Hipsters and spikes: mapping gentrification and defensive architecture in Tower Hamlets
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- Methodology Geographical scale and focus
- Mapping defensive architecture: transect walk and mapping
- Collecting perceptions on gentrification and defensive architecture: surveys and semi-structured interviews
- Data presentation and analysis The more gentrified an area is, the more extensive the use of defensive architecture
- Table 1.
- Table 2.
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- The undermining of social cohesion by gentrification process/inherent to gentrification process leads to the implementation of defensive architecture
- Spitalfields: hostile public spaces and social exclusion promoted by defensive architecture
LSE GROUPS RESEARCH CONFERENCE PAPER 2013 – GROUP 5 Hipsters and spikes: mapping gentrification and defensive architecture in Tower Hamlets Robert Clark, Sofia Lesur Kastelein, Xinyang Li, Sally Park and Tatiana Pazem LSE GROUPS, London School of Economics and Political Science
We would like to express great thanks to Joe Lane, our supervisor throughout this project, to Leah Borromeo, for allowing us to interview her via email, and to Dr. Saxey and Dr. Gordon, along with the rest of the LSE GROUPS team, for giving us the opportunity to conduct this research. Abstract As London experiences extensive redevelopment, poverty and homelessness remain pressing issues. Public and scholars alike have given widespread attention to “gentrification” and debates around who benefits from redevelopment. Existing literature considers the role of defensive architecture in the context of securitisation of urban space, (Petty, 2016). Gentrification is understood as a social and economic change that produces ‘urban space for progressively more affluent users’ (Hackworth, 2002). Defensive architecture is an aspect of urban design intended to render public spaces ‘unusable in certain ways or by certain groups’ (Petty, 2016). This paper contributes a first attempt to ascertain a link between gentrification and defensive architecture, using a case-study to investigate the nature of the relationship between the two. It provides new empirical evidence, mapping defensive architecture, shops designated ‘indicators’ of gentrification and house-price increases in two wards of Tower Hamlets. It also looks for qualitative social effects of gentrification and their relationship to defensive architecture using questionnaires. The research then explores the ownership, usage and perceptions of the social space in which defensive architecture is located. It identifies the tendency of more defensive architecture being present in more gentrified area at the inter-ward level but not at the within-ward level. Also the presence of defensive architecture was found as being considered an uncomfortable reflection of social exclusion generated by gentrification, as well as lack of social cohesion between local government and people. Keywords: defensive architecture, gentrification, social exclusion, mapping
As London experiences extensive redevelopment, poverty and homelessness remain pressing issues. In this context, “gentrification” has attracted much attention and debate. There is consensus gentrification disproportionally affects the poor as they may be pushed out of the area – a report by the Institute for Children, Poverty & Homelessness (2016) suggests gentrification reshaped Manhattan and increased homelessness in New York City, while Atkinson and Bridge (2005) have linked gentrification with urban colonialism. Nevertheless, it is also argued that gentrification is a process of redevelopment which benefits all by drawing investment, increasing government revenues and improving infrastructure (The Economist, 2015). Analysing the impact of redevelopment becomes particularly pertinent to poverty and inequality when thinking about poverty as ‘social exclusion’ (Ludi and Bird, 2007, p.4) and considering gentrification ‘the production of urban space for progressively more affluent users’ (Hackworth, 2002, p.815) which results in ‘winners and loosers’(Colenutt in Porter and Shaw, 2009, p.69). This paper aims to examine the relationship between gentrification and social exclusion through ‘defensive architecture’ – defined by J. Petty (2016, p.68) as ‘structures … installed in spaces of public use in order to render them unusable in certain ways or by certain groups.’ This dynamic will be analysed in spatial terms via mapping, and in social terms through discourse analysis. Hypothesis 1: The more gentrified an area is, the more extensive is the use of defensive architecture. The corresponding methodological approach to this puzzle consists therefore in measuring the concentration of hostile urban designs between and within two wards in the London borough of Tower Hamlets. Evidence drawn from the field observations suggests a spatial relationship between gentrification and defensive architecture at the ward level. Although within wards the location of defensive architecture doesn’t exactly match the most gentrified areas, it does seem to follow a pattern. Hypothesis 2: The undermining of social cohesion by gentrification process leads to the implementation of defensive architecture. This second approach is interested in the perceptions of defensive architecture in relation to gentrification, as we expect the presence of defensive architecture to reflect the exclusionary nature of gentrification process.
Defensive architecture, whilst a widely known phenomenon in the public sphere which has been heavily reported on by the Guardian and other news sources, has received comparatively little academic attention. M. Davis (1992) was one of the first academics to report on this phenomenon in some detail, discussing urban space in Los Angeles during its’ attempts to gentrify in the 1990s. He begins to attempt to suggest a deliberate link between anti-homeless architecture and government attempts to promote ‘white collar colonialization’. Notably, he remarks in this work that gentrified areas have ‘comfortable and welcoming architecture,’ while defensive architecture is actually used in the surrounding areas to push out undesirable communities that may be ‘tarnishing the urban renaissance’. However, Davis makes no mention of defensive architecture that is not directly related to homelessness, such as anti-skateboarding devices or ‘pig’s ears’ (Image 1) (Petty, 2016). From a wider perspective, some research suggests a link between urban planning and social exclusion of the homeless community, explicitly bringing into the discussion the gentrification context. J. Greene (2014) studies the homeless politics of the British Conservative government between 1979 and 1993 and the containment of the ‘disruptive effect of visible homelessness to manage the mobilisation of collective dissent’. He argues the policies implemented ‘serve an important political imperative: to make the city attractive to mobile capital, tourists and the gentrifying middle class’. J. Goldberg (1994) observes a link between the arrival of homeless people and the offer of social services in the district of Upper West Side in New York. Responding to J. Goldberg (1994), N. Smith (1996) further remarks that urban policies tend to intentionally locate social facilities in low-income neighbourhoods, and qualifies this phenomenon as “Environmental racism”. Adopting a more philosophical approach, R. Sennett (1974, 1992) develops the concepts of the ‘Intimate Society’ , elaborating on the perception of the stranger as a threatening figure. E.M. Kramer and S. Lee (1999) on the other hand argues that the homeless is not considered as part of the society because ‘they do not appear in the collective memory of the group as a bureaucratic entity’. Being aware of the presence of the homeless provides the ‘insiders’ the feeling of being ‘secure in the normative system of interaction’. These two works, developing diverging but not incompatible theories for the rationale behind the marginalisation of homeless people, explore the definition of the public space in relation to social and thus political change. More recent work on gentrification and defensive architecture includes J. Petty’s (2016) discussion of the ‘London spikes controversy’, offering a useful explanatory framework to help understand the issue. Petty focuses on the public reaction to defensive architecture and provides a comprehensive review of all previous existing literature. However, he falls short of attempting to link defensive architecture to gentrification or attempting to explain the locations of such architecture. This article seeks to contribute is a more rigorous analysis of how gentrification links to a wider picture of defensive architecture in London by mapping both gentrification and defensive architecture in two specific areas of London.
Given the short time frame of the research period, this study focuses on rather small geographical area: the wards of Spitalfields and Bromley in borough Tower Hamlets. Of the recently gentrified three London boroughs of Newham, Tower Hamlets and Hackney, Tower Hamlets exhibited the greatest change in housing prices between 1995 to 2014, according to London Datastore, suggesting a sample area representative the gentrification process. Examining the same information within the borough, the wards of Spitalfields and Banglatown, and Bromley respectively demonstrate the most extreme changes and so were chosen a case studies.
Given the data available and the complexity of the gentrication phenomenon, the use of quantitative modelling would not produce robust results in attempts to establish a link between the presence of hostile urban designs and gentrification. Visual depictions of defensive architecture in the gentrification context appeared to be a particularly suitable methodology due to the close relation of urban designs and the use of space to this research. This approach is innovative as it does not use any proxy to quantify and pinpoint defensive architecture. To reduce the scope for subjectivity in counting defensive architecture, this research categorised it into 3 different types (‘bum-proof’ benches (image 3), pig’s ears and spikes (image 2)), and proceeded the fieldwork in groups of 2. (Furthermore, pictures were taken of architectural designs whose purpose was ambiguous.)
The research aims to understand whether defensive architecture is an effect and expression of the social exclusion inherent to gentrification. Ethical sensitivity required constant consideration in research decision-making processes due to the association of gentrification with social cleansing and homelessness. Most significantly, the idea of interviewing the homelessness – the most immediate victims of the defensive architectures – was overturned. Instead, collecting perceptions of defensive architecture and the gentrification process from residents and people working in the area offered an insight into the underpinning social climate and forces. A questionnaire consisting of two sections was designed; the first section aimed at architecture identification and opinions on it, while the second attempted to engage respondents with defensive architecture in a gentrification context. In Spitalfields and Banglatown, where defensive architecture is concentrated around two areas with specific and diverging features, the questionnaire was used as a prompt to conduct interviews and obtain more detailed information on residents’ views. A group of activists working on turning defensive architecture into hospitable spaces was also contacted. Although their response entails a certain bias, it nevertheless constitutes a part of the public debate and reflects the experience of these activists in observing urban design patterns and conversing with rough sleepers.
The findings from mapping gentrification and defensive architecture indicate that defensive architecture appears to increase with gentrification between wards but not within wards. Using land registry data on ‘lower layer super output areas’ it was possible to analyse the change in house prices of the respective wards and areas. Mapping the change in house prices between 2004 and 2014 revealed an average increase in house prices of 226% in Spitalfields and Banglatown, and 171% in Bromley-on-Bow. Mapping defensive architecture in the wards revealed defensive architecture in 22 sites of Spitalfields and Banglatown, while only in 9 of Bromley-by-Bow. Furthermore, Spitalfields and Banglatown contained 7 of the shops designated indicators of gentrification while Bromley-by-Bow had none. All of these results indicate a correlation between the presence of defensive architecture and the level of gentrification at a ward level. However, this correlation was not present within the wards themselves when divided into ‘Lower Layer Super Output Areas’ to further break down house-price increase. The sub-sections of wards that had experienced a greater increase in house prices over the last 10 years did not notably have more defensive architecture or more of the shops designated indicators of gentrification. These results support hypothesis 1 that the more gentrified an area is, the more extensive the use of defensive architecture at the inter-ward level, yet this is not true on a smaller, within-ward level. Naturally, this research is limited as it is not possible to confirm how representative two wards of one borough in London may be of trends in general urban design. Nevertheless, they remain valuable findings for understanding context-specific social change in Tower Hamlets, and local connections between processes of gentrification and the building of defensive architecture.
Figure 1. Maps showing gentrification and defensive architecture in Spitalfields and Banglatown and Bromley-by-Bow, wards in the London borough of Tower Hamlets Left: Increase in house prices between 2004 and 2014 in Spitalfields and Banglatown Right: Increase in house prices between 2004 and 2014 in Bromley-by-Bow  
Left: Defensive architecture in Spitalfields and Banglatown Right: Defensive architecture in Bromley-by-Bow   
Left: Shops designated indicators of gentrification in Spitalfields and Banglatown Right: Shops designated indicators of gentrification in Bromley-by-Bow  
Gentrification as both economic and social change not only affects landscape changes in terms of new buildings but also defensive architecture. In this section, social implications of gentrification reflected through defensive architecture will be discussed; process of social exclusion of certain groups of people in order to adjust spaces for the use of the perceived public. Surveys, semi-structured interviews and email contacts with an activist were carried out to find out whether and if so how defensive architecture can facilitate social exclusion as a product of gentrification.
Public spaces can be ‘hostile and fortified against certain groups’ and so promote particular ‘identities and behaviours’ that are specific to the area.(Petty, 2016:72) In other words, depending on the perceived public users of space, “public” spaces can have limited access. Since gentrification process involves a social aspect and supports a particular group (i.e. middle class) it can facilitate social exclusion with its less supportive nature towards other groups of people. Leah Borromeo, journalist and artist filmmaker involved in activist group BetterThanSpikes, argued that hostile architecture is “socially exclusive in nature”, given that it is only implanted in places where a perceived threat is present. On this note, it is worth considering social repositioning of homeless people in the context of gentrification. Gentrification is innately associated with an effort to create posh, ideally “world-class”, capital attracting places. Therefore, following the rationale behind revanchist city, it is often easily justified to stigmatize the powerless, the non-beneficiaries of gentrification, including the homeless. Interviewee 10 in Spitafields described the presence of homeless people in public spaces as “undesirable intrusion”, a “problem” that “unfortunately necessarily” needs to be solved. With such reasoning, interviewee 10 supported the role of defensive architecture. This reflects people’s perception that defensive architecture can serve the purpose of socially excluding homeless people, which arguably is a product of gentrification. On the other hand, interviewee 12 and 13 expressed their discomfort toward rough sleepers, describing the related phenomenon as a “problem”, but also a strong resistance against the idea of defensive architecture. They explained how the presence of defensive architecture undermines social cohesion by making both residents and the homeless uncomfortable. “I don’t see how it addresses the problem. It’s really nasty and doesn’t do anyone any good at all.” They identified rough sleeping as a social problem but saw defensive architecture as highlighting, not solving the perceived problem. Also, they evaluated public consultation, government’s effort to reflect opinions of people in devising and implementing schemes for urban change as being “rubbish” and merely doing the role of “PR”(public relations). They further expressed the prevailing sense of disconnection and lack of social cohesion in their neighborhood community. On social changes in Spitalfields, they commented: “(the government) Don’t really take into consideration how people use this place. (The social change) has nothing to do with how people feel.” Although interviewee 12 and 13 stressed difference between improvement of a place and pushing-out aspect of gentrification, they well pointed out the effect of social change on undermining of social cohesion. They felt excluded in the decision-making processes that made changes in places, which directly affected them. For them, defensive architecture reflects hostility towards homeless people, which makes everyone feel uncomfortable. Thus a relationship between social exclusion promoted by gentrification and defensive architecture is identifiable. Firstly, defensive architecture can reflect the revanchist nature of gentrification against those who are not identified as the mainstream public. Secondly for those who find the presence of defensive architecture aggressive, on the one hand it reflects the disconnection between government and people, and on the other hand it highlights uncomfortable social gap between residents and the homeless.
In Bromley-by-Bow, data has been obtained from questionnaires completed by 20 respondents. This data suggests some relationship between a degree of gentrification and the presence of defensive architecture, and frequent negative attitudes towards such structures. Despite having the lowest increase in house prices in Tower Hamlets between 1995 and 2014, 83% of respondents believed that the area has become less affordable, and 50% would consider moving out due to the changing affordability of the ward. Most respondents (58%) also recognised a change in the amount of defensive architecture in the last 5 years, a result tenuously indicating a possible correlation/causation relationship between gentrification and defensive architecture, something indicated far more strongly by the mapping of the borough. Just over half (60%) of questionnaire respondents in Bromley-by-Bow believed defensive architecture is aimed at homeless people and 45% of them disagreed or strongly disagreed with the implementation of such structures – with the most frequent reasons for this being that it was “dehumanising” or “unethical.” The majority of respondents (66%) who disliked the change in the architecture in the last 5 years cited similar reasons for doing so. Nevertheless, it should be noted that a large minority of respondents (40%) could not identify defensive architecture from the photos in the questionnaires, suggesting the negative impact of defensive architecture on social cohesion might not be as significant as we thought in the hypothesis. Further examination is needed to clarify this link.
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