Plaistow ( or )Wells, J.C. Longman Pronunciation Dictionary, Harlow, UK: Longman, 2008 (3rd edition)Daniel Jones, Peter Roach, et al. Cambridge Pronouncing Dictionary, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011 (18th edition) is a suburban area of east London, England, within the London Borough of Newham. It adjoins Upton Park to the north, East Ham to the east, Beckton to the south, Canning Town to the south-west and West Ham to the west. Plaistow also borders Stratford, home to Westfield shopping centre and the new West Ham Stadium.
It was originally a ward in the parish of West Ham, hundred of Becontree, and part of the historic county of Essex. In 1965, new boundaries designated in the London Government Act 1963 came into effect and, since then, Plaistow has been part of the London Borough of Newham, a local government district of Greater London. The area forms the majority of the London E13 postcode district. Plaistow North, Plaistow South, and Plaistow West & Canning Town East are three of the ten electoral wards making up the UK parliamentary constituency of West Ham and Beckton.
The main roads are the A112; Prince Regent Lane, Greengate Street, The Broadway, High Street and Plaistow Road, which is a former Roman road; and the A124 (Barking Road), which passes south west/ north east through Plaistow and past the former West Ham United football ground. Commercial and retail premises are on the A112 at Greengate Street leading north and Prince Regent Lane south, leading to Newham Sixth Form College and along the A124.
Toponymy The name Plaistow is believed by some to come from Sir Hugh de Plaiz or Plaitz who, in 1065, married Philippa de Montfitchet, of the Mountfitchet Castle family; she owned the district and is reputed to have named it the Manor of Plaiz.
However, in his book What's in a Name?, first published in 1977, author Cyril M. Harris states that c. 1200 Plaistow was recorded as Plagestoue, derived from the Old English , meaning 'sport' or 'playing', and 'place'. It was a place where miracle plays were performed so it was a 'playing place'. While the book concentrates on the names of London railway stations, Harris could have confused Plaistow in Essex (and later London) with the Plaistow, near Crich in Derbyshire, which is recorded as Plagestoue in the Darley Charters of 1200. Nevertheless, the derivation from + could apply equally to all places named Plaistow, Plaister, etc.
Plaistow in Essex is reported as appearing as Playstowe in the county's Patent Rolls of 1414. This is also quoted by James Kemble, another who cites the derivation from + – a 'place for playing'.
The book Fifty Years a Borough, 1886-1936, The Story of West Ham, compiled by Donald McDougall on behalf of West Ham County Borough Council, leans towards the derivation from Hugh de Plaiz, as Lord of the Manor, and that Plaistow was the Stow or village of the de Plaiz family.
History Medieval and Tudor Hugh de Balun was a property-owner in the area in the 12th century and belonged to the same family as Hamelin de Balun. Known as Balostret in the 1371 Calendar of Inquisitions Miscellaneous, Balaam Street is one of the oldest roads in Plaistow and is probably named after de Balun, though some argue its namesake is in fact a Walter Balame.
In 1353, Sir Richard de Playz gave the manor of Plaistow to the abbot of Stratford-Langthorne. When this abbey was dissolved the manor was appropriated by the Crown, and granted to Sir Roger Cholmeley in 1553.
18th century Daniel Defoe's 1724 work Tour of the Eastern Counties mentions Plaistow as a town in which there had been much new building as well as repairs to existing houses since the Glorious Revolution. Plaistow is connected with the legend of notorious highwayman Dick Turpin. Several stories state that among Turpin's first crimes was the theft of two oxen from his employer, a Mr Giles of Plaistow, in 1730. Turpin is also alleged to have run a smuggling gang that operated between Plaistow and Southend-on-Sea.
In Aaron Hill's time there (1738–1750), Plaistow was a rural village described as a day's coach journey from Westminster, despite it being a distance of only some . The Black Lion public house in the High Street is one of the oldest landmarks in Plaistow and is reputed to date back to at least 1742.
19th century Newly-appointed as pastor to a Congregationalist church in Plaistow, John Curwen opened the Plaistow Public School in 1844. That year also saw Plaistow become a chapelry as well as an Anglican parish in its own right, split off from All Saints Church, West Ham; Plaistow's chapel of ease St Mary's became the new parish's church. Curwen also started a printing business in Plaistow in 1863.
In the 1870s, John Marius Wilson described it in his Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales as a village, a chapelry and a ward in the Parish of West Ham in Essex. The population of the chapelry was recorded as 11,214 in 1861. James Thorne, in his 1876 work Handbook to the Environs of London, mentions Plaistow, Essex, as a village and ecclesiastical district of West Ham parish with a population of 6,699. Thorne recounts the changes to the old village of Plaistow, with the gentry, merchants and others of renown having gone and the occupations of the residents changed from agricultural and pastoral to manufacturing. In 1886 Plaistow became part of the new County Borough of West Ham.
The area gained several new Anglican churches in the second half of the 19th century – St Philip's in 1860, St Andrew's in 1868, St Katherine's in 1891, St Martin's in 1894 and St Thomas's in 1898. Only St Martin's and St Andrew's survive; St Andrew's is mentioned in Thorne's work and, like its adjoining vicarage (1871), is a grade II listed building. John Curwen's son, John Spencer Curwen, published a paper called Old Plaistow in 1891 describing houses of the area.
1900–1995 It was not until 1905 that Plaistow was connected to the telephone network, though it became its own UK Parliamentary constituency in 1918, consisting of the Plaistow and Hudsons wards of the County Borough of West Ham, plus part of the Canning Town ward. That constituency was subsumed into the West Ham's in 1950.
The Memorial Baptist Church was built in 1921 as a monument to the dead of the First World War. Opened in 1922, it is now a grade II listed building. Its ten Memorial Bells bear the names of more than 150 men who died in the fighting The bells were cleaned and restored using a National Heritage Lottery grant between February and August 2011 as part of a larger restoration project.
In 1921, the YMCA opened Greengate House on Greengate Street. Now a grade II listed building, it was once used as an Art college by the University of East London and students included Jake and Dinos Chapman. In 2010, the building was demolished but the grand and ornate façade was retained and modernised; a new block of flats was built behind it.
The area was heavily damaged during the Blitz in the Second World War. The Plaistow North area is largely made up of a local authority housing estate, which was constructed in the 1960s on a bomb-damaged site. The estate used to include five 14-storey 1960s tower blocks, but much has changed since and the area has undergone a major redevelopment programme. The Black Lion public house was frequented by West Ham United football players especially such as Bobby Moore in the 1960s and '70s with several West Ham footballers spotted in the area since.
In 1965, Plaistow became part of the new London Borough of Newham, formed when West Ham joined with the County Borough of East Ham and small parts of Barking and Woolwich.
1995–present Just before the end of the 1990s, a £92 million regeneration programme known as the Forest Gate and Plaistow SRB5 got under way, with the aim of renewing and revitalising neighbourhoods, creating jobs, building new homes and improving many existing ones.
West Ham and Plaistow New Deal for Communities (NDC) was part of a government programme designed to tackle social exclusion, community safety, unemployment and low educational attainment in areas of severe need throughout the country. It was awarded £54.6 million to bring about improvements to the local area over a ten-year period to 2010, with the intention of improving the quality of life and providing more opportunities for residents in the West Ham and Plaistow area.
In March 2010, the NDC set up Newham New Deal Partnership (Newham NDP), a not-for-profit organisation, to continue providing community benefit to the NDC area and beyond, and continue the work carried out over the ten years of the NDC Programme. Newham NDP works in partnership with the East London Business Alliance, East Thames Group, London Borough of Newham and One Housing Group to provide community benefits to the area either directly or in partnership with other stakeholders.
In March 2011, the Memorial Community Church was awarded money by the Big Lottery Fund Reaching Communities programme, to improve community facilities there.
On 10 December 2012, Plaistow South was named as one of fifty areas of England to share in a Big Lottery Scheme grant of £200 million. Plaistow South received £1 million to fund locally-designed projects to improve the area. In January 2013, councillors approved a new housing development of both private and affordable homes on the site of the old Plaistow Hospital. Construction began in March 2013 with completion of Phase 1 in 2015 and Phase 2 in 2016.
Governance Plaistow is part of the West Ham and Beckton constituency for elections to the House of Commons.
Plaistow is part of the Plaistow North, Plaistow South and Plaistow West & Canning Town East wards for elections to Newham London Borough Council.
Transport Railways and underground stations are in the district, in London fare zone 3. Both are served by the London Underground's District and Hammersmith & City lines, which link the area directly to destinations in Central London, including , , and . Eastbound trains run towards Barking, and .
West Ham station is less than one mile away, in fare zones 2 and 3. The station is on the Jubilee line and Docklands Light Railway (DLR), which links the area directly to several key destinations and interchanges, including , London City Airport (), and .
Stratford station is also nearby, to the north of the district, which is served by the Central and Jubilee lines, DLR and National Rail trains. This links the area to destinations across North East London, Essex and East Anglia. Canning Town station is to Plaistow's south-west on the Jubilee line and the DLR.
Since 2022, the area has also been linked directly to London Heathrow Airport and Reading, via the Elizabeth line from the nearby Custom House station.
Buses Plaistow is on the London Buses network, served by routes: 5, 69, 115, 147, 241, 262, 276, 300, 325, 330, 473, 678 and N15. Routes 69 and night bus N15 run overnight through Plaistow.
Cycling The Greenway, a shared-use path, runs through the area. The route runs unbroken from Hackney Wick to Plaistow, via the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Stratford and West Ham. Eastbound, the route runs towards Newham University Hospital, East Ham, Beckton and Cycle Superhighway 3 towards Barking. The Greenway runs atop Joseph Bazalgette's Northern Outfall Sewer. It is a part of Transport for London's cycle network, numbered Cycleway 22.
Cycle Superhighway 2 (CS2) runs along the northern edge of Plaistow, through Stratford. The route runs non-stop and mostly traffic-free westbound towards the City, via Bow, Mile End and Whitechapel.