I’ve recently moved into South London after being a “Live East, Die East” kind of girl for a few years.

I’ve lived in London for five years now, the whole time being based around Shoreditch and nowhere even remotely out of the EC postcode. Like most, I moved out of home when I ventured on to University. I was scared and didn’t think of coming out of my room until a few days after I moved my stuff in.

I’d visited London a few times, like your stereotypical tourist I’d been to Piccadilly Circus, Chinatown and Leicester Square but never into East London. After a year, I became obsessed with the East London lifestyle.

It was all far different compared to my home town, Leicester. Everyone was far more mature and everyone was wearing black. It was fashionable, not many people were smiling and everything was moving ten times faster.

This was all perfect for my years at University, it was the hub of creativity and events, everyone wanted to be in East London all of the time. But as I graduated from University and found myself working in Shoreditch every day, I began to see its imperfections. It became too well-known and the creativity started to fizzle out into desperacy.

That’s when I started to spend more time South London, it was like a get away of some sort, like a small piece of home. Firstly, I fell in love with Brixton. Although it’s busy and and the endless traffic doesn’t scream “relaxation”, it’s the markets and the huge green space (Brockwell Park) I was interested in.

If you walk 1 mile around Shoreditch zone 1, you’ll be in Bank, London Bridge, Dalston, Hackney Central. All great locations but all gentrified and surrounded by concrete. If you walk a mile from Brixton, there’s Herne Hill, Clapham and Dulwich. All places with so many things going on but with half the population and a lot more greenery. So, when I moved from my small flat paying £700+ a month which had three windows and no room for guests into a house paying £400 a month with a garden, living room and beautiful kitchen, it was a no brainer.

It’s taken a few weeks to move in fully and there are still things that need to be done here and there (shelving, painting, the garden etc), but I’m happy with everything at the moment and glad to be living in a proper house.