ABSTRACT
This advertisement was placed in the window of a corner shop off Hoxton Square, East London - 'the capital's trendiest area' - next door to the local osteopathy and massage centre (The Economist, 2000). The phenomenon of collective production in 'Marshallian districts' has been evident from pre-industrial artist and craftsbased communities, to contemporary cultural industries quarters in 'post-industrial' (sic) cities. The arts and particular forms of cultural production have exhibited this preference, with the clustering of firms and the convergence of production and consumption and related support activities being practised from classical times; in medieval and mercantile societies; to industrial and late-industrial eras, including the neo-Bohemian quarters of cities. The focus on the historical role and impact of so-called cultural milieu in the heyday of cities has also been celebrated in major publications (Hall, 1998; Jardine, 1996) and in exhibitions such as La Ville: Art et Architecture en Europe 1870-1993 (Pompidou, 1994); Century City, Arts & Culture in the Modern Metropolis (Tate Modern, 2000); Creative Quarters: the Art World in London 1700-2000 (Museum of London, 2001); Paris Capital of the Arts 1900-1968 (Royal Academy, 2002); and the first international conference dedicated to Creative Clusters held recently in Sheffield (2002). This West Yorkshire city, long associated with mining, steel and related manufacture, has since the 1980s adopted the Cultural Industry Quarter as one of the prime elements of its urban regeneration strategy (URBED, 1988), particularly in the declining city centre, joined by a growing list of cities which aspire to identify and nurture cultural quarters and the economic and marketing advantages of a critical mass of activities - both consumption-and production-based.
