DUE EAST 1a: From POPLAR to BLACKWALL, EAST INDIA DOCK, TRINITY BUOY WHARF, and on to CANNING TOWN
Exploring East London: a very useful web!!!
POPLAR. You are still in TOWER HAMLETS
CHRISP STREET MARKET
East India Dock Road
Former PUBLIC BATHS
RICHARD GREEN Statue
Former GEORGE GREEN SCHOOL. CENTENARY CLOCK
CHILDREN’S MEMORIAL
ST.MATHIAS Church. Originally the EAST INDIA COMPANY Church
Poplar High Street
Former POPLAR TOWN HALL
CORONERS COURT
Former Station Building
ALL SAINTS Church
Former ROBIN HOOD GARDENS (Social Housing).
A residential estate designed in the late 1960s by architects Alison and Peter Smithson and completed in 1972. It was built as a council housing estate with homes spread across 'streets in the sky': social housing characterised by broad aerial walkways in long concrete blocks, much like the Park Hill estate in Sheffield; it was informed by, and a reaction against, Le Corbusier's Unité d'Habitation.
A redevelopment scheme, known as Blackwall Reach, involves the demolition of Robin Hood Gardens as part of a wider local regeneration project that was approved in 2012. An attempt supported by a number of notable architects to head off redevelopment by securing listed status for the estate was rejected by the government in 2009. Demolition of the western block began in December 2017 and was completed in 2018. Demolition of the Eastern block started in mid 2024 and finished in March 2025.
Part of the building has been preserved by the Victoria and Albert Museum[4] and was presented at the Venice Architecture Biennalein 2018.
BLACKWALL
BLACKWALL TUNNEL (North entrance)
Route to POPLAR DOCK (WEST INDIA DOCKS) and Blackwall Riverside: VIRGINIA QUAY & EAST INDIA BASIN
Naval Row
P.H.
Former Pumping Station
High Walls… Former Quays
Eateries and convenience stores
EAST INDIA DLR Station
Site of the EAST INDIA DOCKS
For 150 years the East India Docks were one of London’s main Thames dock complexes. They were originally created at the start of the 19th century for the loading and unloading of the East India Company ships trading with the Far East.
MULBERRY PLACE
In the early 1990s, the council decided to move to a more modern building, on the site of the former East India Import Dock.[3] The new Town Hall, completed in 1992 and occupied the following year,[4][5] was built by the Nordic Construction Company, with Birse Construction the main contractor.[3] The new building formed part of a larger development of four linked blocks,[3] designed by Sten Samuelson and the Beaton Thomas Partnership in the Modernist style.[3][6] The design made extensive use of reflective glazing and pink Sardinian granite.[3]
The name Mulberry Place commemorates the construction of Mulberry harbours in the dock during the Second World War,[7]and reflects the sprig of mulberry included in the boroughs coat of arms in recognition of the East End's weaving heritage.[8] The ship bell of the sloop HMS Crane is placed in the Town Hall foyer. The ship was adopted by the Borough of Bethnal Green during the Second World War and the connection with the ship and its crew has been maintained ever since.[9]
In February 2015 the council acquired the old Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel Road and announced plans to convert it for use as the new Tower Hamlets Town Hall to which the council would relocate when it became available
Future development
TELEHOUSE DOCKLANDS CAMPUS. Data centres
The Telehouse Docklands campus is Europe's primary internet and connectivity hub, a massive, interconnected complex of carrier-neutral data centers in London that hosts the London Internet Exchange (LINX) and connects major cloud providers (AWS, Azure), over 530 carriers, and global networks, forming a critical backbone for the internet with huge power, advanced cooling, and stringent security for hosting digital infrastructure.
Key Aspects:
- Connectivity Hub: It's home to LINX and offers massive peering capacity, making it essential for internet traffic in the UK and beyond.
- Carrier Neutral: Offers customers freedom to choose from hundreds of network providers.
- Cloud Ecosystem: Direct access to major cloud platforms like Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure.
- Infrastructure: Multiple interconnected data centers (North, East, West, North Two, South) with high power density, advanced cooling, and redundant systems.
- Security: Features 24/7 security, alarmed perimeters, CCTV, and strict access controls.
- Sustainability: Newer builds, like Telehouse West Two, focus on 100% renewable energy and high efficiency.
THE EAST INDIA DOCKS
Site of the COPPERAS
Situated on the west bank of the River Lea, just within the parish of St Leonard's Bromley (see fig. 247), this was one of the earliest industrial sites in the Blackwall area having no connection with shipbuilding. A copperas works was established here in the seventeenth century, and continued in business until the East India Dock Company bought the premises early in the nineteenth century. Leamouth Road bisects the site, which was partly absorbed into the curtilage of the East India Docks. The remainder of the site, between the road and the river (where the copperashouse itself stood), became Orchard Wharf, latterly the premises of J. J. Prior (Transport) Ltd.
The manufacture of green copperas (ferrous sulphate), a chemical used in dyeing cloth, tanning and the making of black ink, was an important industry around the Essex coast during the eighteenth century. Its centre was at Walton-on-the-Naze, where copperas was being made by 1690. (fn. 54) Little is known about the origins of the Lea-side works. In the 1690s they belonged to Sir Nicholas Crispe, the 2nd baronet (c1643–98), who held the site on lease from the then freeholder, Sir Thomas Middleton. Crispe was also the joint-owner of another copperas works at Deptford, and it seems likely that he established the Blackwall works. (fn. 55) There is, however, a possibility that the founder was his grandfather, Sir Nicholas Crispe, the 1st baronet (d. 1666), who was certainly interested in copperas, having been farmer of the customs and subsidies of both copperas and alum.
You leave the Lower Lea Crossing to your left, and you continue with the former East India Dock basin to your right
Orchard Place (street)
SALOME GATES
EAST OF BKACKWALL…
The area of eastern Blackwall formerly known as Orchard House was for over 150 years one of the most isolated and least accessible parts of Poplar. It lies at the eastern extremity of the parish where the confluence of the Thames and the meandering River Lea (here called Bow Creek) produces two peninsulas with a thumb-andforefinger-like configuration. The construction of the East India Docks in 1803–6 cut this area off from the rest of Poplar, and made it difficult of access by road. While not inhibiting the industrial development of the district, this encouraged the growth of a poor but self-contained community of whose existence the outside world seemed largely oblivious. 'London's "Lost" Village', as it was called in 1931, had no public transport links with the rest of Poplar, and any would-be visitors were faced with a long walk down the 'forbidding-looking thoroughfare bearing the picturesque name of Leamouth Road, flanked on both sides by the high stark walls of the adjacent dock premises' (Plate 111). (fn. 2) The community here was destroyed in the 1930s, when most of the houses were pulled down under slum clearance orders and their inhabitants moved elsewhere. Local industries, on the other hand, did not move out
Two modern developments: to the left London City Island, historically called GOODLUCK HOPE
To your right: ORCHARD PLACE or LEAMOUTH PENINSULA
The Orchard House property, or Pemell Estate as it was known in the nineteenth century, was the larger of the two main land holdings, with some 20 acres. (fn. 3) It comprised the whole of the east-pointing peninsula formed by the confluence of the Lea and the Thames, and extended westwards to include areas later swallowed up by successive enlargements of the East India Dock basin.
Also known from its location as Leamouth (or 'Laymouth'), the estate took its name from the Orchard House, a moated property comprising a house and a large orchard, which formerly occupied much of the eastern peninsula.
Modern residential developments
Former GRAVING DOCK
TRINITY BUOY WHARF
Trinity Buoy Wharf is a creative site in Docklands developed and managed by Urban Space Management Ltd. Home to London’s only Lighthouse, a vibrant creative community, a sculpture park, event venues and Container City™ Buildings.
Since Urban Space Management took over this vacant site in 1998, Trinity Buoy Wharf has seen a stream of artists, photographers, designer- makers, web designers and small businesses settle in its low-cost workspaces and studios. Home to a thriving creative community of over 750 people, Trinity Buoy Wharf is a base for English National Opera, Uber Boat by Thames Clippers, Faraday School, The Big Draw and The King’s Foundation to name a few.
THE CORPORATION OF TRINITY HOUSE of DEPTFORD STROND
Trinity House,[a]founded by Royal Charter in 1514, is the General lighthouse authorityfor England, Wales, the Channel Islands, and Gibraltar. It maintains navigational aids such as lightvesselsand buoys, as well as communications services and pilotage for ships in the North Sea. These are financed by dues levied on commercial vessels calling at ports in the British Isles.
n addition, Trinity operates a registered charity, which provides welfare services for retired seamen, education, and promoting safety at sea. Funding for this is generated separately.
Trinity House had its headquarters in a fine building in the City designed by the great James Wyatt in 1798,
TH established Trinity Buoy Wharf as its Thames-side workshop in 1803. At first wooden buoys and sea marks were made and stored here, and a mooring was provided for the Trinity House yacht, which was used to lay the buoys and collect them for maintenance and repair. The river wall along the Lea was rebuilt in brick in 1822, making this the oldest surviving structure on the site.
Many new buildings were constructed during the Victorian period, and a number still survive of which the earliest, the Electrician's Building, was built in 1836. It was designed by the then Chief Engineer of Trinity House, James Walker, originally for the storage of oil. He rebuilt the remainder of the river wall in 1852, and the first of two lighthouses here in 1854. On his death in 1862 he was succeeded by James Douglass who designed the lighthouse that still stands today as London's only remaining Lighthouse.
The iconic Experimental Lighthouse, and its neighbour the Chain and Buoy Store were built by Douglass in 1864 and were in constant use to test maritime lighting equipment and train lighthouse keepers. The roof space adjoining the present lighthouse housed the workshop for the famous scientist Michael Faraday.
In 1869, Trinity House set up an engineering establishment at Trinity Buoy Wharf to repair and test the new iron buoys then coming into use. Overcrowding soon became a problem, and in 1875 the works expanded westwards into the neighbouring property, previously Green's Shipyard. By 1910 Trinity Buoy Wharf was a major local employer, with some 150 engineers, platers, riveters, pattern makers, blacksmith, tinsmiths, carpenters, painters, chain testers and labourers working here.
The Wharf continued through the twentieth century to be responsible for supplying and maintaining navigation buoys and lightships between Southwold in Suffolk and Dungeness in Kent. It was modernised and partially rebuilt between 1947 and 1966, and finally closed on 3rd December 1988 when it was purchased by the London Docklands Development Corporation. In 1998 Urban Space Management took the site on a long lease.
Buoys now
Buoys and sea marks in England are managed and sourced by various entities, primarily the Corporation of Trinity House.
Trinity House is responsible for all navigation aids around England, Wales, and the Channel Islands, while other local port and harbour authorities manage their own areas. There is no single "factory" where all buoys are made; rather, they are sourced from commercial manufacturers and maintained at various depots.
Management and Maintenance
- Trinity House: As the General Lighthouse Authority for England and Wales, it maintains approximately 450 buoys and inspects many others. Historically, their primary workshop was Trinity Buoy Wharfin London, which closed in 1988. Today, Trinity House operates from various bases, including its Harwich headquarters, to deploy and service buoys using vessels like the THV Galatea.
- Local Authorities: Individual port and harbour authorities, as well as operators of wind farms and utility companies, are responsible for deploying and maintaining buoys in their specific jurisdictions.
- Scotland and Isle of Man: In these areas, buoys are managed by the Northern Lighthouse Board.
Manufacturing and Sourcing
The actual buoys and components (such as lights, fog signals, and top marks) are manufactured by a range of specialist commercial companies. These companies produce durable buoys made of materials like steel, plastic, or fiberglass designed to withstand harsh marine conditions.
Examples of how buoys are sourced and supplied include:
- Companies like JFC Marine fabricate top marks and navigation posts and manufacture mooring buoys.
- Hydrosphere, a marine equipment supplier, has provided racing marker buoys to sailing clubs on the Isle of Wight.
Now, you have to retrace the route in order to visit London City Island, on your way to CANNING TOWN
LONDON CITY ISLAND. Historically GOOD LUCK HOPE
RED BRIDGE
Welcome to Canning Town!
DLR Rotunda!
Route to POPLAR DOCK (WEST INDIA DOCKS) and Blackwall Riverside: VIRGINIA QUAY & EAST INDIA BASIN
BLACKWALL DLR Sta.
Poplar High St. (Eastern end)
BLACKWALL TUNNEL NORTH ENTRANCE
Cycle/Walking Subway under Aspen Way. You emerge in Preston Road by the Poplar Marina
Trafalgar Way
Student Accommodation
Former POPLAR DOCK, now MARINA
A small dock in Poplar, London. It connects to the Blackwall Basin of the West India Docks and, although independent of this system, has never had a direct connection to the Thames.
Originally a series of reservoirs built by the West India Dock Company and completed in 1828, Poplar Dock was converted into a railway dock, in the days before any of London's enclosed dock systems were connected to the railway network. The dock was built by the East & West India Docks and Birmingham Junction Railway Company (later the North London Railway Company) and connected to the company's goods yard at Chalk Farm.
Because of its lack of a direct connection to the river, its operators needed the agreement of the owners of the West India Docks for uses which did not compete directly with their interests. In its early years the dock was used mainly to import coal from the Northeast of England.
Much of the dock survives today as a mooring connected to Blackwall Basin. Poplar Dock is now known as Poplar Dock Marina. It was opened by Queen Elizabeth II in 1999.
Cross Preston Road
Into Blackwall
Baffin Way
Blackwall Way
Former BLACKWALL YARD: shipbuilding
Blackwall was a shipbuilding area since the Middle Ages. In 1607, the Honorable East India Company (HEIC) decided to build its own ships and leased a yard in Deptford. Initially, this change of policy proved profitable as the first ships cost the Company about £10 per ton instead of the £45 per ton that it had been paying to have ships built for it. However, the situation changed as the Deptford yard came to be expensive to run.
In 1614 the East India Company outgrew Deptford and ordered William Burrell to begin work on a new yard for repair, construction and loading of out-going ships. The site Burrell selected was at Blackwall, which was further down river and had deeper water, allowing laden ships to moor closer to the dock. The new yard was fully operational by 1617. The yard and its facilities were enlarged repeatedly during the early 17th Century. The yard was surrounded by a 12-foot (3.7 m) high wall, but was not used for storage of imported goods. [1] Later on in the 17th century the East India Company reverted to its original practice of hiring vessels.
In 1656, following a decline in the East India Company's fortunes, the yard was sold to shipwright Henry Johnson. The Anglo-Dutch wars of the late 17th Century resulted in too much work for the royal dockyards, and the Navy Board under Samuel Pepys began to commission third rates from Blackwall which was by then the largest private yard
was overtaken in importance by Bronsdens yard at Deptford. With the end of the Dutch wars naval shipbuilding had also retreated to the royal yards. This was reversed by war with Spain in 1739
The yard recovered under the management and later ownership of the Perry family. When the Navy again surveyed the yard in 1742, the yard had the greatest capacity on the Thames. In 1784 when Francis Holman painted it, it was said to be the biggest private yard in the world.[2] It was at this time that the Perrys began construction of the large Brunswick Dock to the east of the yard, opened in 1790.
The yard was reduced in size in 1803 when the East India Dockcompany bought the eastern part including the Brunswick Dock. The Brunswick Dock became the East India Export Dock (the southern of two docks), which in the 20th Century was filled to become the site of Brunswick Wharf Power Station
became Perry Sons & Green (George Green having married into the family)), then Perry Wells & Green (a half share having been sold to Rotherhithe shipbuilder John Wells) and eventually Wigram & Green.
In 1821 the firm built its first steamship. During this period the yard built Blackwall Frigates.
In 1834 the paddle-steamer Nile was built for delivery to the Egyptian Navy.
In 1843 the remaining site was split into two yards, with Money Wigram & Sons in the western yard. Wigrams soon began construction of iron ships, but ceased building in 1876.[6] In 1877 Wigram's yard was bought by the Midland Railway and developed as a coal dock, which survived until the 1950s.
seriously damaged by bombing and it was later filled in and used as a fuel oil storage yard by Charringtons. Part of the site is now occupied by the northern ventilation shaft of the second Blackwall Tunneland the rest by housing.
New developments
one of Tower Hamlets’ last underdeveloped riverfront sites. Sat within a locale rich in maritime history, this new neighbourhood will build a thriving and sustainable community.
Located on a 1.7-hectare site, Blackwall Yard will provide almost 900 homes, including 35% affordable, with a vast range of shared amenities and facilities, making it a sustainable ‘compact city’.
Working collaboratively with White Architekter, Panter Hudspith, and landscape architects LDA, the neighbourhood is formed of four buildings carefully arranged around a listed graving dock, from which the public realm will act as a stage for community life, including a primary school, a cafe square, abundant play space and a riverside pub.
Former THOMSON-REUTERS data centre, now TELEHOUSE South
A significant modern building designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners, which housed crucial tech infrastructure and later became part of a large redevelopment site (Blackwall Yard) for residential use, sold by Reuters to developers around 2020
SUPER-LOOP
EAST INDIA DLR Station
Convenience store
John Smith Mews
Newport Avenue
Prime Meridian Court
Riverside path
VIRGINIA QUAY SETTLERS MONUMENT
The Virginia Quay Settlers Monument, a free-standing stone and bronze monument of 1951, incorporating a bronze plaque of 1928 and with later sculptural additions of 1999, commemorating the departure of settlers for Jamestown, Virginia (USA), is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Historic interest: the monument is an accessible memorial to the British settlers who set out from Blackwall Quay to establish a colony at Jamestown, Virginia (USA) in 1607;
* Artistic interest: the monument's rough-hewn rock base and astrolabe navigation instrument combine to convey the sense of adventure involved in crossing the Atlantic during the C17, and the risks associated with establishing a colony on an unknown continent;
* Sculptural interest: Wendy Taylor’s astrolabe is a well-detailed addition to the memorial reflective of her oeuvre;
* Historic association: with the Pocahontas Statue at Gravesend
Captain Newport, John Smith (mutineer, but a future councillor and leader), John Rolf (merchant) and his future wife Rebecca…
The flotilla was made up of three small ships - Susan Constant, the Godspeed and the Discovery. During the voyage there were times when the ships lay becalmed and it was on one of these occasions that Captain John Smith, a soldier and adventurer, was charged with mutiny by Captain Christopher Newport who was in overall charge of the passage. Smith was then held securely for the rest of the voyage, pending execution on landfall.
On reaching America in April 1607 the expedition leader opened a sealed box containing orders. John Smith was listed as a named councillor for the new colony, and as such he was pardoned. Many of the settlers were exhausted and sick from the long and arduous trip, but they established Jamestown as the first Virginia English colony. It is situated on the banks of the Back River, 60 miles from the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay.
Almost immediately they were attacked by Native Americans, necessitating the rapid construction of a secure timber stockade. Disease, famine and continuing attacks took their toll on the population and by 1609 only 60 of the original c105 settlers survived. Captain John Rolfe joined the colony in 1610, bringing with him tobacco seeds which thrived in the local climate and Virginia was eventually established as a tobacco-based colony.
Legend has it that Captain Smith was captured by Native Americans and that his life was saved by Pocahontas, the daughter of a Chief. She later converted to Christianity and after marrying John Rolfe, as Rebecca Rolfe she visited England, where she helped recruit more settlers and raise funds. On her return journey in 1617 she fell ill at Gravesend, and died a few days later. She was buried under the chancel of the Church of St George, and a statue of her stands in the graveyard
The first colonists of Virginia sailed from the Blackwall Steps.
Site of the BRUNSWICK DOCK, then SOUTH DOCK (quays), and later on of Blackwall Power Station
Former Lock
EAST INDIA DOCK BASIN NATURAL PARK
East India Dock Basin is the largest remaining part of the early 19th century East India Docks complex. Owned by Lee Valley Regional Park Authority it has been identified as a site to be enhanced to fulfil its potential as a heritage resource and nature reserve.
MILLENIUM BEACON
SALOME GATES
Exiting the Gates you are in Orchard Place, Leamouth, for
TRINITY BUOY WHARF and LONDON CITY ISLAND, and for ROYAL DOCKS (Lower Lea Crossing viaduct) and CANNING TOWN (through London City Island or along Bow Creek -River Lea- and Barking Rd.)
Bus route SUPER-LOOP