page_title: Hackney Central
section_title: Victorian Hackney
hierarchical_section_title: Hackney Central / History / Victorian Hackney
caption_attribution_description: English: 1830 Map of Hackney
context_page_description: Hackney Central is a sub-district of Hackney in the London Borough of Hackney in London, England and is four miles northeast of Charing Cross.
  The Hackney Central area is focused on Mare Street and the retail areas to the north of it including Narrow Way and surrounding local area around Hackney Downs railway station. As such it extends north from Regent's Canal, takes in most of Broadway Market and London Fields, and follows each side of Mare Street till it terminates in the vicinity of Hackney Central railway station. The area also includes the central retail area which extends from Hackney Downs station in the west to the Hackney Walk Outlet Village, on Morning Lane and goes in between Wick Road and Cassland Road till meeting Hackney Wick, to the east.
  Hackney Central is the area that once would have been known as Hackney Village. This was a place that flourished from the Tudor period, when principal members of the Court had their houses in the surrounding area, and King Henry VIII of England had a palace. Hackney Central remained a popular resort for Londoners until the end of the Georgian era, when this suburb of London began to be completely built up.
context_section_description: During the Victorian era, many of the old buildings were swept away and the estates broken up to form streets of terraced housing. The change from rural suburb to firmly urban, was marked by the arrival of the railway in 1850, with a great iron rail bridge crossing Mare Street. Trams began to make their appearance on the streets in the 1870s, and a tram depot opened in 1882 on Bohemia Place.
  Increased access and the culverting of Hackney Brook in 1859–1860, brought about the present road layout. Many older buildings were pulled down to intensify development and to make room for street widening and the railway. In 1802 the parish vestry hall on the Narrow Way was rebuilt. In 1900 it was re-faced in stone and given a pediment inscribed 'Hackney Old Town Hall'. A new town hall was built on a different site in 1866; it was in turn superseded by today's Town Hall, built in 1937. By the turn of the 20th century, only St Johns Gardens, and Clapton Square, the areas around the 1791 church, remained as public open space.
caption: 1830 Map of Hackney village
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