Relational States of Dalston

What’s the social value of Dalston’s Cultural Quarter?

In 2017, Hackney Council published a strategic masterplan proposal to redevelop the Dalston Cultural Quarter identifying the sites and homes of existing cultural, creative, and social organisations as development sites. The community outcry which followed, revealed the limitations of the institutional knowledge in relation to this cluster of socially produced and much-valued spaces.

It was within this context that, in collaboration with Hackney Council, we set out to investigate the significance of key stakeholders in Dalston town centre. The final output, a large format drawing, 3.5m wide by 2.5m high, visualising and anlysing the web of relations and interdependencies of the urban actors and their wider impact, became part of the evidence base studies for the Draft Dalston Plan and Local Plan 2033, adopted in 2020.

Keywords: social value, existing city, urban transformation, socio-spatial relationships, spatial production, agents of change, interdependencies, relational mapping, redevelopment, urban replacement, displacement.

Impact: 
Draft Dalston Plan and Local Plan 2033, adopted in 2020.

Links:
• London Plan 2033
• Dalston Draft Plan 2023
• Project Report

Publication
• DALSTON! - who asked U?!

WHO WAS ABOARD?

Collaborators:
Blanka Hay - London Borough of Hackney 
Lizzy Bird - London Borough of Hackney 
Cory Defoe - London Borough of Hackney
David Williams - Bootstrap Charity
Gunther Jancke - Bootstrap Charity

Research Participants: Age UK, Cafe Oto, Bootstrap Charity, Dalston Square Tenant & Resident Association, Eastern Curve Garden, EartH, Forest Road Youth Centre, Hackney Cooperative Development, Hackney CVS, Hackney Pirates, Ridley Road Market, Rio Cinema, Tropical Isles Carnival Youth Group, Vortex Jazz Club, V22.

Researchers:
Carsten Jungfer - Aboard and UEL
Fernanda Palmieri - Aboard and UEL

Co-researchers:
Angelle Dimech, Dalcimaira Nunes Cardoso, Julia Skiba, Kiesse Andre, Marianne Gallagher, Nelton Bordonhos Barbosa, Nisha Anwar.

Support: Hackney Council, Bootstrap Charity, and University of East London.

Status: complete (2018-2019)

This project was an extension of the teaching work we do at University of East London.

Students aboard:

UEL BA Architecture design studio - Unit A - academic year 2017-2018:

Year 3: Aaron Williams-Grant, Abdulaziz Ghbaya, Angelle Dimech, Dalciamaira Nunes Cardoso, Daniel Kiss, Kiesse Andre, Makinde Otesanya, Marianne Gallagher, Nelton Bordonhos Barbosa, Yasmine Pala.

Year 2:  Ben Roder, Daniella Marchant, Delrich Biyoulou, Israa Salim, Julia Skiba, Kurt Arenas, Luciana De Souza, Lyes Hamidi, Mouniratou Traore, Nisha Anwar, Omar Harrak, Ying Pang.