HOUSING REBELLION OCCUPYING THE LESNES ESTATE

I was inspired to paint this view of the Lesnes Estate in Thamesmead after hearing of the action by a group of residents calling themselves ‘LesRes’ (the Lesnes Resistance!) alongside Housing Rebellion who worked together in occupying these homes in protest of their looming demolition by Peabody Housing. 

Learning about the Lesnes story it unfortunately feels really familiar to other London housing redevelopment horror stories, and just as in many of those other stories we now see dozens of long-term and elderly residents and home owners on this estate facing compulsory purchase orders. As ever, this mass eviction is being carried out in a similarly broad and impersonal approach to those used to ‘decant’ residents from their homes for redevelopment across London, such as Balfron Tower, Aylesbury Estate, and Six Acres. In the Lesnes case it appears these purchase orders unsurprisingly ‘lowball’ the value of these arguably iconic brutalist homes which once featured in the film ‘A Clockwork Orange’. One resident explains it to the BBC like this:

“In 2007, we managed to get this mortgage, which we finished this year. When they said that they’re going to demolish our houses and pay peanuts to us, it means that they will leave us homeless. I will not be able, at the age of 72, to be able to buy another house with the money that they suggest that we can have.”

I went to visit and take in the estate and the ongoing occupation, and seeing the handmade banners hung up by the community as they take matters into their own hands – right alongside the metal shuttered neighbouring windows of the ‘decanted’ empty homes here was an inspiring image.