Dalston's "Creative Quarter" and community Eastern Curve Garden are officially at risk

On 24 March Hackney's Cabinet will be considering the sale of some family silver - sites it owns in Dalston's "Cultural Quarter". The sites include 10 -14 Ashwin Street, townscape buildings which are locally listed and in the Conservation Area. They are currently providing affordable studios for 30-40 artists and have a long cultural legacy, including jazz and choreography since the 1980s. The site also includes the Eastern Curve Garden's only indoor space - its "Hothouse" meeting place, office and toilet. How will the Garden survive if it loses those, on top of having a redevelopment site next door?

Cash strapped Hackney is said to have obtained a sales valuation based on demolition of the buildings and re-development as luxury flats. It has already said that all the artists tenants must leave by 1st April, because it's supposedly now 'too unsafe' to remain. Eastern Curve Garden is also partly on the site so a future purchaser could decide its Hothouse and facilities have to go too. The sell-off is part of a plan to privatise Dalston's "Cultural Quarter"sites first revealed in 2018. (Hackney's previous Mayor had said "Not on my watch". Ed.)

10 -14 Ashwin Street was designed by the eminent Victorian architect Edwin Horne in 1870. The frontages have decorative brick, stone and iron work detailing although these are presently disfigured by shabby white paint. Edwin Horne's other houses in Ashwin Street were demolished by World War II bombs and in 2010 by Hackney Council. He also designed the Reeves and Son Artists Colourworks at 18-22 Ashwin Street and the stations at Hackney Central and Grade II Listed Camden Road.

To the rear of 14 Ashwin St is the former engineering works of Tyer & Co who, in 1852, invented the railway signalling system which was adopted throughout the UK and in France. Consultant's instructed by Hackney consider this former factory is of HIGH historic value as forming  part of Hackney's industrial legacy.

Entrance to Ashwin St. off Dalston Lane around 1900 - the Railway Tavern's design is also attributed to Edwin Horne

10-14 Ashwin Street has a long association with cultural uses. Between 1985 and 1994 it was occupied by the registered charity, Pyramid Arts Development. Pyramid had raised government and charitable grants to buy and renovate the building for teaching and promoting performance arts. The former Government Minster Sir George Young 6th Baronet personally visited to wish them well - as archive film footage reveals. But for a mysterious reason the buildings were bought in the Council's, and not Pyramid's, name. Hackney seems to think there are now no charitable or other constraints against sale. The buildings have a strong cultural and architectural legacy, but these have yet to be appropriately valued.

Pyramid's musicians included the Grammy Award nominee Steve Marshall, Lee 'Scratch' Perry and the American jazz prodigy Clifford Jarvis who mentored many British jazz musicians there include Courtney Pine - a founder of the Jazz Warriors.  Also in 1985, Deborah Baddoo MBE opened a dance studio there which focussed on promoting Black dancers and choreographers internationally. Since 2005, under V22's management, many eminent visual artists have benefitted from the studio facilities including Dame Phyllida Barlow DBE RA, Fernando Marques Penteado, Peter Kennard, Fergal Stapleton and others. 

Could Hackney's latest planning policies save the Cultural Quarter from the mammonists? The recent Hackney Plan 2033 aspires to protect the Eastern Curve Garden and to resist developers seeking to demolish heritage buildings and change affordable and cultural uses into luxury flats. But the local cultural economy and heritage buildings are fragile. Even if a developer promised to try and save the facades of 10-14 Ashwin Street, and give its scheme a new cultural gloss, public ownership and the local vibe will be lost. Like the houses of Dalston Terrace which were sold off, demolished and then re-built in "heritage likeness" with no affordable housing at all.

What can you do about this?

You could write to the newly elected  mayor@hackney.gov.uk  to express any concerns which you may have.

This short 2018 film "Dalston Arts 150" reveals Dalston's 150 year long association with the arts and Hackney's original plan to sell off Dalston's Cultural Quarter sites to "maximise capital value and rental revenue for the Council". That plan could now being realised - the privatisation of public cultural spaces.