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Evening Standard
Evening Standard
Comment
Andy Beill

Talking Point: Where is London’s coolest area to live?

Hackney’s house prices have become unaffordable for many young Londoners

(Picture: AFP via Getty Images)

The word on the street is Hackney is no longer cool. Or at least, that’s the word according to a recent article in The Times, which says the borough is no longer the “grotty, arty, party central” it once was.

It says the “influx of creatives” who helped form the ‘Hackney hipster’ image, having already been priced out of Islington, are now finding the east London neighbourhood to be long past gentrification and above their budget.

London’s fashionable east end is now apparently to be found the other side of Stratford, in Forest Gate. With the opening of the Elizabeth line, its transport links are undoubtedly cooler than Hackney’s overground service. It’s also said to have reasonably priced houses for starting a family. Cool.

South of the river, Deptford is also offered up as a place to fulfil the needs of young Londoners (*the cool ones, obviously) – such as craft beer and pizza. Both still abundantly available in Hackney, as it happens.

Other cool successors to E8 suggested by The Times are somewhat further afield, if you fancy a move to Dundee, Glasgow, Swansea or Worthing.

But surely London has more attractive areas than Forest Gate and Deptford alone. As for what The Times thinks of “Hackney’s demise”, those of us who live here might just be too cool to care.

Where is London’s coolest area to live? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below for the chance to be featured on the ES website.

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