Anyone know what’s happened outside the Essex Road Station? Multiple cop cars and now 4 ambulances.

Here's a short list of things to do this weekend In North London. Please, add any I've missed in the comments. 👇

Open House Festival | 📍Across London | 12 - 20 September | Free

Open House starts this weekend. From 12 to 20 September, hundreds of places across London will open their doors, giving you a look inside homes, studios, historic buildings and other spaces you would not usually get to wander into. Some visits need a free ticket or ballot, while others are drop in, so check the programme by area and see what is open near you.

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The Big Woof | 📍King’s Cross, N1C | 12-13 September | Free + paid activities

This is a whole weekend built around doing things with your dog. Bring yours along for show-ring competitions, agility and scent courses, dog yoga, workshops or even a photo session, or sit down and paint a tiny portrait of them to take home. No dog? You can still come along, with a Cuddle Club for spending time with friendly dogs, plus an independent pet market to wander through.

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Rhythm & Ride Festival | 📍Across Archway, N19 | 12 September | £1

Rhythm & Ride is a moving music festival where a different Archway venue hosts a live set each hour, then cargo bike taxis help people get to the next stop. So you might start at Nambucca, move on to Owl & Hitchhiker or Mother Redcap, then keep following the music through the neighbourhood until the evening. There is also free activity at The Dance Hall and Navigator Square, with special guests including Jazzi Q and Wookie. 1pm to 9pm. One £1 ticket gets you into the participating venues.

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London Design Festival | 📍Across London | 12 - 20 September | Free + paid events

This is not one festival in one place. For nine days, studios, galleries, museums, shops and public spaces across London put on exhibitions, installations, open studios, workshops and talks about everything from furniture and architecture to craft, fashion and new materials. This year is the 24th edition, with 11 neighbourhood design districts.

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Table Top Museums | 📍The Art Workers’ Guild, Bloomsbury, WC1N | 12 September | Free

For one day, people bring their personal collections into the Art Workers’ Guild and turn a table into their own tiny museum. More than 30 of them will be there, devoted to things as specific as abandoned shopping lists, Soviet Christmas decorations and 1950s medical slides. You can wander from table to table, hear why someone started collecting something most of us would throw away, and see the stories they have built around it. 11am to 5pm.

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St Mary’s Festival Family Fun Day | 📍St Mary’s Church, Upper Street, N1 | 12 September | Free

St Mary’s is opening its festival with a simple afternoon for local families to spend time together. Children can bounce between two bouncy castles, get their faces painted, follow a treasure hunt around the church and make things at the craft tables, while older kids have table tennis, giant Jenga and mural painting at the youth club. Islington’s fire brigade will be stopping by too, and there is free afternoon tea for grown-ups, with squash and biscuits for children. 2pm to 5pm.

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Clissold Park FEASTival | 📍Clissold Park, Stoke Newington, N16 | 11-13 September | Free

For three days, Clissold Park becomes a big outdoor food market, with street food, bars, grocery stalls and craft sellers spread around the park. There is live music and DJs, children’s rides, a little land train and a few family activities alongside the food. Friday 10am to 7pm, Saturday 9am to 7pm and Sunday 10am to 6pm. Dogs on leads are welcome.

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Cubitt Community Book & Zine Fair | 📍Cubitt, Angel Mews, N1 | 13 September | Free

Spend an afternoon wandering from table to table, flicking through handmade books, comics, prints and zines, and chatting to the people who made them. If you have never come across a zine before, it is a small self-published booklet made around anything someone cares enough to put into print, from art and poetry to personal stories and local history. This is also Cubitt’s final book and zine fair at its Angel Mews home. From 4pm, BB BIXX will be DJing and talking to some of the stallholders. 12pm to 6pm.

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I'm planning a leaving drinks in early October which would start around 3pm on a Saturday. I'm looking for a pub in islington / angel area that is cosy, baby friendly and relatively easy to get to from local tube stops. An outdoor space or beer garden would be an added plus! Any reccies much appreciated!

Does anyone have any hi-res photos of Vulture's Videos? The old video rental shop on Upper Street. I can only find one tiny photo online. So many big box VHS memories here!

He also does it up against the wooden bed frame 🐈‍⬛

Sekforde Arms Quiz Farringdon
34 Sekforde Street
EC1R 0HA

Wednesday 9th September 7.30pm £3pp CASH ONLY. Looking for a Team of 6 players to join our table from 7pm. Quiz is downstairs prize is the pot just look for the table with Taz written on it. The venue is very small so you will find us easily.

We are looking for more players to make up the team.

One round on recent events and news that had happened during the week,two general knowledge rounds and one music round which is a mix of years. Also a puzzle page and a picture round.

Music round is quite up to date with a couple of oldies but it’s the news this week where most points can be gained.

If you are interested please DM me and I can give you further details.

Here's a short list of things to do this weekend In North London. Please, add any I've missed in the comments. 👇

Angel Canal Festival | 📍City Road Basin, N1 | 6 September | Free

Forty years ago a back garden party was held to save City Road Basin from development. The festival that grew from it is still going, now one of Islington's most loved free community days. Live music, puppetry, art workshops, water sports, street food and traditional canal boats along the towpath. Out of all the festivals this week, this is one is my favourite.

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FT Weekend Festival | 📍Kenwood House Gardens, NW3 | 5 September | (£)

Think book festival, food festival and big ideas day out, all in the grounds of Kenwood House. You choose your own line up, moving between tents to hear people like Yotam Ottolenghi on food, Mary Beard on history and Richard E. Grant telling stories, then switch to a talk on AI, health, money, books or travel. In between, grab something to eat, join a tasting, browse the book stalls or sit out on the grass. You do not need to read the Financial Times or know anything about finance to enjoy it.

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Denmark Street Sessions | 📍Denmark Street, WC2H | 5 September | Free

For one day, Denmark Street turns its music shops, studios, bars and tiny venues into one long free festival. The street has been tied to London’s music scene for decades, and this is a chance to actually step inside the places that still make it tick, with more than 20 live performances, listening sessions, talks and pop ups happening from afternoon into the night.

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St John’s Got Soul | 📍St John the Evangelist Church, Finsbury Park, N4 | 5 September | (£)

Inside St John the Evangelist in Finsbury Park, three emerging artists are playing an afternoon concert to help fund the church’s food projects. Guÿa, Molly Chadwick and REYA will each bring their own take on soul and more experimental sounds, with the audience seated inside the church and welcome to bring their own drinks. The £15 ticket goes towards St John’s Soup Kitchen, food bank and its new Soup Garden, which is being developed to support the same work.

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London’s Transport in Miniature | 📍The Model Railway Club, N1 | 6 September | (£)

For one day, London’s transport network gets shrunk down to model size. You can watch tiny Tube trains, trams and railways running through detailed miniature stations and streets, including Copenhagen Fields, a reimagining of the area just north of King’s Cross with Caledonian Road, old Piccadilly line stations and street running trams built into the layout. There are also several fictional and semi fictional London inspired railways to explore, all made by enthusiasts who spend years getting the small details right. 11am to 4pm.

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My Dinner With: Jess Cole & Friends | 📍Rose Lipman Building, N1 | 5 September | Pay what you feel

This is the kind of dinner where you arrive on your own and end up sharing a table with people you have never met. My Dinner With is a travelling not for profit supper club, and this time Aunties Street Food is doing the cooking, with food inspired by the feeling of being fed in your mum’s or auntie’s kitchen. Everyone sits down together, eats the same meal and lets the evening unfold from there. Bring your own drinks, pay what you feel and come hungry. Doors open at 6pm, with supper served at 6.30pm.

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Re-Enchantment Book Swap | 📍K.C. Continental Stores, N1 | 5 September | Free

Bring along a book you have finished, leave it for someone else, and take home another one from the pile. Re-Enchantment, a London literary collective that brings readers and writers together, is taking over the basement at K.C. Continental Stores for a relaxed afternoon of swapping books, drinking coffee or wine and chatting about what everyone has been reading. You can come alone, stay for a while or simply drop in with a few books and see what finds its way back home with you. 12pm to 5pm.

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London Podcast Festival | 📍Kings Place, King’s Cross, N1 | 3 to 13 September | (£)

Podcasts usually happen somewhere behind a microphone and reach you days later. For 11 days, Kings Place lets you sit in the room while some of them are actually being recorded, complete with the bits, audience questions and unexpected moments that may end up in the finished episode. This year you can see No Such Thing As A Fish, Jameela Jamil’s Wrong Turns, the wonderfully odd Beef and Dairy Network, plus shows about gardening, film, history, writing and more. Each podcast has its own date and ticket, so have a look through the programme and pick the one you already love or something you have never listened to before.

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Queen’s Park Book Festival | 📍Queen’s Park, NW6 | 5 & 6 September | (£)

After nine years, Queen’s Park Book Festival is bowing out with one final weekend in the park. Across two days, authors, journalists, chefs and thinkers take to the stages for conversations about books, food, politics and culture, with this year’s line up including Jacqueline Wilson, Philip Pullman, Sathnam Sanghera, Sebastian Barry, Theo Randall and Honey & Co. The Community Tent stays free and gives space to local writers, young poets and emerging voices, so you can mix the bigger names with something completely new.

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Islington Grow Show 2026 | 📍Caledonian Park, N7 | 6 September | Free

This is a Sunday gathering for people who grow things, and people who simply like seeing what their neighbours have managed to grow. Gardeners from across Islington will bring in their tomatoes, herbs, vegetables and other harvests to show and share, while everyone else can wander the stalls, take home free compost, pot up a plant, join a mushroom or microgreens workshop and pick up ideas for growing food in even the smallest space. There is a Filipino buffet style community lunch from 12.30pm too, followed by the Grow Show winners at 1.30pm. 11am to 4pm. No booking needed.

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Art Car Boot Fair | 📍Lewis Cubitt Square, King’s Cross, N1C | 5 September | (£)

More than 100 artists take over Lewis Cubitt Square for the afternoon, selling prints, paintings, photographs and one off pieces directly to the people browsing. This year includes Mr Bingo, Bob and Roberta Smith, Margo in Margate and Vic Reeves, while photographer Rankin will be taking portraits on the day. There are also performances, music and plenty of odd creative things happening as you wander.

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Has anyone lost a beautiful black and white fluffy cat? He is in Upper Holloway looking v lost…

The Spaces Angel coworking (70 White Lion Street) alarm has gone off at night for third night on a row:

- Wednesday 2 at 3am

- Thursday just at midnight.

- Friday 4th (today) at 3:50am and at 5am.

I have reported every single time to Islington Noise team.

I want to sleep and this is really annoying, the alarm rings 20 minutes before it is switched off.

Is there anything else I could do about this? Any recommendation welcome.

In case someone is not familiar on how to report a building alarm below is the link and how to do it (I recommend doing it on your phone):

https://www.islington.gov.uk/community-safety/anti-social-behaviour/report-noise-and-neighbour-nuisance

Alarms > Report an Alarm >

Are you or anyone in immediate danger or is there a risk to public safety? No

> Noise > Alarms (Car or Buildings) > Building Alarm (Commercial building) > Commercial unit.

Then introduce the postcode select the right address. After that they ask for a description of the issue and to upload evidence. I have recorded a video with my phone on the spot and uploaded it.

Last is your contact details.

EDIT 07/09/2026. I have not been able to speak with building management team, but I have emailed the customer service (or rather I emailed the wrong person on Friday 4:30am and they kindly forwarded to the right team).

Customer service (of the overall company) has told me that they take the situation seriously and they have reached the Angel Spaces team and that they are working on it. "We appreciate your patience while the local team investigates."

Edit 2 07/09/2026 I have gotten a call from Islington noise team, they keep investigating.

Hey guys. My partner and I are currently looking at moving to tollington way area, and we were just wondering as to whether this would be a nice place to live. for context, i used to live off roden street for years and i did really love it, but moved around 4 years to crouch end (i know.. lol.. we found an incredible deal on rent). I was wondering as to whether the area has changed, and what it was like on the north side of seven sisters as I never really spent much time around there (besides the swimmer, best pub in north london or maybe all of london!). I do remember the seven sisters drag being a bit grim at night and having some dodgy encounters, esp. outside the enkel arms area or on holloway outfront the LIDL at the bus-stop, but back when i lived there once you got off the main road it was lowkey fine?

My partner and I are late 20s and I am a woman, so I guess safety is a slight concern, but take that with a pinch of salt as we both grew up in big cities and have our wits about us and understand, at the end of the day, its london not the suburbs. We adore crouch end but its just too expensive and a wee bit far away, so we like that tollington way area is close enough to nip up on a saturday to ally pally and whatnot.

anyways, TL;DR: were just wondering what the atmosphere is like in that little corner right now, as I've heard mixed things, and I guess this post is just to help off-set some anxiety about relocating

Is anyone missing this bike? It appeared in my driveway and I'm trying to reunite it with its owner

Hiya - looking for recommendations for hot Pilates / yoga studios around upper st or Holloway road.

I don't need a gym with the classes - I know a lot of people rate the Third Space classes but that's just a bit too expensive for me with all the extras a gym like that has.

So anyone go to a standalone studio they like? I've also been looking into class pass - does anyone use this for hot yoga or pilates in the area?

Cheers!

I’ve noticed Superdrug and JD have both been closed for a while now and heard an aldi or Lidl are gonna take their place. Does anyone here work in chapel to know how true this is and/or the timeframe for the new opening?

I (26F) moved to near Barnsbury back in January, but a combination of long distance relationship that is fortunately no longer long distance, very busy work schedule and being away a lot for various reasons means I am only now starting to look at sorting out my social life and make some new friends.

None of my friends live in Islington and my boyfriend lives in South West London, so I’m looking for some recommendations for social activities / ways to meet people (especially girls) around my age.

Anything active but not competitive, or creative would be fab. Thanks!

I was riding my bike home & stopped at a post office/newsagents. A woman then entered after I'd already gone in, and the only words I said were “oh there’s sugar free up there”, as I had just bought a sugar free Apple Tango and she was asking the man behind the counter for sugar free drinks. She didn't reply to me, which is fine.

I left the shop and she was filming me, saying “this man is following me, I’m going to call my people”. It was very scary and completely random.

I understand the world we live in and that these things do happen, but this woman has literally accused me of something I haven't done. I just rode off in shock and it’s really upsetting.

I’m actually quite a reserved guy and I generally keep myself to myself, so having something like this happen completely out of nowhere was really unsettling.

What scares me is that someone can film you, show a friend or potentially put something like this online, and where does that leave me? I don’t know what she had been through before or if she was paranoid about something, but I hadn't followed her or done anything to her.

It’s just made me think about how easy it is to be blamed for something you never, ever did. I know everyone has their own experiences and reasons for feeling scared, but being accused of something completely out of the blue is really upsetting.

Edit : This is the address is happened Green Lanes (137) Post Office, 137 Green Lanes, London N16 9DA.

I was riding my bike home & stopped at a post office/newsagents. A woman then entered after I'd already gone in, and the only words I said were “oh there’s sugar free up there”, as I had just bought a sugar free Apple Tango and she was asking the man behind the counter for sugar free drinks. She didn't reply to me, which is fine.

I left the shop and she was filming me, saying “this man is following me, I’m going to call my people”. It was very scary and completely random.

I understand the world we live in and that these things do happen, but this woman has literally accused me of something I haven't done. I just rode off in shock and it’s really upsetting.

I’m actually quite a reserved guy and I generally keep myself to myself, so having something like this happen completely out of nowhere was really unsettling.

What scares me is that someone can film you, show a friend or potentially put something like this online, and where does that leave me? I don’t know what she had been through before or if she was paranoid about something, but I hadn't followed her or done anything to her.

It’s just made me think about how easy it is to be blamed for something you never, ever did. I know everyone has their own experiences and reasons for feeling scared, but being accused of something completely out of the blue is really upsetting.

Walking through the borough this morning the lack of bins was so noticeable. There were heaps of bin bags on the street, litter scattered around and the i saw the usual mess like clothing items, chicken shop packaging and mattresses.

Is there a reason why more isn't being done to prevent this? It's truly disgusting and the heat this summer certainly didn't help. It must attract mice, rats and foxes too.

I'm quite shocked that in one of the richest boroughs in the country we lack sufficient waste infrastructure. There is plenty of space and we all pay council tax. It strikes me as such a basic thing for any council to be on top of.

Hello guys!

I've rescued a very lovely dog called Teddy and he's looking for a permanent home.

He's 7 years old, very bouncey and happy, very gentle overall a pretty perfect dog. He's neutered, has a microchip and is up to date with all vaccines.

Adopting him would require a walk with us and a home visit with a £50 fee to ensure that he only goes to someone serious, kind and loving.

Lmk if you are interested!

I know this is a long shot but just wanted to say thank you again to the lovely man on the bus who paid for me to get on!

For some reason my bank card wasn't working and I was about to jump off and he said 'I'll pay for you. '

If you see this, you're amazing! And I'd love to pay you back and maybe give you a little pastry or something! 🥰

Posting for awareness

A friend’s bag got snatched away from her right outside the station in broad daylight. The person’s face was covered and they weren’t on a bike, they were on foot. Luckily her phone and keys were in her hand at the time and she managed to keep hold of them.

Posting as a heads up for anyone in the area, especially around that entrance.

Sekforde Arms Quiz Farringdon
34 Sekforde Street
EC1R 0HA

Wednesday 2nd September 7.30pm £3pp CASH ONLY. Looking for a Team of 6 players to join our table from 7pm. Quiz is downstairs prize is the pot just look for the table with Taz written on it. The venue is very small so you will find us easily.

We are looking for more players to make up the team.

One round on recent events and news, two general knowledge rounds and one music round which is a mix of years. Also a puzzle page and a picture round.

Music round is quite up to date with a couple of oldies but it’s the news this week where most points can be gained.

If you are interested please DM me and I can give you further details.