Comments on: Dan Cruikshank’s Spitalfields Photographs

By: Christine Sharpe

Christine Sharpe — Wed, 24 Sep 2025 06:50:40 +0000

Your knowledge of Spitalsfield ,has been a great bonus in my ancestry search. My ancestors were the Duvall’s-French silk merchants and lived in at no.13 Elder street They fled to Holland and then crossed to Yarmouth.
They were very affluent it seems setting up residences in London and Ramsey,Harwich.

By: Linda Porter

Linda Porter — Sat, 02 Sep 2023 22:46:14 +0000

My father and his family lived in Princelet Street off Brick Lane. The houses were in decay, but I loved to wander the streets of Spitalfields during the 60’s and 70’s, on my way home from school, and admire the faded beauty of the peeling paint, and crumbling facades, whilst imagining the lives of people that had lived there in the past. Much to my mother’s dismay, I would mooch about Club Row and Brick Lane on Sunday mornings, then over to Petticoat Lane via Spitalfields. Dan’s photos transport me back to that moment in time. Whilst my grandparents house has been renovated in recent years, my old school, Central Foundation School for Girls in Spital Square, has not been so lucky! All that remains of the building is the school hall that is now a restaurant.

By: Christine Swan

Christine Swan — Thu, 03 Aug 2023 16:07:06 +0000

You don’t know what you have got, until it’s gone. It is very true of buildings and the environment. We don’t need to keep building from new. It’s a tragedy that so many of these historic buildings have been lost. As others have said, those folk who tried to prevent their loss have been proven correct. Elder St is a remnant of what once was, loomed over by the ugly monstrous towers of hipster Shoreditch.
By the way, and I am sure that your readers are aware, Dennis Severs’ House are fundraising for urgent chimney repairs. Please do help if you can. Maintenance of this type is essential and also expensive. Thank you.

By: Adele Lester

Adele Lester — Thu, 03 Aug 2023 13:34:59 +0000

Walked through Brushfield St and the then Spitalfields Market every day on my way to and from school (Spital Square). We didn’t appreciate those old buildings and the warm atmosphere of the market porters throwing us an apple as we stepped over the detritus of a busy day in the market. My grandfather and/or uncle picked up their supplies every morning at 4 am. They had a market stall in Watney St.

By: Cherub

Cherub — Thu, 03 Aug 2023 11:01:43 +0000

Sad that such lovely old buildings fell into dereliction and had to be demolished. When I worked at Spitalfields I used to like walking along Brushfield Street, it just seemed to have a nice feel to it.

By: Eve

Eve — Thu, 03 Aug 2023 10:11:34 +0000

Thank you, such a pity they couldn’t all have been lovingly preserved as was Dennis Severs’, instead of left rotting away – cursedly being so close to the City’s ‘high flyers’ backyard..

By: Bernie

Bernie — Thu, 03 Aug 2023 09:29:14 +0000

Those images resonate with me because my aunt Ray and my mother, Sarah, found refuge thereabouts in the early years of the 19th century. Ray and her husband, and growing family made their long-term home at 61 Wilkes St until the war made it expedient to move to Hendon. Even then Ray’s husband carried on his furrier’s business in the very glassy top floor. I think that the glass survived all the bombing, amazingly. So I remember visiting, and the brewer’s drays and the great horses in the street outside. And the voice-pipe and whistle by which uncle Wolf could communicate with his wife and children downstairs.

90 years old now; there cannot be many who still remember homes in that area as it once was. And I was born in a nursing-home nearby.

By: Gee

Gee — Thu, 03 Aug 2023 06:44:31 +0000

The group of young people who squatted, including Dan, were very much unsung heroes. Thanks for sharing his photos of a very different era