38 years is a long time to stay anywhere, but when you have nearly 3,400 square feet to play with, it figures that you won’t need to be moving on any time soon. 

A pioneering creative spirit lead Gill and Marc to Fawe Street Studios in the early eighties and it’s that same creative vibe which still exists in the other blocks – and their residents – that form the “Spratts Patent Complex” that’s kept them here. 

“We arrived long before the DLR was built and the landscape outside was semi-derelict ” explains Gill. “It’s been a wonderful place to live. I’m a photographer and Marc’s an artist, so it’s been great to have all this amazing space – not only to work from but also bring up a family in. Happily, it’s so big we’ve been able to keep living and working separate”.

The entire apartment is achingly authentic, inside and out. The imposing red brick exterior loses none of its industrial feel once you’re inside, which is where it gets really interesting. 

As you might expect, the whole place has impressively high ceilings. Defining each space is a little tricky, in fact you could pick and choose how to arrange it but if large family accommodation is for you, there are up to four bedrooms, one of which is a huge suite of its own with as much space as you’d find in a normal two bedroom apartment! As well as all this, there’s a study, an open-plan reception room plus an enormous artist’s studio with adjoining balcony and a utility room. 

While the apartment is a wonderful as it is, one can’t help fantasise about what it might look like as one huge open plan space. It actually wouldn’t take a huge amount of work, as most of the interior walls are stud. The possibilities are endless. 

Venture out beyond the communal parking and entrance gates and the playground of East London lies at your feet with a wide and diverse mix of eateries, pubs, bars and markets to occupy your weekends and weekdays from Shoreditch, Hoxton, Victoria Park and Fish Island then on to Canary Wharf, or west to the City. With the DLR is on your doorstep, they’re all easy to get to.