London’s Pocket Parks: St Thomas’s Square, E9

This Hackney park on a busy road is surrounded by a range of post-war blocks of flats, and you might, not unreasonably, think it was created as part of the post-war clearances of the area — but in fact, the park is one of the oldest parts of Hackney to be built.The park was first laid out in 1772 when most of the area was still fields and only just starting to see developments along the main road into London. It was created by the property developer Robert Collins, who leased the land for