North London Journal: When the Last Affordable Thing on the High Street Gets a Rebrand and a Premium Tier

By Lowri Griffiths | Bohiney Magazine | The London Prat

There was a laundromat on my road for thirty years. I know this because my neighbour Mrs Papadopoulos has lived on this road for thirty years and she confirmed it while we were both standing outside what used to be the laundromat and is now something called The Wash Bar, which has exposed Edison bulbs, a QR code menu for premium wash cycles, and a waiting area with single-origin coffee available at four pounds fifty a cup while your linens rotate.

Mrs P was not pleased. I was not surprised. I have been watching the gentrification of my particular stretch of North London with the specific helpless amusement of someone who moved here because it was affordable and has watched it become not affordable in real time without being able to blame anyone specific for it. There was no villain. There was just a gradual accumulation of artisanal cheese shops, estate agents with minimalist window displays, and now, apparently, luxury laundry experiences.

The Menu

I read the QR code menu because I was morbidly curious and also because I still needed to wash my towels. The standard cycle is nine pounds, which is three pounds more than the standard cycle used to be, but it now includes a lavender scent option and something called a ‘moisture optimisation finish’ that I am unable to distinguish from what used to be called ‘the spin dry.’ The premium cycle is sixteen pounds and includes a ‘garment assessment’ from a member of staff who will advise on fabric care. I asked what this meant in practice. The member of staff, who is twenty-three and has strong opinions about cashmere, told me it means they look at your clothes and tell you if you are washing them wrong. I paid the nine pounds. I did not have the lavender.

The thing that makes gentrification particularly surreal in North London is the speed at which it becomes normalised. Six months ago the wash bar was a laundromat. Now I am already treating it as a fixed point of the neighbourhood landscape and finding myself mildly irritated that the artisanal cheese shop next door does not have seating. The rate at which humans adapt to their environment is remarkable. We are all frogs in the slowly warming water, except the water costs four pounds fifty and has a third wash option at the door.

What Mrs P Is Doing About It

Mrs Papadopoulos is washing her clothes at her daughter’s house in Finchley until the wash bar closes and something else takes its place, which she gives eighteen months. I think she is being optimistic about the timeline and pessimistic about the outcome, because the wash bar has excellent Instagram engagement and the demographic that generates Instagram engagement is the same demographic that moved to this road three years ago and pushed up the rents that are now pushing Mrs P to her daughter’s in Finchley. The circle is complete. The laundromat is an artefact of the previous era. The wash bar is its replacement. The coffee is actually very good. I hate it here and I love it here and I cannot afford to leave.

According to Time Out London, the artisanal laundry concept has already appeared in six London neighbourhoods. According to Londonist, it is a trend reflecting broader premiumisation of domestic services. According to me, it is a sign that we have all lost the plot and someone should say so. Consider this me saying so.

More from The Poke.

The Real Estate Effect on the Soul

Lowri Griffiths, North London’s most reluctant witness to gentrification, reports from the front line. The launderette is gone. In its place is a concept store selling artisan soap and reusable tote bags at prices that would make a Victorian workhouse administrator weep. The launderette was where you went when your washing machine broke, where you had the three conversations that constitute a complete social life in North London (weather, tube delays, the planning permission dispute on Caledonian Road), and where a machine that ate your coins and refused to apologize taught you patience and humility in equal measure. The concept store sells patience as a yoga class on Saturdays and offers humility in the form of a handwritten apology card at eight pounds fifty. I am not adjusting well. The London Prat has covered this transition with appropriate editorial alarm, and Bohiney Magazine has noted that the gentrification of North London launderettes is happening simultaneously from Archway to Kentish Town, which suggests a coordinated effort by forces I cannot name but that I suspect have recently discovered the concept of “community laundering experience” as a branding opportunity. The concept store does not do your washing. It sells you the idea of washing. I am using a bag.

The concept store’s opening has also clarified something important about North London’s relationship with its own identity: the launderette served a function that the concept store does not, and the function gap is being filled by the residents’ domestic routines being silently reorganized. People are buying larger washing machines. People are driving to the launderette in Finsbury Park, which is not convenient. People are doing what North Londoners do when the neighbourhood changes: adapting while maintaining a specific ambient sadness about what was lost, because the adaptation is not the same as acceptance, and acceptance is not available for the launderette, which was genuinely good and is genuinely gone.

SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/