Tower Hamlets Art Project Bookshop

Tower Hamlets Art Project (THAP) began as part of a protest against an art project run by Thames Television called 'Eyesights' which commissioned artists from outside of the borough to create posters for display. Tower Hamlets Art Project was formed by local artists and community members. Supported by Thames Television and the Arts Council, THAP mounted a month-long 'Big Show' at the Whitechapel Gallery. The Basement Writers, the local worker writers' group, had a stall running throughout the exhibition. Inspired by this success, plans formed to launch a permanent bookshop in the borough.

There were no bookshops in Tower Hamlets at the time, although Centerprise in the adjoining borough of Hackney provided an example of what could be achieved.

First a bookstall was held at Whitechapel Market on Saturdays, selling secondhand books and local history publications made by THAP and Centerprise.

Then, the THAP bookshop opened in April 1977 in a modest building in Watney Market, stocking locally produced books, prints, and community newspapers. The new premises allowed for expanded community engagement, including guest readings by renowned authors such as Michael Rosen, Andrea Levy, and Jeanette Winterson. The bookshop specialised in local history, children's books, Bengali language books, worker writers' publications, and works by women and black writers.

THAP combined bookselling and publishing. Their books included local history, autobiographies of local people, poetry collections and other work such as Across Seven Seas and Thirteen Rivers: life stories of pioneer Sylhetti settlers in Britain by Caroline Adams (1987) which was the first book to explore the first wave of Bangladeshi migration to the UK.

With a stock of 12,000 titles, it served as an important cultural and educational hub for the East End community. By 1980, the bookshop moved again to a larger building in Whitechapel, rebranded as Eastside, under the leadership of Denise Jones and Richard Sylvester.

This legacy carried on with the creation of Brick Lane Bookshop.

Sources:

History page of Brick Lane Bookshop website [https://bricklanebookshop.org/history/, accessed 11.7.2025]

Radical Bookshops Listing, Radical Bookshop History Project (November 2023) [Available online here, accessed 11.7.2025]

The Radical Bookseller, Issue 75, 1991