Ridley Road indoor market traders fear permanent ‘eviction’ – but landlord says they could return ‘as early as June’

The Shopping Village is due to be shuttered on 31 March. Photograph: LDRS

Market traders from an iconic East London bazaar are fearing the end for their businesses – but their landlord denies they are being evicted, and says they could return “as early as June”.

As previously reported by the Citizen, shopkeepers from the indoor market at Hackney’s Ridley Road are facing being turfed out by their landlord by 31 March – before the building is shuttered amid police reports of anti-social behaviour in the vicinity.

The offshore private developer, Larochette Real Estate, claims the market will reopen as early as June, but traders and campaigners behind them are sceptical.

The distrust has been sown over many years amid the landlord’s repeated attempts to force them to vacate the Dalston site.

At the public meeting (L-R): Ladieswear trader Asli Uygur, Save Ridley Road campaigner Dan Hayward and Green party candidate for Dalston, and Rachel Nkiessu-Guifo. Photograph: LDRS

Many of the 17 sellers are worried this is the last chapter in a decades-long struggle against what they feel is gentrification.

“I feel so exhausted,” said ladieswear trader Asli Uygur. “I don’t even have the energy to fight again.”

Larochette bought Ridley Road’s indoor market or Shopping Village in 2016.

In October 2018, the landlord tried to evict the traders in order to demolish the building and make way for luxury flats and offices. The shopkeepers, many of whom had been there for decades, were handed 14-day eviction notices.

In 2019, local solicitor Bill Parry-Davies negotiated new three-year leases for the traders, who stayed put.

The same year, Hackney Council listed the building as an Asset of Community Value (ACV) which partially protected it from full redevelopment, citing its benefit to the local community.

Despite this, the years since have been marked by a tug of war between the market sellers and Larochette director Guy Ziser.

Roughly 60 artists occupying the building’s upper floors were eventually evicted to make way for refurbishments.

However, the Save Ridley Road campaign hailed a “huge victory” in 2022 when the council agreed to a 15-year takeover of the lease, which was on the proviso that a refurbishment was completed.

Yet that deal has now expired because the refurbishment was never fully completed. Despite Larochette’s legally-binding agreement to revamp the building, only half of the ground floor is finished.

After the partial refurbishment was completed in March 2025, all the traders on the ground floor signed new 12-month leases, but these had no security of tenure and included provisions, dictated by the council, for no-fault evictions.

Bill Parry-Davies said: “This is precisely how gentrification happens.”

He added that the council took a “commercial landlord’s position” in the 2022 lease deal.

The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) understands that at a meeting between council officials, the Mayor of Hackney, traders and supporters on Tuesday (17 March), Mr Ziser suggested traders could move back as early as June.

However only those businesses deemed not to have been “involved in anti-social behaviour” and with no substantial rent arrears will be invited back.

Traders and campaigners met at Ridley Road Market Bar on Tuesday 17 March. Photograph: LDRS

In a statement to the LDRS, Larochette insisted nobody was being evicted but that leases were not being renewed to “draw a clear line under historic challenges”.

“Businesses who have not been involved in antisocial behaviour and who are not in significant rent arrears will be offered temporary accommodation within the building or outdoor pitches depending on their needs until the market reopens,” the company said.

Several shopkeepers deem this an excuse. The police have also rejected Larochette’s earlier suggestion that they ordered for the site to be shut, explaining that their warning over antisocial behaviour and crime was the “lowest form of enforcement”.

Peter Dissi. Photograph: LDRS

Trader Peter Dissi said: “I can see no reason why the landlord can’t take specific action against those breaching their contracts.”

Mr Dissi runs Lion Paw Records, which has been in business for 10 years. He said he told Mr Ziser the traders were being “collectively punished” even though they were also affected by antisocial behaviour.

However, Mr Dissi still holds out hope the landlord will stick to his word and a “good working relationship” can be achieved. If not, it will be an “absolute devastation” for the local community.

“Ridley Road could be like that great sycamore tree those people cut down, which was there 200 years and it’s now just gone like that,” he told the LDRS.

Mayor of Hackney, Caroline Woodley, said: “Larochette made a commitment to me and to businesses that they would use a temporary closure to speed up long overdue investment in the building, allowing it to reopen and for responsible businesses to return this summer.

“I will do everything I can to hold Larochette to that promise, and continue to offer any support we can to those who face uncertainty in the meantime,” she said.

Meanwhile, campaigners from Save Ridley Road continue to organise, as some activists float an “eviction resistance” come 31 March when the leases expire.