The East End Dwellings Company was a Victorian

philanthropic Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private good, focusing on material ...

model dwellings company Model dwellings companies (MDCs) were a group of private companies in Victorian Britain that sought to improve the housing conditions of the working classes by building new homes for them, at the same time receiving a competitive rate of return o ...

, operating in the

East End of London The East End of London, often referred to within the London area simply as the East End, is the historic core of wider East London, east of the Roman and medieval walls of the City of London and north of the River Thames. It does not have uni ...

in the latter part of the nineteenth century. The company was founded in principle in 1882 by, among others,

Samuel Augustus Barnett Samuel Augustus Barnett (8 February 1844 – 17 June 1913) was a Church of England cleric and social reformer who was particularly associated with the establishment of the first university settlement, Toynbee Hall, in east London in 1884. He ...

, vicar of St Jude's Church,

Whitechapel Whitechapel is a district in East London and the future administrative centre of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is a part of the East End of London, east of Charing Cross. Part of the historic county of Middlesex, the area formed ...

; it was finally incorporated in 1884. Its aim was to "house the very poor while realizing some profit", "their particular purpose being to erect blocks of dwellings, to be let by the room, so that the poorest class of labourers could be accommodated". Unlike many of the model dwellings companies, the EEDC offered accommodation to the casual poor and day labourers. The company's first venture was Katharine Buildings in

Aldgate Aldgate () was a gate in the former defensive wall around the City of London. It gives its name to Aldgate High Street, the first stretch of the A11 road, which included the site of the former gate. The area of Aldgate, the most common use of ...

, followed by a number of schemes in

Bethnal Green Bethnal Green is an area in the East End of London northeast of Charing Cross. The area emerged from the small settlement which developed around the common land, Green, much of which survives today as Bethnal Green Gardens, beside Cambridge Heat ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. They went on to build around the East End. Along the principles of

Octavia Hill Octavia Hill (3 December 1838 – 13 August 1912) was an English Reform movement, social reformer, whose main concern was the welfare of the inhabitants of cities, especially London, in the second half of the nineteenth century. Born into a fa ...

's schemes, the company used female rent-collectors, including

Beatrice Potter Martha Beatrice Webb, Baroness Passfield, (née Potter; 22 January 1858 – 30 April 1943) was an English sociologist, economist, socialist, labour historian and social reformer. It was Webb who coined the term ''collective bargaining''. She ...

(later Webb), one of the founders of the London School of Economics & Political Science and Ella Pycroft, who ran the Buildings alongside

Maurice Eden Paul Maurice Eden Paul (27 September 1865, Sturminster Marshall – 1 December 1944) was a British socialist activist, physician, writer and translator.'Paul, Maurice Eden' in ''Who Was Who'' Early life Paul was the younger son of the publisher Charl ...

Buildings

Katharine Buildings Katharine Buildings were model dwellings in Cartwright Street, Aldgate, London, the first project of the philanthropically-motivated East End Dwellings Company. The block was built during 1884, and opened in 1885 as model apartments for the workin ...

- Cartwright Street, Aldgate * Museum House - Green Street, Bethnal Green (1888) *Tankerton Street, King's Cross (1892) * Meadows Dwellings - Mansford Street (1894) * Ravenscroft Dwellings -

Columbia Road Columbia Road is a street in Washington, D.C., that forks from Connecticut Avenue north of Dupont Circle, and branches north and east through 16th Street to the McMillan Reservoir. Along its route, it marks the southern border of the Kalorama ...

(1897) * Dunstan Houses -

Stepney Green Stepney Green Park is a park in Stepney, Tower Hamlets, London. It is a remnant of a larger area of common land. It was formerly known as Mile End Green. A Crossrail construction site occupies part of the green, with Stepney Green cavern below ...

(1899) * Whidborne Buildings - Tonbridge Street, Kings Cross (1890s) * Mendip Houses - Kirkwall Place, Bethnal Green (1900) * Shepton Houses (1900) * Merceron Houses (1901) *

Montfort House Montfort can refer to: Feudal fiefs and houses * House of Montfort, Montfort-l'Amaury, a French noble house, extinct in the 14th century * Montfort of Brittany, descendants in the female line, reigning house of the Duchy of Brittany in the 14th a ...

(1901) * Gretton Houses (1901) * Thornhill Houses -

Barnsbury Barnsbury is an area of north London in the London Borough of Islington, within the N1 and N7 postal districts. The name is a syncopated form of ''Bernersbury'' (1274), being so called after the Berners family: powerful medieval manorial ...

(1902)Thornhill Houses Tenants and Residents Association
/ref> * Evesham House -

Old Ford Old Ford is an area in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets that is named after the natural ford which provided a crossing of the River Lea. History Administration and boundaries Historically, Old Ford was a cluster of houses and a mill, aroun ...

(1905) * Globe Road/Cyprus Street block -

(1906)

Buildings

See also

References

Further reading