Comments on: Fran May’s Brick Lane

By: Marcia Howard

Marcia Howard — Sun, 28 Sep 2025 20:41:41 +0000

So so impressive.

By: nicholas borden

nicholas borden — Sat, 30 Aug 2025 20:38:31 +0000

great human spirit!

By: Bernie

Bernie — Fri, 29 Aug 2025 10:29:37 +0000

Well, Andy, a synagogue needs a minion. A minimum of ten worshippers joining in the service. And with the changing population that characterises the East End, ten Jews present daily for the morning service may well be unattainable now.

In my teenage years, the 1960’s, I sometimes used to go to Brick Lane on Sundays (I had an aunt living at 60 Wilkes Street). And sometimes I took my camera too. But either through ignorance or poverty I did not, in those days, have a decent light-meter and so my photos were rarely up to scratch, unlike those seen here, which are perfectly exposed and also well-framed.

By: Paul Rennie

Paul Rennie — Fri, 29 Aug 2025 08:17:52 +0000

Fran’s photographs provide a vivid reminder of the old Brick Lane. A world that I glimpsed, in the early 1980s, and just as it was beginning to disappear…
The pictures remind me of Bill Brandt’s own social photography in his book, The English at Home (1936), and in Moholy-Nagy’s book about London street markets, also from 1936. This work inspired a whole lot of very interesting home-front WW2 photography…not least by Lee Miller etc.
More recently, Brandt’s book has inspired Martin Parr.
If you are interested in this kind of photography, I recommend The Social Eye of Picture Post (1972), and essay by Stuart Hall that describes the political and cultural imapact of these images.

By: Kate Bacon

Kate Bacon — Fri, 29 Aug 2025 06:33:01 +0000

Thanks for sharing Fran May’s images, I’m so glad Bill Brandt advised her to keep all her student work – the East End of the 70s has entirely disappeared….

By: ANDY

ANDY — Fri, 29 Aug 2025 06:22:52 +0000

Isn’t it interesting that as the East Ebd became gentrified the kind of people you see selling things and Club Row I knew was no more .

Plus down and outs were a noticeable part of our scenery .
Recently ,I saw Enforcement Officers move them on , paid by the Council and encouraged by local shopkeepers .

Whatever has become of the childhood I knew ?

Even the Synagogue I knew and grew up with is permanently closed .

By: Chris Savory

Chris Savory — Fri, 29 Aug 2025 05:29:41 +0000

Great article.All brick lane articles are part of the East End fabric!