London Is Still Here, But For How Long? October 2025

There has been a rise in chatter about London of late. It seems to have become one of the world’s cesspits — at least, that’s how it’s spoken of. The far right in particular seem to hold a special disdain for the city, convinced that to take any joy in the capital is to somehow endorse the melting pot that it undoubtedly is. I’ve lived here for most of my life, walking more or less the same six-mile radius the entire time. Adventurous? No. But you can take from that a certain devotion; I am, unapologetically, in love with London.

Yet the negativity permeates. I hear people groaning under its weight, claiming the city has lost its soul. Fraser Nelson recently wrote in The Times, “Violent, lawless, broken Britain? The facts tell a different story,” arguing that much of the narrative about national decline is perception rather than reality. Still, London, like the rest of us, has its troubles. But I don’t believe they’ll be solved by dismantling the very structures that made this place what it is.

My aggravation began, perhaps for what some might see as a trivial reason, when I read in the Guardian that the Prince Charles Cinema was under threat from catastrophic rent rises imposed by developer Asif Aziz. Aziz planned to build a hotel above the cinema, which stood inconveniently in the way of his new entrance. After a lengthy dispute, a 15-year lease was secured in favour of the cinema. Thanks in large part to its managing director, Ben Freeman, who took the matter public. Outrage followed, from cinephiles and ordinary Londoners alike.

The Prince Charles Cinema

We live in a hyper capitalist society, a bitter pill we’ve long learned to swallow, but this case perfectly illustrates developers’ ongoing obsession with tearing out the character of the capital to make way for WeWorks and, with grim inevitability, awful hotels. In doing so, they destroy precisely the kind of culture that their future hotel guests might have come to London to enjoy. Though quite frankly, anyone who chooses to stay in Leicester Square is a lunatic and probably there for the M&M’s shop, rather than to see a film in an establishment that Christopher Nolan cited as the beating heart of cinema - “Film culture in Great Britain is unthinkable without the Prince Charles.”

For now, we can breathe a sigh of relief: 140,000 signatures and public pressure saved it. But this is just the tip of the iceberg.

The MOTH Club

These stories are multiplying at a ridiculous rate. In January, the MOTH Club faced demolition to make way for.... you guessed it some exceedingly hideous flats. Over 19,000 people have signed a petition opposing the plan, but its future still hangs in the balance. Next up: Leila’s Shop in Tower Hamlets. Alongside five other shops on Calvert Avenue leading to Arnold Circus, Leila’s faces eviction or a 300% rent rise from the council this October.

Leila's Shop Taken From Their Instagram

Over the past twenty-three years, Leila McAlister’s café and shop have become a cornerstone of the community. The Friends of Arnold Circus even rallied residents to restore the park nearby, turning dereliction into a shared public space. There’s no question that Leila’s has been instrumental in this community-led regeneration. Yet despite local support, Tower Hamlets Council seems to be will-fully ignoring any value that isn't financial.

Meanwhile, Brick Lane is contesting the Truman Brewery’s plan for a large office block on its site, another blow to a corner of the city already under siege. Spitalfields has endured a steady creep of corporate slabs from the City, steel and glass at odds with narrow streets and old brick fabric. The Fruit & Wool Exchange and Norton Folgate once housed small local businesses; now they are vast offices with empty shopfronts. Local councillors rejected the schemes, yet Boris Johnson, as Mayor, overruled them in favour of the developers.

As the Save Brick Lane campaign notes, over the past decade the City of London acquired around forty leases in Norton Folgate, replacing much of the conservation area with sterile corporate boxes. It is an outdated economic model that may well falter in the wake of Covid and Brexit. Yet the appetite for glass towers continues. At Bishopsgate Goodsyard a vast scheme of offices and luxury flats looms, promising ten years of disruption and only a small share of genuinely affordable housing.

What’s clear is that many of those in power have little love for London. They seem blind to what makes people come here in the first place. It isn’t the millions of square ft of unused office space. It’s places like Leila’s. It’s the chance to see an independent film at the Prince Charles Cinema and discuss it over a Chinese. It’s walking down Brick Lane and breathing in history (and curry). It’s visiting Simpson’s Tavern — once a beating heart of hearty business lunches , now shuttered for a third year in another rent dispute.

Bellmans Auction - Each Piece Sold For At Least Three Times Over The Estimate.

Even the National Gallery, a museum I adore, has caught this disease of thoughtlessness. They recently auctioned off their gallery furniture — wonderful, comfortable pieces made in the 1980s — in favour of bland, uncomfortable benches. The reason? To save £80,000 in restoration costs. This from an institution just awarded £150 million by the Julia Rausing Trust. One might think they could have spared a little to preserve part of their own character.

We’ve become obsessed with growth and forgotten the purpose of it. Progress is fine, but towards what? Tear out community, beauty, and heritage and you empty the city of its meaning. London risks turning into a mausoleum of glass and steel, closed to the very people who made it. The homogenised, sterile, corporate glaze might quieten a few right-wing barkers and briefly paper over inequality, but it won’t mend a thing. London doesn’t need more towers; it needs care. Resist where we can; tend to beauty and community, even if it costs us a little “growth”.

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