Fatima

"Together, my two brothers, Bayram and Morat, my father, Hassan and me run our shop, Altun," explains Fatima. We are open every day from 7 in the morning to 11 at night and we all work ten-hour shifts. We have been here three years. I love our customers and I am always happy." Above the counter is a ‘Masallah’ – which looks like a large eye and gives protection for the shop. Fatima moved to the UK eight years ago from Gaziantep, Turkey's sixth biggest city and one of the oldest continually inhabited cities in the world.

Changing Face

Many businesses have closed because of financial difficulties, family feuds, or death. The ‘Wrigleys shop’, as locals affectionately call it, features a dusty, fading window display of giant packets of chewing gum. They lie untouched since the sprightly, twinkly-eyed 83-year-old owner finally shut up shop in 1994. Over the years, the traditional ice cream parlour has been replaced with a powder blue coffee shop, the old library is now a community arts centre and the pie and mash shop has become a Chinese take away.

A Story of Faith: Wayside Community Centre

In the window of the Wayside Community Centre are copies of Reverend Jean's book, When God Intervenes. "We have a charity shop, a keep fit class for the elderly and help people with mental health problems – I just treat them as individuals," says Jean.

"Oh my god, when I first came to the shop, it was such a mess, derelict. It hadn’t been used for 15 years. Chatsworth Road was really down and a lot of the other places were closed down, closed for many, many years and it was really, really bad, you know. When we first came in here there was a big crashing sound of the ceiling falling in, the building was so shaky. The fire brigade came and all the shopkeepers came out and they couldnt really believe what I was doing. My family stopped talking to me and my husband said that everyone was laughing at me. I live in Powerscroft Road and have always been a local community member. It has involved a lot of fighting. I have gone through so much, but it has come out good. I really believe God sent me here."

Mighty Meats

"Thirty years I have been a butcher on Chatsworth Road," says Alex, the Cypriot owner of Mighty Meats (now at number 46, and originally at number 58). "There was a nice, beautiful market. Nice, very nice. When I came here, off licence was the off licence. Greengrocers was a greengrocers. Butcher shop was a butcher shop. Now you can see, every shop sells everything. I still only sell just meat – original – but we lost everything else. I don’t know if the market coming back will make a difference; the big problem is the supermarkets. Before people would wait in a queue to get their meat. If you come here and you try to park now they charge you a fortune. You go to the supermarket all the parking is free, darling."

According to Alex, Sunday opening about 20 years ago changed everything. Then, when the parking restrictions came in a few years ago, it was the real nail in the coffin. "Before, at the fruit and veg shop that was owned by Italians, there would be between 50 and 100 people inside. And it would sell just fruit and vegetables, not nuts or even eggs. I have never seen anything like it in my life – and I have been in London 40 years. Now everything's changed. Nothing original is left. Now all shops sell everything. There used to be seven butchers in Chatsworth Road. Seven and everybody was happy."

The World in Microcosm

Acclaimed street photographer, Colin O’ Brien and award-winning travel writer, Jane Egginton are a couple of Hackney residents who love living just off vibrant Chatsworth Road. This strip of high street is important culturally, socially and historically. As one local jokingly commented: “You can live your whole life on Chatsworth Road, with no need to ever leave. You can be born in the hospital at one end, attend the school at the other and then be buried by the funeral parlour conveniently situated somewhere in the middle.“

There's a Turkish greengrocers, a Nigerian butchers, a French deli, a Caribbean supermarket, two West Indian take-aways, a boutique coffee shop and an Eastern European Social Club. Other local businesses include an electrical repair shop, a dentist, two greasy spoons, two glaziers, several hairdressers and three betting shops. It also boasts a Muslim prayer room, a Methodist church, and a massage parlour. A computer repair shop gives Koran lessons and a snooker hall is housed in a listed building.

Chatsworth Road is a unique high street made up almost entirely of independent shops. Once host to Hackney’s biggest market, and within a stone’s throw of the Olympic site, this road, with its increasingly gentrified population, is in a state of flux. The reintroduction of the market in 2010 and the Olympics in 2012 will see this fascinating stretch of road change dramatically – perhaps beyond all recognition.