Everything about Shoreditch totally explained
Shoreditch is an area of
London within the
London Borough of Hackney. It is a built-up area of the
inner city immediately to the north of the
City of London, located north east of
Charing Cross. It is situated at the point where five postal districts converge.
History
The etymology of 'Shoreditch' is debated. A legendary early tradition connects it with
Jane Shore, the mistress of
Edward IV who according to an ancient ballad died in the eponymous ditch....However as the place is attested as 'Soersditch', long before this, a more plausible suggestion is 'Sewer Ditch', in reference to an ancient drain or watercourse in what was a boggy area adjacent to the 'fens' of
Finsbury/Fensbury to the west (Mander 1996). Possibly it refers to the headwaters of the river
Walbrook which rose in the
Curtain Road area.
The legendary associations of Jane Shore with the area are commemorated by a very large painting of that lady being retrieved from the ditch at
Haggerston Branch Library and by a design on glazed tiles in a shop in Shoreditch High Street, showing Edward IV meeting her at the goldsmith's establishment her husband kept. This shop was formerly 'The Jane Shore' tavern (Clunn 1970: 312, 493).
Though now part of the
inner city, Shoreditch was previously an extra-mural suburb of the City of London, centred around
Shoreditch Church at the crossroads where Shoreditch High Street and
Kingsland Road are intersected by
Old Street and
Hackney Road.
Shoreditch High Street and Kingsland road are a small sector of the Roman
Ermine Street and modern
A10. This, known also as the Old North Road, was a major coaching route to the north, exiting the City at
Bishopsgate. The east-west course of Old Street-Hackney Road was also probably originally a Roman Road, connecting
Silchester with
Colchester, bypassing the City of London to the south (Sugden n.d.).
Shoreditch church (dedicated to St Leonard) is of ancient origin and features in the famous line: 'when I grow rich say the bells of Shoreditch', from the nursery rhyme:
Oranges and Lemons.
Shoreditch was the site of a house of nuns, the
Augustinian priory of 'Halliwell' or 'Holywell' (named after a Holy Well on the site), from the 12th Century until its
dissolution in 1539. This priory was located between Shoreditch High Street and Curtain Road to east and west and Batemans Row and Holywell Lane to north and south. Nothing remains of it today (Wood 2003).
On this site, in 1576,
James Burbage built the first playhouse in England, known as '
The Theatre' (commemorated today by a plaque on Curtain Road). Some of
Shakepeare's plays were performed here and at the nearby
Curtain Theatre, built in 1577 200 yards to the south (marked by a commemorative plaque in Hewett Street off Curtain Road). It was here that Shakespeare's
Romeo and Juliet gained 'Curtain plaudits' and where
Henry V was performed within 'this wooden O'. In 1599 Shakespeare's Company literally upped sticks, and moved the timbers of 'The Theatre' to
Southwark, after the lease had run out, to construct The
Globe. The Curtain continued performing plays in Shoreditch until at least 1627 (Shapiro 2005).
The suburb of Shoreditch was attractive as a location for these early theatres because it was outside the jurisdiction of the somewhat puritanical City fathers. Even so they drew the wrath of contemporary moralists as did the local:
» 'base tenements and houses of unlawful and disorderly resort' and the 'great number of dissolute, loose, and insolent people harboured in such and the like noisome and disorderly houses, as namely poor cottages, and habitations of beggars and people without trade, stables, inns, alehouses, taverns, garden-houses converted to dwellings, ordinaries, dicing houses, bowling alleys, and brothel houses' (Middlesex Justices in 1596 cited in: Schoenbaum 1987: 126)
During the 17th century, wealthy traders and
Huguenot silk weavers moved to the area, establishing a textile industry centered to the south around Spitalfields.
By the 19th century Shoreditch was also the locus of the furniture industry; now commemorated in the
Geffrye Museum on
Kingsland Road.
However the area declined, along with both textile and furniture industries, and by the end of the 19th Century, Shoreditch was a byword for crime, prostitution and poverty. This situation wasn't improved by extensive devastation of the housing stock in
the Blitz during
World War II and insensitive redevelopment in the post war period, in which whole swathes of the old terraces were replaced by brutalist high-rises.
Administration
The medieval parish of
Shoreditch (St Leonard's), was originally part of the county of
Middlesex until 1889 when it became part of the
County of London. The parish vestry was the local unit of administration until the creation of the
Metropolitan Borough of Shoreditch in 1899 in the same area.
Shoreditch town hall can still be seen on
Old Street. It has been restored and is now run by the
Shoreditch Town Hall Trust. The Metropolitan Borough of Shoreditch was made up of three main districts in all:
Shoreditch,
Hoxton and
Haggerston. The whole Metropolitan Borough was incorporated into the much larger
London Borough of Hackney in 1965.
Victorian music hall and theatre
In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries Shoreditch was a centre of entertainment to rival the West-End and boasted of these theatres and
Music halls:
- The National Standard Theatre, 2/3/4 Shoreditch High Street (1837-1940). In the late 19th century this was one of the largest theatres in London. In 1926 it was converted into a cinema called The New Olympia Picturedrome. The building was demolished in 1940. Sims Reeves, Mrs Marriott and James Anderson all performed here; as well as programmes of classical opera and even Shakespeare, with such luminaries as Henry Irving. There was considerable rivalry with the West End theatres, in a letter from John Douglass (the owner, from 1845) to The Era after a Drury Lane first night, in which he says that "seeing that a hansom cab is used in the new drama at Drury Lane, I beg to state that a hansom cab, drawn by a live horse was used in my drama . . . . produced at the Standard Theatre in ....... - and so on- "with real rain, a real flood, and a real balloon."
- The Shoreditch Empire aka The London Music Hall, 95-99 Shoreditch High Street, (1856-1935). The theatre was rebuilt in 1894 by Frank Matcham. the architect of the Hackney Empire. Charlie Chaplin is recorded as performing here, in his early days, before he achieved fame in America.
- The Royal Cambridge Music Hall, 136 Commercial Street (1864-1936), was destroyed by fire in 1896, then rebuilt in 1897 by Finch Hill, the designer of the Britannia Theatre, in nearby Hoxton. The Builder of December 4 1897, said The New Cambridge Music Hall in Commercial Street, Bishopsgate, is now nearing completion. The stage will be 41ft wide by 30ft deep . The premises will be heated throughout by hot water coils, and provision has been made for lighting the house by electric light.
Sadly, none of these places of entertainment survive today. For a brief time,
Music hall was revived in Great Eastern Street, by the temporary home of the Brick Lane Music hall, this too, has now moved on.
A number of playbills and posters from these
Music halls, survive in the collections of both the
Bishopsgate Institute and the
Victoria and Albert Museum.
Today
Since post-war decline, Shoreditch has risen up to become a popular and fashionable part of London. Often combined with neighbouring Hoxton, the area has been subject to considerable gentrification in the past twenty years, with accompanying rises in property prices.
A former citadel of the working classes, Shoreditch and
Hoxton have been colonised by
Boho yuppies and the artistic set who have turned former furniture warehouses into loft apartments and made
Hoxton Square the centre of contemporary bohemia.
Curtain Road and
Old Street are notable for their clubs and pubs which offer a variety of venues to rival those of the West End.
Art galleries, bars, restaurants, media businesses, the building of the Hackney Community College campus and SPACe Sports Centre and an urban golf club are further features of this transformation. However, to the north, east and south, urban dereliction is still prevalent. Other traditions of working class entertainment survive on Shoreditch High Street where the
music halls of yesteryear have been replaced by the greatest concentration of
striptease venues in London (Clifton 2002). Also, further south on
Commercial Street prostitution is still rife (Taylor 2001: 61).
Notable local residents
James Burbage - Tudor actor and impresario: built The Theatre; buried in Shoreditch church.
Richard Burbage - Actor in the Lord Chamberlain's Men, Shakespeare's own Company. Renowned for his performance of Shakespeare's greatest roles: Hamlet, Richard III etc. Buried in the church.
Hetty King a famous male impersonator of the Music hall, was born here. Her father, William Emms was a local comedian known as William King.
Marie Lloyd - Born in Shoreditch, where she made her debut in the local music halls. Commemorated in the name of a local pub, where the Cockney songs she made famous ('My Old Man' etc) are still sung by the locals, to this day.
Christopher Marlowe - Elizabethan dramatist lived in Norton Folgate, the southern continuation of Shoreditch High Street, and wrote plays for the Shoreditch theatres.
Matt Monro - Singer (Born Terence Parsons on December 1st 1930) Dubbed "The singers singer" and "The British Sinatra") Famous for singing the 1st James Bond 007 hit "From Russia with love" and "On days like these" from the film "The Italian job"
William Shakespeare - lodged in nearby Bishopsgate and wrote and performed plays for both The Theatre and Curtain Theatre. A small chapel in Hollywell Street commemorated his association with the area, but was destroyed in World War II. A pub sign that claimed that he drank in the White Horse on Shoreditch High Street has recently been removed.
William Sommers - Henry VIII's jester; buried in Shoreditch church.
Richard Tarleton - Elizabethan comedian. Shakespeare's Yorick is believed to be a homage to his memory. Buried in Shoreditch church.
Barbara Windsor comediene, film actress and modern 'soap' star, was born here.
William Fairman, the radio presenter, has lived in Shoreditch since 2001.
Damien Hirst artist, was key to the redefinition of the area's art scene in the 1980s and 90s
Tracey Emin also member of YBA scene still lives in nearby Spitalfields
Alexander McQueen, fashion designer, was resident for several years on Kingsland Road in the same period
Hoxton Tom McCourt, influential in the late 1970s and early 1980s mod and oi/punk scenes and founder of the band, the 4-Skins born in Shoreditch in 1961
High above 38 Great Eastern Street, a painted stone wall made the claim "The Old Blue Last. The First House Where Porter Was Sold. Truman Hanbury, Buxton & Co. Entire". This 1700 public house (rebuilt 1876) was said to be the originator of London Porter, a beer, popular in the 18th century and peculiar to London, that's no longer sold, but evolved into Guinness.
Education
» For details of education in Shoreditch see the Hackney article
Transport
Nearest places
In 2005 funding was announced for the East London Line Extension which would extend the existing line from Whitechapel tube station bypassing Shoreditch tube station (which closed in June 2006) and creating a new station titled Shoreditch High Street at the site of the old Bishopsgate Goods Yard which was demolished in 2004.
Bethnal Green
City of London
Clerkenwell
Dalston
Hoxton
Haggerston
Islington
Finsbury
Spitalfields
Nearest stations
Liverpool Street station
Moorgate station
Old Street station
Shoreditch High Street railway station (opens Jun 2010)
Disused stations
Shoreditch railway station
Shoreditch tube stationFurther Information
Get more info on 'Shoreditch'.
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