Interview with Marta: Why I Love Living in Hackney
Last week, we conducted an interview with Marta, a freelancer who has been working with us at KOMPAS. Marta is originally from Bulgaria but has lived in a variety of European countries. She’s currently a proud resident of Hackney, where she is housemates with our CEO, Tom. We asked Marta about why she loves living in Hackney, and where some of her favourite spots are.
Why do you love living in Hackney?
I love living in Hackney because it’s a bit rough but at the same time quite mixed. So, I think it’s an exciting place. It’s culturally mixed. It reminds me of places where I used to live, for example in the Netherlands and in Bulgaria. I kind of relate to it. It has the same vibe to the neighbourhoods I lived in. It’s a bit sad that it’s been gentrified because everybody is pretending to be super cool and hipster. But on the other hand, there are lots of things to do here. And it’s not extremely expensive if you want to go out, unlike West London.
What’s your favourite place to eat in Hackney?
My favourite place to eat is Blanchette. It’s a little tapas bar with a really good wine selection. Even though it had small portions and wasn’t cheap, I felt like giving my money, which is quite rare in London. A lot of places I’d be looking at the price and be like “oh we’re on a night out, I’ll pay for it, whatever” but this place, they had amazing service, good wine list, and the whole venue was really cosy, so you just wanted to stay there and chill.
If you wanted to relax or have a day off, where would you go?
I really like to go around and check out the secondhand shops, the charity shops, and generally just walk a lot because there are so many things happening. Living next to London Fields is really great because you can just go and chill in the park when the weather is nice with your friends.
Where do you like to go out?
I recently went to Total Refreshment Centre. I liked it there because it has different music style nights and they invite different DJs. It’s a venue that works quite late, but it’s not as big as Fabric. I don’t like Fabric or The Egg. It’s way too many people for me. I like TRC because it’s smaller, and it’s one of the places that work until 5–6 AM. You can stay there and not be pushed out at 2.
The other place is Brilliant Corners in Dalston. I really like it because of the way the venue is organised: you can eat and then they move the tables away and turn in the venue into a club. Last time they were playing disco-funk. One of my friends was DJ-ing, so it was really nice. Apparently, it’s really popular for its sound system. The guys who created the venue really put effort into that. One of the main reasons people go there is the sound system. I’m not a musician, but when you’re at a venue with a shitty system, you’d know.
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Originally published at KOMPAS Blog.
