Pic: The Gentle Author
The future of Spitalfield’s historic London Fruit & Wool Exchange site will be decided in in a meeting of Tower Hamlets Council on Tuesday.
Community groups launched a petition against the regeneration project, contracted by the City of London Corporation to private developer Examplar in 2010.
Spitalfields Community Group, numbering 120 residents, oppose the demolition of the pre-war Fruit & Wool Exchange building as well as of Barclays Bank and Gun Public House and Dorset Street.
The Community Group also opposed the closing of Dorset Street, which played host to Jack the Ripper’s final murder in 1888, and encouraged its reopening with shops and restaurants.
Member John Nicolson said: “The Fruit & Wool Exchange is a building from the 1920’s and they want to smash it down. We object on a number of grounds. We think their designs are very ugly, inappropriate and lumpy.”
The group claims the petition, which has raised over 200 signatures so far, is the biggest public petition from Spitalfields against a demolition.
But developers say the project maintains the character of the building, retaining the original façade with new restaurants and offices built on the site.
Examplar’s Maxwell Shand said: “The London Fruit & Wool Exchange building will be demolished, but only behind the façade, which will be retained and put back to its original design and refurbished. We’ve been working very hard to preserve the view.”
Under the proposals, a new pedestrian street open to the public, will run through the development to connect Artillery Lane and Bell Lane with Brushfield Street and Old Spitalfields Market, replacing the currently inaccessible service road.
Tower Hamlets Council said the project will “contribute to the enhancement of vitality of Spitalfields and the immediate locality.”
People moving back in is what Spitalfields needs, according to Nicolson. He said: “All they want to do is build offices. We want shops and restaurants, retail and space, not offices. We need to reintegrate.”
“I’m not an opponent of modern architecture, as long as they build something better, something exciting. But their design is mediocre.”
Pic: The Gentle Author
Built in 1929 to handle an influx of produce through east London’s docks after the first world war, and designed by Sydney Perks, the Exchange features elaborate glass ceilings, a grand staircase and a network of basement tunnels that served as bomb shelters during the Blitz.
Nearby Dorset Street, slated to close under the plan, was a notorious slum which played host to the fifth Jack the Ripper killing in 1888.
If the plans are approved, the new building could be complete by 2015.
Local residents do not “oppose the refurbishment of the pre-war Fruit & Wool Exchange building”.
The plan by Exemplar Properties is to DEMOLISH the London Fruit and Wool Exchange, not refurbish it, as reported. Similarly, the Barclays Bank and The Gun Pub. All that will not be demolished by Exemplar is the face of the Exchange building on Brushfield St while all the other facades on Crispin, Commercial and Dorset Streets PLUS all the rest of the huge 1929 Fruit & Wool Exchange building (and Bank and Pub) will be bulldozed.
This is not a “regeneration project” either. Regeneration is just developer speak for demolition. The Exchange is a significant building in East End history and should not be demolished. It should be restored/refurbished in its entirety, and converted to flats and shops. That is true “regeneration” – and that is what the hundreds of petitioners are signing up to.
I’m John NIcolson. and I was interviewed for this piece. I did NOT say that locals oppose the ‘refurbishment’ of the Fruit and Wool. I said we opposed its DEMOLITION. Refurbishment is restoration. We support refurbishment but that’s not what Exemplar are offering and their spokesman Maxwell Shand doesn’t understand the word.
Exemplar’s plan, so we are all quite clear, is the eradication of Dorset Street (inaccessible because Exemplar have chained it closed), together with the complete demolition of the Fruit and Wool, the Gun pub, and Barclays Bank.
Councillors vote on Tuesday. Their choice will be whether to support 500 locals or the developers and planners. The choice is clear.
To both commenters above: thanks for bringing that to our attention. The copy has been corrected to say you oppose the “demolition” (as appears to be the case) and we apologise for the oversight.
Mr. Nicolson: if you consent, I would like to quote your comment in the story itself, as it expresses your case very clearly.
Hi Laurence.
Yes I’m happy for you to quote my comments. You might be interested to know that 355 people have now signed The Spitalfields Community Group petition bringing the total number of objections to more than 600 – the largest in Spitalfields history. In fact Tower Hamlets planning office say they are having trouble coping with the volume of objections reaching their office. Which makes me wonder even more why they are recommending demolition to councillors.
The ‘inaccessible service road” you mention in the article is Dorset Street, a street laid out in the 17th century road which the developers want to wipe from the map by building on top of it. The reason it’s “inaccessible” incidentally ?,is because the developers have chained it closed to stop people walking down it. In true Orwellian fashion they now claim it’s redundant because no one uses it!
Finally, I’m quoted as saying the proposed building is ‘lumpy’. However that wasn’t my word. That was the word used by Exemplar’s architect to describe his own building. He also said he was only “working to a brief” (the architect’s equivalent, I suppose, of “I was only following orders”). Hardly a ringing endorsement of a building he wants us all to have to look at daily……