“The Old Fire Station N16:  Looking out for our community since 1886” ran from May 2024 – April 2025 and was part-funded by 9.6k from Historic England’s Everyday Heritage grant programme, celebrating working class histories.

Our team worked with past and present local community members to collect, communicate, and respond to stories of the buildings’ past, present and future in varied ways. We ran open events, co-creation and skill sharing workshop sessions alongside recording oral histories and archival research.

The project culminated in a community celebration in April 25 where our participants and contributors, their friends and families came together to share their creations and efforts, accompanied by amazing music, food and activities all inspired by the Old Firestation’s history.

There were domino sessions run by Hackney Caribbean Elders who started here in 1985, and hobby horse making from Hackney Children’s Theatre – did you know both horses and children used to live in the building, when the Fire Station first opened as a residential station in 1886 and that horse-drawn fire engines were in operation here?

We also unveiled our OFS textile banner; the result of our amazing community workshops with textile artist Alice Blackstock.

Artist Donald Waugh curated artwork and archive images about the OFS created by the HCEO community.                                        

READ ON FOR MORE ABOUT OUR LOOKING OUT PROJECT DISCOVERIES…

HEAR edited excerpts of some of the stories we collected from our wonderful interviewees (pictured below) on our Mixcloud

Short snippets and reminisces of stories shared with us as well as a full length recording of a building tour with Fire Station expert Billy Reading can be found on our Mixcloud

Find out more about what went on in the Old Fire Station in the 1980’s and 90’s from our neighbours Michael, Fiona, Maureen, and Terence, get insights into its operations as a working Fire Station in the 1970’s from Paul and Bill, and what the area was like to grow up in from Martin.

Rubena founder of Jamboulay Carnival Arts and Julie, director of Growing Communities fill us in on how their organisations made the Old Fire Station their home and why they are still here!

While Colin and Heidi’s reminisces of visiting the Old Fire Station as children in the 80’s can be found on our Insta account @lookingout_ofs 

READ more about what we have discovered about the history of this amazing building in our themed information ‘windows’ here

And take a look at our new timeline which gives an overview of the history of our building

Special thanks to Peter Archard for his research and Donna Travis from Future Hackney for her amazing photos…

Thanks also to the Looking Out Team:

Rosa Woolf Ainley – Historical Researcher

Martin Osman – Oral History Interviewer

Milly Patrzalek – Project Assistant

Rebecca Sainsot-Reynolds – Community Producer

Natalie Silk – OFS Trustee and Project Manager

The brilliant OFS staff team and all our collaborators and friends (some pictured) including architectural historian Billy Reading, and Stoke Newington History who generously donated the proceeds of one of their history talks to the OFS ; and of course our funder Historic England.

Thanks also to Diane Abbott who recently visited the OFS and shared her memories of running her first MP surgeries here in 1987!

Watch this space and follow us on insta @lookingout_ofs for future community co-creation projects building on Looking Out’s work.