Rediscovering East London: Shoreditch drops edgy cool for brand

Shoreditch has always been at the edge of fashion, culture and London - that was until Central London embraced it. Formerly the home of artists, musicians, people on low-income it has now become one of 'the' places to visit in London.

Once ignored Shoreditch is now thriving with more upmarket galleries, stores, bars and clubs - infact if you go Soho you're as No-Go. This is the new place to be seen. What people wear this season in Shoreditch people wear in 2 seasons across the globe - but can that remain to be the case?

I arrived at Shoreditch tube in the early evening last Saturday, its a tube stop I frequent regularly as I head for the city district of Liverpool Street - instead I was heading to Brick Lane, so I took a different turn and here I stumbled upon Box Park Shoreditch.

A set of quirky storage boxes turned into tiny retail stores. This truly hit my interest, I love this sort of thing. It was well positioned, structured and each store well presented, but to my disappointment it was all huge global brands - at this point I realised the uniqueness of Shoreditch is being lost.

Though what a surprise - with city workers muscling in on the space and property value increasing immensely - developers finding spare land to build on and the Olympics 2012 on its way, Shoreditch as it was once - maybe lost.