Wapping Equals London

London. The City of London. Docks and Markets. Import and Travel. Trade and Industry in its widest sense. London would not exist as the historic heart of Empire without its docks. Perhaps, without its docks, there would never have been a British Empire. Without its docks, London’s real-life markets for fish and meat, vegetables and flowers, would not have spawned the financial markets which powered it through the post-war years. Without its docks, London would not be the magnetic hub of Britain today. And the heart of London’s docks was Wapping.

I have begun my Wapping research with an excellent little book by a local GP called simply Memories of Wapping. It features excerpts from interviews with Martha Leigh’s patients, and others whose families had long histories in the area. It is indispensable for its 1925 map of the area which, when overlaid over today’s Google Maps equivalent, shows just how wet Wapping was. The largest docks and basins have been filled in and turned into the apartments Wapping is now famous for. Even the old News International buildings, which made Wapping famous again in the 1980s, have been demolished ready for the next chapter in Wapping’s fascinating story.

Wappings docks might be flats, parks and other recreational facilities now, but the history barely hides under this surface. Even looking at the map reveals that suspiciously precise, regular gardens are really filled-in docks. The wharves and jetties, if not preserved, are now pubs and restaurant terraces. The old East End cannot be erased so easily. The wisps of the past are forever trying to creep into the present.

Which is just as well, because from this spring, our Historic Wapping walk with Airbnb will be open to the public. We’ll take you backwards in time to uncover stories of commerce, murder, espionage and mystery. And, with the help of some local experts, we will bring ancient Wapping back to life. Yet as you would expect from our walks, we will not lose sight of the future either. Welcome to Wapping, 2018.