Survey of London: Whitechapel Initiative

This project is an experiment in the creation and dissemination of urban history. It establishes a publicly collaborative website of the highest calibre dedicated to the history of the London East End district of Whitechapel. This website stands as a resource in its own right and also constitutes a base for a printed volume in the Survey of London series. Begun in the 1890s, the Survey of London was founded with a commitment to the advancement of social equality and solidarity through shared understandings of a common built environment. That commitment is now renewed in this digital initiative which draws on strengths that derive from the Survey's well-established approaches to topographical and architectural history. Across decades and disparate parts of the metropolis, the Survey of London has developed an inclusive approach to urban history, with social contexts strongly presented as crucial determinants of architecture. Regularly cited for its high academic standards, the series has long presented its comprehensive synoptic accounts of urban fabric in book form, incorporating assessments of demographic, social, industrial and commercial characters based in close investigation of archives and building fabric. The Whitechapel project is the Survey of London's first initiative from within the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London, and draws on the pioneering technological and public engagement expertise of UCL's Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis. The map-based website involves the public in research for and the drafting and compiling of the Survey's texts and illustrations. At the same time, the project maintains full commitment to the qualities and standards that have given the Survey its strong reputation for public-service scholarship. Undertaken in partnership with Tower Hamlets Local History Library and Archives, with support from Historic England, the Whitechapel Art Gallery, the East London Mosque and Wilton's Music Hall, the Survey of London's engagement with Whitechapel includes plans for newly catalogued archives, exhibitions and events such as walking tours, as well as for the publication of scholarship in journals and, in due course, in a Survey volume. A broadly collaborative approach to understanding the architectural expressions of Whitechapel's rich histories is an appropriate way to illuminate stories of housing, commerce, religion and entertainment, wealth and poverty, dissent, reform and conflict. Immigration is a primary historical fact, embracing over centuries German, Irish, East European Jewish and Bengali settlements. Whitechapel's history and present circumstances make it an excellent testing ground for the experimental formation of a public history from below with receptivity to both difference and universality in experiences of the built environment. The material that the website hosts ranges from contemporary photographs and records back to early views, maps and architectural drawings, on to newly synthesized archive-based historical accounts of building projects to oral reminiscences. Topography will serve as a gate for the presentation of personal experiences of buildings (housing, schools, places of worship and others) whether positive or negative - articulating changes witnessed, epiphanies had, or travails borne. Alongside the forces of capitalism, social and ethnic heterogeneity, religious diversity and vernacular energy are all manifest in the area's architecture. The Survey of London is largely about agency in the built environment; the aim now is to search more deeply for evidence of ordinary agency. With support from both academic and local communities, this project will be stimulating for British architectural and social history. No urban historical series has embarked on such a venture. It aims to be exemplary, setting a new standard not only for the future development of the Survey of London but for urban histories across the world.

The non-academic beneficiaries of this research will be:

1 - the London public at large
The project will give the public access to better knowledge about Whitechapel and its buildings, and an opportunity to engage with the production of history, so educating not just about the place, but also about historical methods. In the introduction of 1896 to the series' first monograph on Trinity Hospital in the Mile End Road the Survey of London's founder, C. R. Ashbee, wrote: 'We plead that the object of the work we have before us, is to make nobler and more humanly enjoyable the life of the great city whose record we seek to mark down; to preserve of it for her children and those yet to come whatever is best in her past or fairest in her present ... and to stimulate amongst her citizens that historic and social conscience which to all great communities is their most sacred possession.' Reinterpreted to address modern needs and sensibilities, the mission articulated by Ashbee is absolutely worth sustaining.

2 - local communities
Aspects of history that have remained hidden or known only to one group will be investigated and opened up, addressing subjects ranging from land tenure to religious worship within houses (from conventicles to chevda to house-mosques) to redistributions of housing (from slums to gentrification). The exchange of information is as important as, if not essentially the same as, new discovery. The history of the East London Mosque is a story of interest in its own right. It will have far greater resonance and wider societal value for being brought together with histories of earlier German churches and Jewish synagogues in its immediate neighbourhood. Events and exhibitions will build and reinforce this impact, as is described elsewhere in this proposal.

3 - heritage professionals, local authorities, architects and planners
The Whitechapel project will result in a vastly improved knowledge base relating to an area of London that is undergoing enormous change. The nature of this knowledge will range from overviews of numerous aspects of urban history to detailed building analyses that will unravel the origins of small sections of historic fabric. The Survey of London has long been recognised by planning professionals as a valuable tool. In support of the Survey's intended Whitechapel project the Greater London Authority's Heritage Advisor, Edmund Bird, has written: 'For both a strategic and a local planning authority, a comprehensive understanding of the evolution and character of the townscape of a particular area is a key component to its future planning and development. The Survey of London volumes certainly enrich and inform both our formulation of planning policy and our development management decision making.'

4 - local and family or genealogical historians
From archive-based accounts of building projects to oral histories, historic views and architectural drawings to contemporary photographs, material on the website will all be readily searchable by places or by names. Numerous short biographical histories will allow many little-known individuals to emerge from the condescension of history.

To conclude, the research undertaken for this project will by its nature perpetuate the Survey of London's long-standing public-service role as described in the 'case for support'. It fundamentally aims to broaden that base to engage with a wider and more socially diverse audience, supplying benefits of widely different kinds to diverse constituencies. Tower Hamlets Local History Library and Archives, English Heritage, and the East London Mosque have already expressed support for the project and a willingness to be represented on the advisory panel. The Whitechapel Art Gallery and Wilton's Music Hall are also supporters and committed to other more occasional collaboration.