The stitch revolution gives old fashioned skills a hipster edge pic: Misato

Crochet is cool, backstitch is back and embroidery is en vogue– so you had better get yourself up to speed.

EastLondonLines spoke to Claire-Louise Hardie, aka the Thrifty Stitcher, who for two years has run sewing classes for beginners and upwards from her studio in Shelford Place, Stoke Newington.

“My biggest surprise has been how different all my students are. I’ve had young professionals looking to escape the tedium of a computer based office job, lots of new mums wanting to get into a more sustainable lifestyle, people looking to learn a new hobby and even several men with a new business idea.”

After spending her teenage years crafting her own outfits to fit her petite figure, Hardie’s first job after college was as a freelance costume designer. However, the recession led her to take her passion towards teaching.

“I read some articles on how sewing was no longer taught at schools, and having been asked by many colleagues and friends to help them learn to sew, I realised that there really was a gap in the market.”

And she insists that, with a bit of persistence, there’s really nothing to it: “There’s never been a beginner that has left with an unfinished project. The leap from being scared of the sewing machine to feeling confident is very easily achieved in one session.”

Her classes range from day sessions for complete beginners, where they will make a simple cushion cover, to intermediate classes where the finished product is a skirt or shift dress. She also runs alterations masterclasses, and ‘SOS sewing surgeries’ which allow the student to tackle a specific sewing task that they have been itching to complete.

“It takes a couple of attempts to learn a new habit, but once it’s in there, the sky is the limit. Having to rely on others all the time to do little jobs is not only awkward, but can be time consuming and expensive. It’s liberating being able to have so much freedom with clothes, once something is worn out, you can cut it up and make into another object.”

Barley Massey, who teaches sewing, alterations and ‘textile upcycling’ classes from her studio, ‘Fabrications’, on Broadway Market, agrees: “I think everyone has the capacity to learn to sew. With a patient teacher and willingness to practice, the ability and fun will soon follow!”

“I teach the art of mending and repair, and also alterations and revamping, giving people the skills to revive old favorites or transform new finds from charity shops or vintage items. It is a really valuable life skill.”

But this is more than just make-do and mend: savvy east Londoners are increasingly looking to DIY design as a way to get unique, bespoke items at a fraction of the designer price tag.

Hardie said: “Vintage fashion has had a huge resurgence in the last couple of years, and being able to alter clothes has become a valuable skill. Women are wanting to stand out from the crowd more, and customizing clothes or making your own means never walking into a party wearing the same as someone else. Being able to sew means being able to express yourself in the way you dress.”

With disposable income to spend on clothes dwindling for many, it is no surprise that we are seeking out quality rather than quantity. The Primark boom is well and truly over; and it is not only the questionable quality of low cost, mass-produced garments that is a concern, but also the ethical implications.

“The recession has made us look at how we spend our money. It’s no longer desirable to buy lots of “disposable” fast fashion. Many of us are thinking about how and where our clothes come from, and there is a hidden cost to fast fashion, the labour force is often badly paid, that hidden cost is something that many of us no longer want to pay.”

Something lovingly crafted by hand is also the perfect way to get a unique and personal gift without breaking the bank.

Massey said: “In buying handmade you are getting something really unique, produced with love and craftmanship. Handmade objects create an emotional attachment with the user so are more likely to be kept and treasured. They are conversation starters or future memories.”

It is not only clothes that the people of London are crafting; making your own gifts and trinkets is an increasingly popular way of getting something special without breaking the bank. Rosie Short and Fumie Kamijo run workshops from their Brick Lane studio where children and adults alike come to sew their namesake ‘Bobby Dazzlers’ – brightly coloured, customised soft toys of all descriptions.

“We both started making dolls from our illustration books we made while we were studying at Camberwell college of Arts. We simply wanted to make our 2D characters alive. It was quite fun to see and touch what we made.”

“We set up about 6 years ago selling lots of bits, but then the dolls took over. They are definitely popular with adults as well as children; everyone enjoys it and gets really into making their own Bobby Dazzler. We often receive pictures of things they have made at home after the workshop.”

“You don’t have to be an expert – if you’re patient and don’t worry too much about how neat it is it can be easy. These days, lots of people are looking for unique products. Our dolls are a true original!”

So what are you waiting for? Go forth and stitch.

People are rediscovering how enjoyable and satisfying it is to make your own, feel productive and exploring creativity. It is great to pass on the skills and witness people’s confidence grow in the realisation that they can too! Also I think there is a movement of people who want to step away from the same old same old, mass produced, badly made unethical fast fashion.

Contacts:

For more information, to download free patterns or to book one of Claire-Louise’s classes, see www.thethriftystitcher.co.uk or follow @thriftystitcher.

For details on Bobby Dazzler workshops, or to buy ready-made dolls online, see http://www.theworldofbobbydazzler.co.uk.

For classes at Fabrications visit the calendar at http://www.fabrications1.co.uk

We asked east Londoners where the best places to stock up your sewing box are, and these were what you recommended:

Our Patterned Hand, Broadway Market, E8 www.ourpatternedhand.co.uk

Dalston Mill Fabrics, 69-73 Ridley Road, E8 www.dalstonmillfabrics.co.uk

Miss Libby Rose, 33 Greenwich Market, Turnpin Lane SE10 www.miss-libby-rose.co.uk

Lewisham & Deptford Sewing Machines, 181 High Street Deptford SE8 http://www.sewingmachinesuk.co.uk/deptford.php

If you're going to spend £8 on a cocktail, do it somewhere exciting pic: Ambernambrose

Slip down a side alley off Tower Hamlet’s Bishopgate and you’ll find yourself outside a brightly lit, ’80s themed brunch cafe. Enter, casually, and approach the counter. When asked for your order simply state: “I’m here to see the Mayor.” If all goes to plan, you will be directed to the door of a white SMEG fridge. You’re in.

Through the appliance and down some stairs is a dimly-lit bar. Dark woods cling to some walls, while plaster flakes from others. Vintage posters and trinkets rendezvous with candles and hanging lamps, giving a fleeting feeling that SMEG fridges may be exempt from the conventions of the space-time continuum.

Henri, the mastermind behind the secret bar, “The Mayor of Scaredy Cat Town”, explains: “The bar came from a variety of ideas. I have a couple of friends who live in New York, and there are a lot of good cocktail bars.”

He mentions one place in particular, La Esquina Corner Deli in New York’s SoHo. Customers enter the eatery, tell the waitress they have reservations, and are led through the ‘employees only’ door, via a kitchen, and into an underground bar.

“There was nothing like this in London,” says Henri.

And so, in May last year, The Mayor of Scaredy Cat Town opened to the public. Well, to the members of the public in the know.

Eight months on, similarly quirky bars proliferate in east London. “There are definitely more, and also more cocktail bars,” says Henri, “cocktail bars lend themselves well to this type of scenario.”

“This type of scenario” is a modern renovation of the speakeasy. These venues – immortalised in Scarface, The Great Gatsby, and countless other films and novels – experienced a revival in their country of origin in the last decade but are only now infiltrating the backstreets of London.

In 1919, the 18^th Amendment to the US Constitution outlawed the sale and manufacture of alcohol. Yet the following decade is ubiquitously known as ‘the roaring twenties’. Androgynous women, drink in hand, passing through the smoky haze of a covert, jazz-filled basement present themselves when the phrase is uttered. The multiplicity of social upheaval in the prohibition era is encapsulated by the speakeasy.

Cocktails are a most diverse genre of drink, allowing modern speakeasies to create innovative menus invoking their chosen era and atmosphere. This microcosm of rebellion against ‘normal’ drinks is completely in sync with our imagined ‘roaring twenties’.

Henri recommends the Rosie and Gin at his establishment: “It tends to be the one that sells most, maybe because it has unusual flavours. It’s harking back to that desire for cocktail bars doing different things, and not relying too much on classic drinks.”

Yet, speakeasy has almost become a carry-all term for any bar deviating from the standard formula.

Lounge Bohemia has occupied the same Shoreditch premises since 2007, but regularly finds itself alongside fledgling bars in the ‘speakeasy’ section of London review sites. Proprietor, Paul Tvaroh, refuses to label his bar in this way: “I don’t care what other bars are offering or not offering – it’s up to the customer to decide whether they like what we offer.

“Basically I wanted to create a bar where you could be confident you could take your mate who had just got back from a three month trip around the world and you could discuss it without shouting over a DJ, without going to the bar and having to fight for a drink and then losing the space where you’re sitting.”

For Paul, the unique drinks are the framework on which his bar is built. He says: “We are known as a cocktail lounge and we do special molecular mixology, which means things aren’t always what they seem.”

Then again, the ethos of the bar and its strict appointment-only policy has created an air of mystery in line with our mythologized conception of the speakeasy.

These bars provide an escape, some excitement, a realistic venue for clandestine liaisons. For those who have ever spent an entire evening drinking in Wetherspoons, or forked out three hours wages for a mediocre-at-best cocktail in a slick, ‘city’ establishment, the new wave of alternative drinking holes is thoroughly refreshing.

Mind you, it’s not cheap. But, if you’re going to drink an £8 cocktail, you may as well do it in a genuinely interesting place.

Why not try:

The Mayor of Scaredy Cat Town – Breakfast Club, 12-16 Artillery Lane, E1 7LS

Lounge Bohemia – 1 Great Eastern Street, EC2A 3EJ

Callooh Callay Bar – 65 Rivington Street, EC2A 3AY

Danger of Death – 202 Brick Lane, E1 6SA

The Dead Dolls Club – 145 Well Street, E9 7LJ

The NightJar – 129 City Road, EC1V 1JB

Worship Street Whistling Shop – 63 Worship Street, EC2A 2DU

Pic: Tillie Cox

Inspired by the success of previous designer and good cause collaborations, Hackney Council have commissioned some of London’s design talent to create bags for them.

The canvas shopping bags will be given to those who collect enough tokens from market stalls and independent shops. Every pound spent gets you one token, and you will need ten to redeem your bag.

The project is in a long line of similar collaborations: Uniqlo, Topshop and Marc Jacobs have all sold clothes for charity projects. There is also Anya Hindmarch’s ‘I’m Not a Plastic Bag’ canvas shopping bag, which sold out of stores nationwide in under an hour, going on eBay for hundreds of pounds a pop. The project was about raising awareness of an issue; in that case the number of plastic bags we use and then chuck away to landfill. Hackney Council’s latest drive to get people visiting its markets, as part of its ‘Love Hackney, Shop Local’ campaign, is on a much smaller scale.

Designers Mark Fast and William Richard Green are responsible for the first wave of bags up for grabs, which can be found this weekend at Ridley Road and Hoxton markets. Discussing his motivation for getting involved, Green explained: “I’ve had my studio in Hackney for 3 years so feel part of the community, and as a small business myself I really understand the driving force behind the campaign.” Two further bags by Atalanta Weller and Simone Rocha will be available in September.

Last weekend saw the first bags going out to visitors of Broadway and Chatsworth Road markets in the east London borough. By lunchtime, the 500 canvas totes given out from a small council trailer had gone. Stall holders were all surprised, if not slightly bemused, by how many people had inquired about the tokens. Anabela Osan, who works on a cake stall, said she couldn’t believe how soon her vouchers went.

Inés Sordo, 21, who lives in fashionable Shoreditch, had read about the bags in the council’s newsletter. Though she periodically visits Broadway market, she had come down specifically that day to get a William Richard Green bag, a designer she likes but can’t usually afford. She explained: “Unlike normal designer collaborations which tend to be for big charities, I like that 100% of my money is going to stall holders. I love Broadway market, it’s an important part of the neighbourhood”.

Like Hindmarch’s bag, the environmental factor is also important in this project. Feryal Demirci, Cabinet Member for Neighbourhoods for Hackney Council, explained that the bags were not just a means to get people to the markets, but also a way to encourage sustainable shopping: “reusable bags for shoppers to use instead of plastic bags”.

The bags tap into the modern day conscience perfectly: save the environment and the British high street in one go. As shoppers at Broadway market stashed freshly baked bread, packages of smoked salmon, olives and all the other treats that complete a lazy weekend shopping trip into the canvas bags, it was clear that another successful designer collaboration had taken place. Though naturally in this trendy part of London, there was no accompanying frenzy.

You can find the bags at Ridley Road Market on February 3 and Hoxton Market on February 4.

Pic: Leon Brocard

Dining at Sheba restaurant in Brick Lane for the first time, the vegetarian Vindaloo I had ordered turned out to be the spiciest Indian food I had ever eaten. This was odd, considering I am Indian and had certainly had my share of spicy food.

The Vindaloo is most certainly an Indian dish, but its spice quotient has become exaggerated in Britain. In fact, Indian food in Britain – served in every Indian restaurant down the road or around the corner – is not very Indian at all.

Most ‘Indian’ restaurants have chefs from other countries in the subcontinent. They may be Bangladeshi or Pakistani or Indian, but more importantly, they are British citizens who have never had the experience of cooking Indian food in the Indian way. The result of their work is not the creation of Indian food, but Anglo-Indian food.

Thankfully, there are several restaurants that do feel the need to employ chefs from India so that they can cook up original curries. Some restaurants also import their ingredients from India, all in the pursuit of authenticity.

Pic: Taste of Kerala

Aside from the Chicken Tikkas and the Bombay Aloos – the latter entirely unheard of in India – the food that is lesser known comes from South India. While North Indian food typically consists of meat and potato gravies to be eaten alongside naans, the cuisine of south India includes rice batter crepes (Dosas) and steamed rice cakes (Idlies) that are usually eaten alongside vegetable lentil soups and chutneys.

Punjabi restaurants serve authentic north Indian food, but these are rarely located in east London, with the exception of Punjab58 in Stoke Newington. This is why Brick Lane’s restaurants would be the best bet in the area for anything that closely resembles north Indian food in terms of taste.

The hub for South Indian food along the east London Line is Croydon, with its large south Indian and Sri Lankan migrant population. Chennai Dosa opened its Croydon branch in the area five years ago, and the franchise provides a sumptuous all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet consisting of every popular south Indian dish. If you are not the kind to stuff yourself in the morning, the lunch buffet offers similar choices.

Mini idlies with Sambhar (lentil and vegetable stew) is perfected here, as is the famed Masala Dosa – a thin rice crepe wrapped around potato curry.

Further down London Road, Taste of Kerala serves dosas as well, but to cater for their Sri Lankan customers. It is a dish that originated in the subcontinent – the Chicken biryani – that is the most popular dish. Manju Sajial, who runs the restaurant, says: “To celebrate the day of harvest in Kerala – Onam – we offer Sadyas, which is a spread of vegetarian food from the region served on a banana leaf.”

The Puttu Kadala – rice with a side dish of curry and the Avial – vegetables prepared in coconut and yoghurt would transport anyone to the taste of God’s own country, as Kerala is often called.

Pic: deepzm

Not too far away, on Lower Addiscombe Road, there is a restaurant with a 22-year-old legacy in providing Croydon with the best Indian food. The Banana Leaf has an award-winning chef and a never-empty restaurant to boast about. Manager Tony Abraham tells me: “About 80 per cent of the customers are English.” The Chicken Chettinadu and meat specials are the most popular with this audience, Abraham says. Their resident chef Thirumugam Sundaram , who moved to the UK in 2002 , is credited with preparing masala-laden cuisine originated in the Chettinad region of Tamil Nadu state in South India. The coconut rice and the okra curry are also certain favourites with vegetarians. The restaurant even serves the seafood that is unique to the state of Goa.

Being an Indian, I had my doubts before I placed my order at Chennai Dosa. Would it be too spicy, like in Brick Lane, or would it be adjusted to suit the English tongue? The manager at Chennai Dosa, Mayyappan, gives me the best news: “Most of our customers love our food just the way it is, so we don’t have to change the spiciness of it.”

Chennai Dosa

239-241 London Rd

Croydon, Surrey

CR0 2RL
0871 971 4757

Taste of Kerala

305 London Road

Croydon

CR0 3PA

020 8683 4477

The Banana Leaf

7 Lower Addiscombe Rd

Croydon, Surrey

CR0 6PQ

020 8688 0297

Stop and search at Nottingh Hill Carnival Pic: belkus, flikr

Statistically, it shouldn’t take long to find somebody who has been subject of a police stop and search – one in 17 black people in Tower Hamlets have had this experience. Yet it was depressingly predictable when the first person asked admits that yes, he is one of them.

“It was demeaning,” said Francis Johnson, 27, a youth worker from Bethnal Green. “Looking back now, I suppose we did look intimidating. Walking round in a big group – just chilling and doing our thing, but with tracksuit and hoodies up … but you shouldn’t be searched because of just that”

His thoughts come just a week after new Met Chief Commissioner, Bernard Hogan-Howe, announced that there needs to be a “radical overhaul” of stop and search tactics, with new limits on Section 60 searches – when someone can be stopped without ‘reasonable suspicion’.

The reforms will include a 50 per cent reduction of the number of times senior officers can authorise section 60 searches, and will aim to focus on stopping people suspected of violent offences, rather than minor drug offences such as possession of cannabis.

Stop and search has been widely criticised in the past by organisations such as Open Society Justice, Human Rights Watch Liberty and Stopwatch, which have voiced concerns about the disproportionate use of stop and search against ethnic minorities.

The policy is considered to be one of the key causes of the 1981 Brixton Riots, and has been pointed to as one possible factor in the spread of riots across Britain 20 years later. Interviewees in the Guardian’s ‘Reading the Riots’ research [link] described regular and degrading searches, with one saying it made them feel “not part of this society”.

Met figures from Oct 2010-Oct 2011 show that black people in London can be up to eight times more likely to be searched than a white person. In Croydon, for example, more black people were searched month on month than white people, despite the population of white people in the borough being five times greater. The arrest rate from searches is shockingly low – in Hackney last year it was never higher than 10 per cent. There are similar figures across other boroughs.

Johnson, who’s mother comes from Cameroon and father from Jamaica, is surprisingly philosophical about his past experiences – he hasn’t been searched for some years now and seems to attribute this to positive changes in his life. Smartly dressed, well informed and evidently passionate about his work, which often goes unpaid, he is reluctant to point to prejudices in the police force as to the reason why he used to get hassled.

“Now that I look back on it, I was just acting up. No one likes to get stopped – its not nice, but at the same time you act up when it happens. There are times when I feel the police may abuse it, but there are times when I feel it’s necessary, but to define the two is a grey area.”

However, Kamaljeet Gill, a member of the pressure group StopWatch – part of the Runnymede Trust – is adamant that people like Johnson should not have to make excuses for the reasons why police target certain demographics.

“I don’t think we should require that communities change the way they dress or behave in order to avoid getting excessive attention from the police.

“Some young people we talk to accept it as part of their daily life and some become angry, but there’s no dichotomy between these two things – they’re both negative reactions and damaging to communities.

“A reduction in stop and search will help to reduce tension between communities and the police, but there’s other things to be done.”

Scrutiny of Section 60 searches is just one aspect of the problem. Under the police and criminal evidence act (PACE), officers are only required to have  ‘reasonable suspicion’ when they search someone.

“In the past the grounds for ‘reasonable suspicion’ have been, shall we say, lax or generous,” explains Gill.

“We’ll have to remain vigilant that these measures are put in place – we need to properly use the regulatory measures that exist.”

Duwayne Brooks, a Lib Dem councillor for Lewisham and friend of the late Stephen Lawrence, has been vocal for years about the destructive nature of stop and search on communities. Not surprisingly he is very unforgiving of the police: “The fact is the police have been doing a shit job – we’ve known that for years, it’s a fact. But we’ve got to look at why it’s not working.

Whether Hogan Howe is sincere or not is irrelevant – we want our streets to be safe. But it should never be a skin colour issue.”

Like Gill, Brooks explains that proper monitoring is crucial to preventing future abuse of stop and search. He argues there should be local groups where people who have been searched can go to register their experiences;

“Every borough should have effective checks and monitoring. People in their own boroughs need to act. Without checks, police can do what they want.”

The impact of the proposals will depend on the motivation behind the reform; some might see them as a genuine effort from the police to engage with ethnic minority groups, others as simply a pragmatic response to the threat of expensive and humiliating legal challenges.

With no mention from the Met of improving the ethnic disproportionality surrounding the use of Section 60, and PACE searches still raising eyebrows, it is likely that it will be some time before finding someone in London who has been subject of a police stop and search becomes the time consuming endeavour you would hope it to be.

Pic: AlexRan

The brutal dog attack that tore away the ear of a six-year-old girl in a park in Essex this week has once again highlighted proposed changes to the Dangerous Dogs Act. Opinion in Lewisham is deeply divided, as residents desperately fight to keep their loved ones safe, both children and pets.

Not much legislation has been as widely criticised as the Dangerous Dogs Act of 1991. The controversial law has been accused of failing both the dogs and their owners, with 6,000 reported dog attacks in 2011.

The new Dog Control Bill, currently awaiting a second reading in the House of Commons, could mean that, in future, owners can be prosecuted only for their dog’s deeds instead of its breed.

This would make it legal to own former “dangerous dogs” such as the Pit Bull Terrier, the Japanese Tosa, the Dogo Argentino, and the Fila Brasileiro.

That is good news for dog owners such as Joy Jones, who lives in Deptford with her Pit Bull Terrier Buster – which attacked her and tore away the skin of her arm some years ago.

The incident has not changed Jones’ determination to keep the adopted Pit Bull alive. Even owning the dog is illegal today, but Jones hopes the proposed new legislation will make it legal again.

Jones said she supports the new bill because it puts the responsibility on the owner instead of the dog. She added: “Aggressive, problematic dogs are always the ones that have been treated badly or been neglected.”

Buster, for instance used to be a dangerous dog before she adopted it three years ago. “She was only skin and bones, and had deep scars after abuse when I found her,” Jones said.

However, she knew that if she reported the dog to the authorities in Lewisham it would be seized by the police and put down. Consequently she begged the owner to sell her the dog instead. Because of the amount she was offering the owner reluctantly agreed.

However, he did warn her that it was an “angry status dog” that only knew how to fight and attack; something Jones personally experienced in the months after she received it.

“One time he bit me and tore away the skin on my arm,” she said, adding that the greatest pain was knowing how badly the dog must have been treated for it to act so aggressively.

“Dogs simply want to please their owners, and if the owner is a nasty person, his dog will be nasty and aggressive as well,” she said.

However, three years later, Buster has put his harsh past behind him. Running around the green in Deptford Park the former dangerous dog looks both healthy and at ease. “He is a happy dog now,” Jones concluded.

But not everyone thinks the dog should be allowed in Lewisham. On the other side of the park is Marie Stuart, 69, who regularly walks her small terrier in the same area. She said she stops short every time she sees a Pit Bull.

Stuart said: “I know some boys in this park that train their dogs to be cruel and I really don’t like to be around such dangerous dogs.”

In her opinion, the new act will only make it easier for the wrong kind of people to buy the wrong kind of dogs.

“I see no reason for keeping these potential murder weapons amongst us,” Stuart said. She wonders how abolishing a law that bans the most dangerous breeds is supposed to make the public any safer.

The second reading of the new bill is set for March 30. If the bill completes all stages it will become law and replace the 1991 act.

Some names have been changed.

Pic: Raziye Akkoc

Swing music greets you as you enter The Takeaway Shop, Amy Lord’s interactive art project. A gallery and educational space in one room, it brings together the art of bookbinding and bookmaking with the history of Deptford. Here you can make a book, have some tea and learn about what happened in an area rich with past delights and drama.

“I found loads of relics around Deptford and wanted to know where they had come from. People would tell me snippets about Deptford. They knew about the Russian Tsar living here and the author of King Kong being brought up here,” said Lord, 26, from Lewisham way.

From murder to bread riots, from the New Cross station fire in 1844 to tea and coffee merchants, Deptford’s full historical splendour is on show. But Lord’s project is not just about what she has found.

“Ideally I want people to bring photos I can copy and scan so the archive grows over time,” she explained.

With me were two freelance illustrators. Nick Marsh, 24, from Bow, got stuck in with the glue gun and some green and purple fabric. He said: “It’s a lot of fun. It gives you an excuse to play, and it’s nice to vent creativity.”

Cutting up pictures to put in his book, Richard Baker, 25, from Clapham explained why he came to the Takeaway Shop: “I moved to London about two months ago and wanted to get involved in more creative activities and meet some creative people.

“It just seemed pretty cool, to get involved and learn about the history of London.”

Funded by Arts Council England and IdeasTap, the artist’s project began to take shape in September last year: “I was seeing Deptford X [a contemporary visual arts festival from July to September] around the corner and I came to something here at number82.

“I’d been looking for a space to do a pop-up thing for a while and at the empty shops in Deptford, but no matter how many letting agents I spoke to, they said, ‘no I can’t get you in touch with the owner’.”

Originally from Newcastle, Lord moved to Lewisham a year ago having lived elsewhere in London. She studied theatre and performance design at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts and has been interested in art since she was a child.

“I used to make a lot of mood-boards and things like that. My mum was generally quite crafty with me and we used to make puppets.”

The Takeaway Shop is based at number82, an independent project venue that offers exhibition space as well as development and education programmes. They also provide support for creative projects like Lord’s.

She hopes to do more workshops at schools after the project ends. It will serve up its last session on Friday, so catch it while you can.

Details:

The Takeaway Shop is open until January 27, 10.30am to 6.30pm on weekdays, 12-5pm on Saturday and Sunday.

It is open until 8pm on Friday as part of the South London Art Map tour. Email the artist at amy-lord@hotmail.com or book sessions online at www.thetakeawayshop.eventbrite.co.uk.

For more information about Lord and the project, visit www.amy-lord.com.

Chinese New Year celebrations, Pic: Laurence & Annie

As the Chinese New Year draws near, EastLondonLines took to the streets to find out what local Chinese residents hoped the particularly auspicious year of the dragon would bring to China.

“What I really want is for China to be more democratic,” says Chun Yang. “Perhaps this sounds unrealistic, but I am 23 years old, and I haven’t voted once in my life. I never hear about how and where I can vote, and no-one wants to talk about it.”

Yang, a Goldsmiths student studying a Master’s in Media and Communications is just one of many students and residents living in east London who hope this year will not only be a particularly lucky year, but one that will bring many changes to China.

The year of the dragon is believed to bring good fortune, prosperity, and independence throughout the coming year. According to Singapore news site, Straits Times, the year of the dragon is also expected to bring a baby boom, for many Chinese people regard having a ‘dragon baby’ as especially lucky.

The opinions of local residents showed a distinct divide in perspectives, not only between university students, but also between students and local residents.

While Nancy Lan, 23, from Lewisham and waitress at Fishy Business in Brockley, hoped for  “society to become more stable, and for the economy to get better,” Freddie Fei Wang, 25, Goldsmiths student studying Image and Communication, favoured a more conservative perspective: “I wish for there to be no more complaints from Chinese people about their own country,” he said.

Many Chinese students opted for rather Eurocentric and perhaps ideological changes to the running of China, including: the right to speak out without worry, more educational and economic development, and the right for every Chinese citizen to benefit fully from the medical system.

However, there were also other rather unexpected suggestions, including calling for recycling schemes to be organized in rural areas, and hoping for Chinese people to be more willing to donate their organs – a wish that is unlikely to come to pass due to religious and mythological beliefs that are embedded in Chinese culture, where one’s body must not be damaged after death for fear that something bad will happen in the afterlife – yet it is still an intriguing wish.

But where opinions differed most, were the thoughts of Chinese residents who had left China to reside in England, and who had therefore loosened their connection with their homeland.

Ying Miao, 36, works at Tian Fu Supermarket in Deptford and moved to England over eight years ago to search for work. She said: “I don’t wish for more power, but for the right to speak to the whole world on what is best for China. Many countries have some opinions of China, some right and some not. I hope we will have the right to choose what happens this year.”

The idea that ‘China knows best’, contradicts the views put forward by other students and residents who have only recently moved to England, and seem to see China in a different light.

However, what is really called to our attention, is the way thoughts are affected by how individuals choose to identify themselves – for one resident, this could not be more true.

Ngoc Ma, 40, who is half Chinese and Vietnamese, and a shop assistant at Viet Hao Supermarket in Deptford told ELL that he was unable to comment on what he would like to see happen in China this year because he no longer identifies himself with his Asian roots.

“I have lived in England for 30 years now, so it is hard to say because this is my home” he said. “I don’t look back at China or Vietnam as my home, because I have been here too long. This is where I was brought up, and where I spent my childhood.

“For me personally, I wish for luck, prosperity, good health, and that everything will work out in the New Year.”

Pic: Soy of the North, Flickr

If you only had one song to express your love, what would it be?

Valentine’s Day is just three weeks away and this year EastLondonLines wants your help.

We want to know what song you are most attached to when it comes to love: feelings, memories, anecdotes – we want to hear about them. Do the lyrics make you feel you can fly? Does the music take you back to the moment you first met? Or does it heal a broken heart?

Tell us what song expresses your love and why?

Send up to 150 words on the song that expresses your love to news@eastlondonlines.co.uk (subject: My Love Song).

Submissions close on February 10, 2012.

And remember, as High Fidelity’s Rob Gordon says: “Using someone else’s poetry to express how you feel … is a delicate thing.”

Scrap metal, Pic: neufcent9 (Flickr)

A wave of low-level metal theft is blighting Bethnal Green – and affecting individuals and businesses, as Michael Pooler discovered.

It was a classic case of ‘I told you so’: coming home from a pre-Christmas drink my flat-mate warned me not to leave my bicycle outside our building – even if chained up with a strong steel lock and braided metal cable to secure the wheels.

The next morning his portent was proven partly right. While the frame and wheels were still intact the handlebars were gone – removed with tools and likely to be sold as scrap metal.

The caretaker of my block says it is nothing new: “There are drug addicts who hang around this estate. They will take anything unless it is nailed down. When the [council] flats in this block were empty, they squatted them and stripped all of the copper piping and boilers. They sell it for scrap and get a few quid if they’re lucky.”

This means Tower Hamlets homes cannot let out the flats without paying to replace all of the plumbing work.

He tells me that thieves even once tried to steal the metal communal bins but were foiled when scrap merchants alerted the authorities.

What happened to my bike was not an isolated incident.

The rise in iron and copper prices – fuelled by demand from developing countries like China – means that scrap, which is smelted down and reused, attracts a premium. In Bethnal Green this has resulted in a constant current of petty metal theft, concentrated around the area between the high street and railway station.

A1 Car Care garage, located beneath the railway arches, is one business that has felt the cost of such criminality. Thieves made off with lead from a roof and recently one of the taxis they hire out had its exhaust cut off – the second time this has happened.

“It will cost three to four hundred pounds to replace and it means the driver is out of work,” says owner Fikret Hassan. “They must have cut it off with a hacksaw, it’s the only way you could get underneath without a jack. It is diabolical.”

Indeed pilfering catalytic converters in order to extract the valuable platinum they contain is lucrative business these days, says the manager of a scaffolding firm with operations across south and east London who didn’t wish to be named.

“We have had the catalytic converter stolen from one of our work vehicles, a 4×4 Toyota, when the guy parked it outside his house one evening. They know what they are doing – they take it for the precious metal.

“While they sell it for £300 at a scrap yard, the part can cost up to £2,500 to replace. The delivery time means we lose that vehicle for four or five days and with it work.

“From speaking with others it seems to be happening everywhere. It is a very serious crime and not enough is being done about it.”

Houses facing the arches have also been targeted. Like many others in his street, the lead roofing on the bay window of Soleman Hussain’s home was stripped around a year ago.

“At first the water leaked in but I can’t afford to fix it, it would cost around £200,” he explains.

He points to a drain on the street, gaping open without a cover: “They took that about two weeks ago but they [the council] still haven’t come to fix it.”

The thieves’ audacity even extends to daylight robbery.

“You see them walking past in the middle of the day with shopping trolleys full of the stuff,” says Neil, who runs a sports trophies shop nearby.

As if to confirm this, moments later I see a man hurriedly pushing a bicycle laden with a metal gate. His direction: one of the scrap-yards under the arches.

Serrif Farmer, owner of Solis Launderette, recounts the desperation of thieves:

“A while ago people went into the toilet at the back and took a small length of copper pipe. I don’t know why, it couldn’t be worth much.”

Some people point the finger at the local scrap merchants, who they say accept stolen wares. I called two dealers in the area to hear their side. One did not answer the listed phone number, while at the other, an employee said the boss was ‘away for a few weeks’ and that he could not answer any questions.

Others argue the council and police are not doing enough. Yet the current state of the law means that the authorities’ hands are tied in what they can do, says Inspector Gary Anderson of Tower Hamlets police.

“A problem [in crime prevention] is that antiquated legislation allows scrap merchants to still operate on a cash-in-hand basis, without the requirement for any ID [of sellers] or the obligation to keep a record of vehicle registration numbers.”

In November the police launched Operation Ferrous, a Metropolitan-wide drive to flush out metal theft. This has seen the force targeting scrap merchants through spot-checks as well as stopping and searching vehicles believed to be laden with illegally acquired metal.

“We can check that vehicles have the relevant documentation and proper haulage licenses,” Anderson explained. “But as it is very difficult to know whether the metal has been illegally obtained, we urge people to lock up anything metal or valuable and UV mark their possessions.”

“Since the start of the operation at least two premises operating as scrap metal dealers in Tower Hamlets have closed,” says Anderson.

“We cannot say for certain that they closed due to [Operation Ferrous], but it happened in the weeks following our visit. The purpose of the operation is a tightening up of scrap yards in the borough and cutting off the destinations where people can go to sell stolen metal.”

The police call on the public to dial 999 to report on any suspicious behaviour such as people pushing shopping trolleys containing metal objects.