move. That's why the "cool" place in London shifted from shoreditch, to hoxton, to dalston , and now to Peckham and brixton. Dare I say it..... Some day it might even reach croydon....

miss annie

Just as an indicator, an average West End shop or service industry wage is around 17,000 pa. Where should those people, who are often doing those jobs while pursuing creative projects outside work, live? People earning 25K are unlikely to want to live in the kind of place that rents for £600pm.

Papa

When we rented a flat on Stroud Green Road in 2005 it cost £740-a-month for first floor double bedroom flat with separate kitchen and a little balcony. This was a decent price - about £50 to £100 below other places we looked at - and plenty big enough for a couple.<div><br><div>By the time my sister moved out from over the other side of the park late last year, she was paying nearly £700 a month for a bedroom in a shared three-bed.</div></div><div><br></div><div>There is absolutely no doubt that people are either a) being squeezed out or b) having to live on considerably less disposable income in much smaller spaces to be here.</div><div><br></div><div>We shouldn't underestimate the effect that has on people's quality of life.</div><div><br></div><div><br></div>

south_to_north

I worked in a bar for a few years and there were people on minimum wage living round here whilst pursuing their own creative projects (one of them now works in radio, the other now works for a brewery)..... I'm not saying there isn't a rental problem - of course there is - I was just pointing out that it's wrong to say the only people who can afford to rent are rich. It's become so normal now to spend a disproportionate amount of money on rent, that you kind of know beforehand what you're getting yourself in for when you move somewhere in zone 2. I could live in Enfield, but I don't, because I want to live here, and hence I pay for that. It's a value judgement that you make. That is for young people though, who have less to tie them down and are more mobile. For people who have dependants / want to buy but can't / long term residents being forced out, that's a different issue where the consequences are more concerning. The real consequences of gentrification are certainly not felt by the young for the most part.... they'll be fine.

CityOfSin

Genuine question - lots of people on here mention residents 'being forced out' of the area. Who are these people? People that are renting and can't afford the price hikes? (Because surely property owners - i.e. those that bought flats here before it was 'desirable' - can stay, and will most likely benefit from the positive changes in the area? Like less crime, a wider range of amenities, etc)

south_to_north

<p>Yes, mainly renters. "Forced out" can mean having your rent hiked up to the point where it makes sense to move, or -- as is equally common -- finding once you reach a certain age and you want to raise a family or buy a house, that it's not economical to keep living in the same area.</p><p>That'll happen to me at some point and I'll have to move away to somewhere more affordable. But to me that's fine, it comes with the territory. No one is forcing me to live here.</p><p>As I said, when it becomes not fine is when you rent and you have dependents. Hence why I posted the link in the first place. My wanting to live here as a twenty-something has a negative impact on people who have a lot more to lose from higher rents than I do. But its an impossible situation, that really requires some kind of policy action for a resolution - but that's a whole other discussion.....</p>

south_to_north

(Btw, for anybody who listens to podcasts there's a really good mini-series on gentrification in New York called <a href="http://www.wnyc.org/shows/neighborhood/">There Goes the Neighbourhood </a>that's worth a listen...)

miss annie

I rent. You can draw your own conclusions about my age, suffice it to say that I am not young. I don't want to buy, what I want is affordable rents, secure tenancies and a good standard of renting for anyone who wants make the same choice. I am lucky, my landlady came over on Windrush with her brother, they worked hard and bought this house to live in. They converted it into three flats and let it at an extremely fair price to people that they think will look after it ad they consider it a home rather than just an investment. I've not had a rent rise since I moved in six years ago, I wouldn't be able to afford it at current market rents. We have an arrangement we do little repairs and painting and whatnot, we keep the garden nice and everyone is happy. No extra bills for my landlady, no rent rise for us.I wish everyone could the same sort of deal but the market favours the profiteers and those who are out to fleece others.