Collage background photo Peter Marshall
The Aylesbury Estate was built during the tail end of the post-war drive for municipal housing construction in the UK. Since its early days, the estate has been criticised in the mainstream press for its size, design, and building materials. Expressions like "sink estate," "hell's waiting room," and other classist and racialised tropes have been used to describe it for decades, despite the ongoing protests of residents and housing campaigners. When the estate was placed under a major urban regeneration programme in 1999, Aysen and her sister Pinar, together with other residents and supporters, started campaigning — at first against plans to "stock transfer" ownership away from the local administration, and later against plans to demolish the estate altogether. The campaigners created networks of solidarity with other estates in struggle across London, always linking their analysis to global processes of gentrification and social cleansing. When Pinar tragically passed away in early 2019, at a time when work towards the demolition of their building was progressing, Aysen's response was to open her home — transforming the flat itself into a space of memory, resistance, and welcome. A tribute for her sister and a celebration of 20+ years of housing struggles. I had the opportunity to curate this resulting exhibition, which evolved through a collective process. My role was to weave together the material traces of the campaign — images, posters, and collages that came to cover most of the flat's walls — creating a visual fabric that could hold the contributions of academics, artists, poets, and supporters alongside the voices of residents themselves. The Fight4Aylesbury exhibition was open for a month between March and April 2023. It welcomed hundreds of visitors who explored the flat and attended eight public talks hosted in the living room and corridor. The exhibition wilfully centres residents' experiences and analysis. Against the backdrop of a relentlessly marginalising public rhetoric, we aimed to uphold a narrative of resistance against the processes of demolition and social cleansing, while making visible the everyday lives that residents continue to create within their homes.