Adam: ‘This street has always been a good street because until recently there have never been restaurants, at least on this section.’
‘The street from my window is a street market with some shops + cafes. [It] has been empty of people and business for a long time. With non-essential shops, being allowed to open up in the past week or so, it struck me that the best item to “bag” would be a business card from a shop I can see from my window. So High Soho is a fancy-dress costume and jewellery shop and has been on the street as long as I have lived on it.’ July 2020
‘The one that bothers me the most is the developers who, with the connivance of city officials, almost always get their way despite local opposition to the tearing down of old buildings + replacing them with bland uninspired new architecture.’ February 2021
Adam is a Canadian in his late 60s, who has lived in London for almost forty years. He has been a ‘social’ tenant in a 17-storeyed council block in the middle of Soho since the late 1990s, when he was diagnosed with a debilitating illness. He is also registered as disabled because of problems with his eyesight. He has always treasured living in the centre of the capital with a huge variety of pubs, restaurants, theatres and cinemas right on his doorstep. However, over the past decade developers have turned his neighbourhood into a building site, and the new infrastructure has in turn led to a huge influx of tourists and shoppers. His block has been in the process of being renovated during six long years with residents having to endure non-stop noise and air pollution. Adam, therefore, really treasured the silence that descended on the capital during the first few weeks of the pandemic. However, this reprieve was short-lived as soon the construction workers and the endless drilling and banging returned. Moreover, as lockdown 1 eased, Westminster Council introduced an Alfresco Dining Scheme that transformed local streets into buzzing, boozing zones that fuelled noise and rowdy behaviour deep into the night.
