Last week, all of the interns at CIDA got a new task, that
is, to explore the area around Brick lane. I have only been to Brick lane
once to try its Asian food market, and it was really nice. However, this
time the purpose is totally different. As two of us were ill yesterday, we
decided to keep this trip relax and simple.
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Our
short visit started here.
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I did a little research about Brick
lane because I did not know about it well. All I know is that it is considered
as the centre of creative industries in eastern London, but I do not
know the reason. According to Wikipedia, Brick Lane is a street in East London, England, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It runs from Swanfield Street in the northern part of Bethnal
Green, crosses Bethnal Green Road, passes
through Spitalfields and is linked to Whitechapel High Street to the south by the short stretch of Osborn
Street. Today, it is the heart of the city's Bangladeshi-Sylheti community and is known to some as Banglatown. It is famous for
its many curry houses. In addition, Mavrommatis(2006) points out that this area
used to be famous for high unemployed and unskilled workforce rate. However, as
a result of the founding of 'Creative Industries Task Force' and the
internet revolution,
creative labours such as web
designers, computer engineers, art directors, music producers etc. began to
gathered around in this area. According to Mavrommatis,
in Brick Lane, a local redeveloped
brewery building provided the space for these new forms of entrepreneurial
creativity to blossom. Through the passage of time, a variety of cafes, bars,
exhibition spaces, etc. conglomerated around the Brewery. These new ‘creative’
cultures inscribed their lifestyle patterns onto the surrounding urban
vernacular. Within a few years, Brick Lane’s vernacular landscape transformed
through the insertion of a ‘creative community’ and its ways of life. These new
lifestyles settled side-by-side with ‘native’ ethnic populations, bodies,
languages, cultures, etc. In short, a new ‘creative’ Brick Lane was born based
on entrepreneurial creativity and the spread of new digital technologies.
However, during this short visit we
were not able to gain the full picture of how this area acted as the
creative centre though there were a several art centre and galleries around it,
illustrating the artistic atmosphere in this area. The most impressive thing
about Brick lane is the street art. They are almost every where. Luckily, we
even met some artists who were just painting graffiti on the wall. I walk to
office everyday, and compared to Liverpool Street which I have passed by
several times, Brick lane gives a more vibrant and creative feeling to me.
Perhaps that is one of the demonstrations of the life style of creative
workers.
During this trip, I found one CD store 'Rough Trade East' which I thought was quite vintage and
creative. The founders opened this store in 2007 against a towering
tide of scepticism and doubt. Today, it's rated one of London's major retail
destinations, winner of numerous awards, a law unto itself. Their aim is to
unite inspiring people with listeners. Visitors can listen to the music on
their machine in store and trying to find their favourite independent music.
This store provided new means for music artists to approach listeners, which I
find quite meaningful. Because nowadays, digital music industry such as iTunes
has influenced the market of traditional music industry, and the stereotyping
of music consumption has made independent music less known to ordinary people.
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