After You've Gone: East End Shopfronts, 1988

Alan Dein's photographs of East End shop fronts were taken in 1988 when many Tower Hamlets streets were on the verge of dereliction. Alan, an oral historian and broadcaster, lived in Stepney at the time. He decided to capture the diminishing, decaying local shops on film, many of them relics of the area’s Jewish community. These oral history clips of former shop owners and customers shed light on life in the borough from the 1950s to the 1980s.

Oral histories
Recorded in spring 2012

Sheila Butt grew up in Great Eastern Buildings, near to the Truman Brewery, in the early 1950s. She recalls host of East End characters and places including Leon’s shop, Petticoat Lane, and the famous Prince Monolulu.