Dalston () is an area of East London, in the London Borough of Hackney. It is northeast of Charing Cross. Dalston began as a hamlet on either side of Dalston Lane, and as the area urbanised the term also came to apply to surrounding areas including Kingsland and Shacklewell, all three of which being part of the Ancient Parish of Hackney.
The area has experienced a high degree of gentrification in recent years, a process accelerated by the East London line extension, now part of London Overground, and the reopening of Dalston Junction railway station, part of London's successful bid to host the 2012 Olympics.
Bounds
Dalston has never been an administrative unit, and partly for this reason the boundaries are not formally defined. There are generally understood boundaries in the south and west, but less clarity to the north and east. There is an electoral ward of the same name which covers a part of the northwest of Dalston.
Dalston's boundaries (taking in Kingsland and Shacklewell, but not De Beauvoir Town, which is also sometimes associated with Dalston) are described with more or less precision below: South: Dalston takes Hackney's southern border with Shoreditch. Albion Drive forms much of this boundary. West: The originally Roman A10 road (under the names, south to north: Kingsland Road, Kingsland High St, Stoke Newington Road) is widely understood as Dalston's western margin. The exception is that both sides of Kingsland High St are included – here Dalston takes Hackney's western boundary as it crosses the A10 to take in a small area bounded by Boleyn Road and the Crossway, to include Dalston Kingsland Railway Station. The western boundary corresponds with the western side of the E8 postal area with which Dalston is associated, though postcodes are not intended to define districts, and the postal area also takes in areas that are not ever described as part of Dalston. North: There is not a tradition of a clear northern boundary with West Hackney. Dalston's association with the E8 postal area means that its 'sphere of self-identification' does not extend far, if at all, beyond the postcode boundary, and no further north than Farleigh Road. East: Between Downs Road and Amhurst Road, the physical barrier of the railway embankment marks the postcode boundary with Lower Clapton. There is little tradition of a boundary with the central Hackney area except that it is sometimes said that Dalston extends as far as the park at London Fields.
History
The name Dalston is thought to have derived from Deorlaf's tun (farm) in much the same way as nearby Hoxton was named after the farm of "Hoch". The first written record available is from 1294 when the name was written as Derleston.
The village was one of four small villages within the Parish of Hackney (along with Newington, Shacklewell, and Kingsland) that were grouped for assessment purposes, together having only as many houses as the village of Hackney.
John Rocque's map of 1746 shows the village of Kingsland centred on the crossroads at what is now Dalston Junction and the small village of Dalston further east along Dalston Lane. Another clear feature is Roman Ermine Street which now forms most of the western boundary of this area. Ermine Street now has the road number A10 and goes by a number of names, including Kingsland Road as it travels through London.
Around 1280 CE a leper hospital was founded in Dalston by the citizens of London and in 1549 it was attached to the chapel of St Bartholomew as an outhouse.
During the 18th and 19th centuries the area changed from an agricultural and rural landscape to an urban one. By 1849, it was described as a recently increased suburban village, with some handsome old houses, and by 1859 the village had exceeded its neighbour and, with the railways and continuous building, the village of Kingsland disappeared.
During the 1930s, 1940s and 1960s the area's large Jewish and other minority populations made it a target for provocative rallies by Oswald Mosley and the various organisations he founded. These were actively opposed by many local people, together with organisations such as the 43 Group in the 1940s and the 62 Group from 1962, and this led to a number of violent confrontations, notably in the Ridley Road and Hertford Road areas. A 2014 novel, Ridley Road, and its BBC One TV adaptation uses the clashes as a backdrop to the narrative.
In July 2017 a riot broke out on Dalston Road, which had originally started as a demonstration against police violence. Protesters barricaded the spot where a man, who later died at the Royal London Hospital, had been arrested. The rioters threw fire bombs at police and caused property damage.