Shoreditch Types...

For one reason or another I sometimes find myself in the Shoreditch area of London. When I first knew it decades ago, it was a gloomy, Dickensian labyrinth of tight cobbled lanes and alleyways connecting shadowy Victorian railway arches, decaying warehouses and dormant manufacturing workshops. Like other pockets of forgotten and unfashionable London at the time, it had a distinctly eerie ghost-town atmosphere. Now of course, it is far, far from that. A super-fashionable ‘artistic’ quarter, the factories and shops have long given way to ‘NY-style loft apartments’ and bars, galleries, bars and more bars encourage the streets to teem with revellers almost 24 hours a day. Not really my cup of tea. But the strenuous sartorial efforts of some of these ‘bohemians’ still amuse. To misquote Garrison Keilor: “Hoxton Square - where the women are strong, the children average, and the men dress like village idiots...”