F. H. W. Sheppard (General Editor)
Spitalfields is well-known for the handsome silk-weavers’ houses in and around Spital Square, Fournier Street and Elder Street, with their distinctive weavers’ garret workshops. The greater part of this volume is devoted to a detailed account of these houses. The area’s principal monument — Nicholas Hawksmoor’s masterpiece, Christ Church, Spitalfields (1714–29) — is also studied in detail, and its complex building history explained, making use of the then recently-discovered archives of the Commissioners for Building Fifty New Churches. In addition, the volume takes in the adjoining suburb of Mile End New Town, an area of eighteenth-century origin, largely rebuilt in the late nineteenth century, and at the time of writing undergoing extensive redevelopment for public housing. Spitalfields Market, and the well-known brewery of Truman, Hanbury, Buxton & Company, are also described.