'Hoxton' (origin Hoc's farm) is an area in the
London Borough of Hackney, immediately north of the financial district of the
City of London. The area of Hoxton is bordered by
Old Street to the south,
City Road to the west,
Regents Canal on the north side and
Kingsland Road on the east.
Historical Hoxton
Origins
'Hogesdon' is first recorded in the
Domesday Book. Little is recorded of the origins of the settlement, though there was
Roman activity around
Ermine Street, which ran to the east of the area from the
1st century. In
medieval times, Hoxton formed a rural part of
Shoreditch parish. It achieved independent ecclesiatical status in
1826 with the founding of its own parish church dedicated to
St John the Baptist, though civil jurisdiction was still invested in the Shoreditch vestry.
Tudor Hoxton
By
Tudor times many moated manor houses existed to provide ambassadors and courtiers country air close to the city. This included many
Catholics, attracted by the house of the Portuguese ambassador,
[1] who, in his private chapel,
[2] celebrated the masses forbidden in a
Protestant country.
[3] One such resident was
Sir Thomas Tresham, who was imprisoned here by
Elizabeth I of England for harbouring Catholic priests. The open fields to the north and west were used for archery practice, and on September 22nd,
1598 the playwright
Ben Jonson fought a fatal duel in Hoxton Fields, killing actor Gabriel Spencer. Jonson was able to prove his literacy, thereby claiming
benefit of clergy to escape a hanging.
Hoxton contained public gardens that were a popular resort from the crowded city streets on holidays, and are reputed to have gained their name of
Pimlico from the publican, Ben Pimlico,
[4] and his particular brew.
''Have at thee, then, my merrie boyes, and beg for old Ben Pimlico’s nut-brown ale''.[5]
The gardens appear to have been situated near Hoxton Street, known at that time, as ''Pimlico Path''. The modern area of
Pimlico derives its name from its former use in Hoxton.
Gunpowder, treason and a letter
On the October 26th,
1605 Hoxton achieved notoriety, when a letter arrived at the home of local resident
William Parker, Lord Monteagle warning him not to attend the
Parliament summoned by
James I to convene on November 5th, because ... ''yet I say they shall receive a terrible blow, the Parliament, and yet they shall not see who hurts them.''. The letter may have been sent by his brother-in-law
Francis Tresham, or he may have written it himself, to curry favour. The letter was read aloud at supper, in front of the company of prominent Catholics, and then he brought it personally to
Robert Cecil at
Whitehall. While the conspirators were alerted, by the public reading, to the existence of the letter they persevered with their plot as their gunpowder remained undiscovered. William Parker accompanied
Thomas Howard, the
Lord Chamberlain, in his visit to the undercroft of parliament, where
Guy Fawkes was found in the early hours of November 5th.
[6] Most of the conspirators fled on the discovery of the
Gunpowder Plot, but
Francis Tresham was arrested a few days later at his house in Hoxton. A commemorative plaque is attached to modern flats on the site of Parker's house in Hoxton Street.
Almshouses and madhouses
By the end of the
17th century the estates were being broken up, and many of the existing large houses used as
mad houses, with
almshouses being built on the land between by City benefactors and
guilds. Hoxton House, for example, became a private asylum in
1695. It was owned by the Miles family, and expanded rapidly into the surrounding streets. Here 'gentle and middle class' people took their exercise in the extensive grounds between Pitfield Street and Kingsland Road. The only remains are by Hackney Community College, where a part of the house was incorporated into the school that replaced it in 1921. Askes almshouses were founded on Pitfield Street in
1689 from an endowment from
Robert Aske for 20 poor
Haberdashers and a school for 20 children of
freemen.
Hoxton Market, founded in
1687, was a once thriving market that lost its status to neighbouring markets such as those at
Bethnal Green and
Dalston. Student flats have now been built on much of the site. A small eponymous square remains.
The Victorian era and the 20th Century
In the
Victorian era the railways made travelling to distant suburbs easier, and this combined with infill building and industrialisation to drive away the wealthier classes, leaving Hoxton a concentration of the poor with many slums.
In Hoxton Street, a plaque marks the location of the
Britannia Theatre. This evolved from the former Pimlico tea gardens, a tavern and a saloon, into a 3000 seat theatre, designed by Finch Hill. Together with the nearby
Pollack's Toy Museum, it was destroyed in
World War II bombing.
Hoxton Hall, also in Hoxton Street, which survives as a community centre, began life in
1863 as a 'saloon style'
music hall. It remains largely in its original form, as for many years it was used as a
Quaker meeting house. There was also the
1870 Varieties Music Hall (by C.J.Phipps) in nearby Pitfield Street, this became a cinema in 1910, closing in
1941, and appears to have been demolished for housing in the
1980s.
In the former Vestry of St Leonard Shoreditch Electric Light Station, just to the north of Hoxton Market, is based
The Circus Space. Inside, the "Generating Chamber" and "Combustion Chamber" provide facilities for circus training and production. The building was constructed by the Vestry in
1895 to burn local rubbish and generate electricity. It also provided steam to heat the public baths. This replaced an earlier facility providing gas-light, located in
Shoreditch.
Gainsborough Studios were located in a former power station, in Poole Street, by the
Regents Canal. The film studios operated here from
1924 to
1951[7]. An historical plaque is attached to the building, a modern apartment block, that occupies the site since the studios' demolition in
2002. The plaque reads
:''London Borough of Hackney
:''The Gainsborough Film Studios 1924-1949
:''
Alfred Hitchcock,
Michael Balcon,
Ivor Novello,
Gracie Fields, “
The Lady Vanishes”, “
The Wicked Lady” worked and were filmed here''
With a new found popularity, parts of Hoxton have been
gentrified, this has inevitably aroused hostility among some local residents, who believe they are being priced out of the area. Much of Hoxton, however, remains deprived with council housing dominating the landscape.
Today, 'ShoHo' or 'Hoxditch'
Hoxton and
Shoreditch are often deliberately or unwittingly conflated though the
portmanteau designation "ShoHo" (or "Hoxditch"). The two districts have a historical link as part of the same
manor, and in the
19th century both formed part of the
Metropolitan Borough of Shoreditch. This was subsumed into the
London Borough of Hackney in
1965, but old street signs bearing the name still occur throughout the area.
Manufacturing developments in the years after the
Second World War meant that many of the small industries that characterised Hoxton moved out. By the early
1980s, these industrial lofts and buildings came to be occupied by young artists as inexpensive live/work spaces, while art happenings,
raves and clubs occupied former office and retail space at the beginning of the 1990s. The area became renowned for artists and the things they enjoyed doing. During this time the pubs on Rivington Street were the nexus for the
Young British Artist scene.
Curtain Road Arts was founded and
Joshua Compston established his Factual Nonsense gallery on Charlotte Road and organised art fetes on
Hoxton Square. Their presence gradually drew other creative people into the area, especially magazines, design firms, and
dot-coms.
By the end of the
20th century, Hoxton had become a vibrant arts and entertainment district boasting a large number of bars, nightclubs, restaurants, and art galleries. In this period, the new Hoxton residents could be identified by their obscurely fashionable (or "
ironically" unfashionable) clothes and their hair (the so-called "
Hoxton Fin", as exemplified by
Fran Healy of
Travis).
Hoxton (and Shoreditch) denizens have been satirised in the
satirical magazine ''
Shoreditch Twat'', on the
TVGoHome website, and in its
sitcom incarnation ''
Nathan Barley''. In recent years, Shoreditch and Hoxton have been home to pop musicians
Jarvis Cocker and
Future Sound of London,
fashion designer Alexander McQueen, and artists
Gavin Turk and
Jake and Dinos Chapman, along with actor
Gael Garcia Bernal. The focal point in the area is Hoxton Square, a small park bordered mainly by industrial buildings.
As property developers moved in to cash in on the area's trendy image, prices rose steeply. In response, the local council formed a not-for-profit corporation, Shoreditch Our Way (ShOW), to buy local buildings and lease them out as community facilities and housing.
Recently, Hoxton has been associated to some extent with the
New Rave scene, being referenced by the Guardian newspaper
[8] in connection with the scene, as well as in the lyrics of bands linked to the scene.
The extension of the
East London Line (completion in 2010), will again provide local rail access, which was lost when the Broad Street approach closed to services.
References and notes
1. ''The ambassador was possibly Anthony de Castillo, who was linked to the Tudor spymaster Francis Walsingham through the Portuguese double agent, Dr Hector Nunes. "Toleration" of the chapel may have been linked to this flow of intelligence.'' in Turmoil: The Abject Life of a Portuguese Alien in Elizabethan England, by Charles Meyers accessed: 23 Nov 2006
2. The Embassy Chapel Question, 1625-1660, William Raleigh Trimble, Journal of Modern History, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Jun., 1946), pp. 97-107
3. On 24th October 1568, the Portuguese Ambassador's chapel was searched for recusants by Raffe Typpinge of Hoxton. Raffe, and the Tipping family would subsequently feature in the arrest and death of Christopher Marlowe. (see Seaton, "Marlowe, Poley and the Tippings" in ''Review of English Studies'' [1929] os-V, p.273-287)
4. British History on-line, disagrees on this point, and considers the derivation ''lost in the past''; it is however probable that it refers to an individual.
5. Newes from Hogsdon (1598) in E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898
6. Houses of Parliament factsheet on event accessed 6 Mar 2007
7. Visiting Hackney accessed 10 May 2007
8. Rousing rave from the grave The Guardian Unlimited
Individuals associated with Hoxton
★
Alfred Hitchcock began his career at the
Gainsborough Studios
★
Reggie & Ronnie Kray - East End gangsters born in Stene Street Hoxton (1933)
★
Marie Lloyd -
Music hall star, was born ''Matilda Alice Victoria Wood'' here on February 12,
1870. The eldest of nine children. She, and her sisters longed to go on the stage, and haunted the local Royal Eagle Tavern, Music hall, on City Road (where their father also worked, as a waiter). Seven of her siblings went onto professional stage careers, adopting the surname Lloyd, apart from Daisy, who had a successful career as
Daisy Wood.
★
Lenny McLean, actor, bouncer, bare-knuckle boxer and 'hardest man in Britain' was born here
★
Jamie Oliver opened the original
Fifteen restaurant in Hoxton in 2002
★
James Parkinson (physician and researcher on
Parkinson's Disease, was a resident of Hoxton Square)
★
Abraham Rees, (editor and
Unitarian minister was a tutor at Hoxton Academy)
★
Mary Wollstonecraft (social reformer, writer, mother of
Mary Shelley, born and lived early years here)
★
Hoxton Tom McCourt , influential in the late 1970s and early 1980s mod and oi/punk scenes and founder of the band, the
4-Skins
Places of interest
''This list includes some Hoxton galleries that have moved to nearby
Shoreditch, some in
Bethnal Green. The Sho-Ho gallery scene is in constant flux, so the list is by no means complete, and many of the original Hoxton galleries have now moved further afield - as leases expire and gentrification takes its toll''
★
Victoria Miro Gallery 16 Wharf Road, N1 (private gallery in converted
Victorian furniture factory
★
Book Works 19 Hollywell Row, EC2 (art publishers)
★
Vertigo 62 Great Eastern Street, EC2 (private gallery in former ropeworks)
★
Bookart Bookshop 17 Pitfield Street, N1
★
Standpoint Gallery 45 Coronet Street, N1 (low cost workshop, studio and exhibition space)
★
Deluxe Gallery 2-4 Hoxton Square, N1 (private gallery)
★
White Cube 48 Hoxton Square, N1 (private gallery)
★
Dominic Berning First Floor, 1 Hoxton Street, N1 (private gallery)
★
Stuckism International 3 Charlotte Road, EC2 (eh, its a movement ...)
★
The Agency Gallery 15a Cremer St, EC2 (private gallery)
Haggerston
★
INIVA 6-8 Standard Place, Rivington Street, EC2
★
Vilma Gold now in
Bethnal Green (private gallery)
★ Modern Art now (apparently) in
Bethnal Green (private gallery)
★
T 1&2 Artspace Bedford House, Wheler Street, E1 (private gallery off
Brick Lane)
★
Flowers East 82 Kingsland Road, E2 (private gallery)
★
Wiebke Morgan Gallery 6 Cyprus Street, E2
Bethnal Green? (private gallery)
★
Century Gallery ACAVA, 1-15 Cremer Street, E2 (private gallery)
★
Geffrye Museum Kingsland Road, E2 (furniture & domestic life)
★
The Alpine Club 55 Charlotte Road, EC2A (exhibitions on mountains and climbing)
★
The Centre of Attention is a not-for-profit artists organisation, now in
Upper Clapton
★
Cell Project Space now in
Bethnal Green
★ MW Projects 43B Mitchell Street, EC1 (private gallery near
Old Street
★
Neon Gallery 117 Commercial Street, E1 (private gallery)
Contemporary Art Projects 20 Rivington Street, London, EC2A 3DU
''Most private galleries are free, but it is normally best to contact them first to check both the exhibition and if there is a need to make an appointment. The information here has been verified in October 2006''
See also
★
London art scene
Education
:''For details of education in see the
Hackney article''
Transport
Nearest places
★
Shoreditch
★
Haggerston
★
Dalston
★
Bethnal Green
★
Islington
★
Spitalfields
Nearest tube stations
★
Old Street station
★
Hoxton railway station (opens Jun 2010)
External links
★
Hoxton Hall Unique Grade II
★
listed building Victorian Music hall - now used for community arts
★
Where have all the cool people gone? The Guardian
2003-11-21
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