Centenarian Alie Touw has lived in this country for over half a century and made Spitalfields her home in recent decades. Yet if circumstances had been different, or if Alie had followed her father’s ...

I don’t know how it happened!’ declares centenarian Alie Touw, shaking her head and raising her hands with a smile of mock bewilderment if you ask the secret of her longevity. ‘I have so many things ...

I have known Paul Rothe’s Delicatessen & Cafe in Marylebone Lane for as long as I can remember. Back in the late sixties and early seventies, my mother used to travel up to town from Putney with me ...

Today I launch a crowdfund to publish a book of the magnificent portraits of WOMEN AT WORK taken by Spitalfields Life Contributing photographer Sarah Ainslie since 1992.

Sarah celebrates the contribution of female labour in exuberant portraits that capture the passion and struggle of the working life. Drawn from Sarah’s personal archive and her sixteen years as ...

William Kent’s arch in the grounds of the Tudor House, Bow, in 1900 with its attendant statues, as illustrated in the first volume of the Survey of London by CR Ashbee (Image courtesy Survey of London ...

People often ask where they can find authentic Bengali food in Spitalfields and I have found the answer in Oitij-jo Kitchen, a women’s collective who run the catering operation at Rich Mix Arts Centre ...

There is a quiet cemetery where you may find yourself the only living soul other than the grave diggers. It is East Ham Jewish cemetery. Amongst the graves is one Barnett Cohen, my Uncle Barney. He is ...

One blustery day, I took the train up to Waterbeach outside Cambridge to visit Alan Shipp, Hyacinth Grower who cultivates two hundred and forty-three different varieties of this favourite flower, ...

Today I thought you might take inspiration from these recipes – culinary and medicinal – from Thomas Newington‘s book that he wrote in 1715 while in domestic service in Brighton, illustrated with wood ...

Artist and collector, Sean Caton, currently has an exhibition of his authentically surreal photo-collages at the Bookartbookshop, 17 Pitfield St, Hoxton, N1 6HB, until 8th May, coinciding with the ...

This weekend we launched our crowdfund and have raised £2,714 towards our target so far. Click here to support our crowdfund to publish Sarah Ainslie’s WOMEN AT WORK Sarah took these black and white ...