London can feel forbidding for a visitor.  All the “sights” and tourist hotspots seem to just be designed to milk money from us.  Often they have this sanitised feel and present a bland image designed as a background for holiday snaps.

But where can you go to just hang out or chill?  There is one seriously hip chill spot that that won’t drain your bank account and has something for everyone.

Gillett Square in Dalston.

Being hip means being in the know.  Knowing Gillett Square means you have street cred’ in London.  Here are 5 reasons why Gillett Square is probably the hippest place in London:

1 – Diversity – with over 100 languages spoken in the square mile radius of Gillett Square, it is one of the most culturally diverse places on earth.  Diversity encourages sharing, innovation and resilience.

2 – Density – Adjacent to Islington where there are almost 22,000 people living in each square mile, Gillett Square is in a densely populated part of London.  Population density offers opportunity for the cross-pollination of ideas and social innovations.

3 – Creativity – London is constantly reinventing itself. It helps that it hosts probably the most diverse mix of humanity on earth.  Diversity crowded into densely populated places like Dalston, generates a vibrant cultural stew.  Gillett Square in Dalston is a generative bubbling vortex of this complex, creative cultural pot.

4 – A growing commons – A local collaboration of social enterprises conspire, with the London Borough of Hackney, to hold and increase the amount of space held in the commons for the common Good.  Over the past 5 years the commons has almost doubled.  This allows hip happenings such as NTS Radio’s summer events to be held in Gillett Square.

5 – Community-led Projects – Fairbnb.coop supports local projects – by sharing half of its commission, Fairbnb.coop is a cooperative supporting local projects such as the Zoom! Bike Project and other community led innovations.