LONDON—For those who closely monitor the London art scene, Stuart Shave/Modern Art gallery’s recent announcement that it would move from the East End to Fitzrovia in the West End was hardly a surprise. Shave’s new space, which opens with a Nigel Cooke exhibition on April 25, is simply further evidence that this underused but centrally located neighborhood is fast becoming a contemporary-art hub. In the past year, Fitzrovia has also attracted Alison Jacques, Alexandre Pollozzon, Matthew Bown, the Approach, and Mummery Schnelle. The latter two, like Shave, hail from the East End.

A major factor contributing to the move to Fitzrovia has been dealers’ desire to expand their ventures in terms of both space and accessibility. Although rents in Fitzrovia, a former garment district north of Oxford Street in central London, are higher than in the East End, they are lower than in the traditional art zone south of Oxford around Cork Street and Mayfair. Like the latter neighborhood, Fitzrovia is easily accessible to the wealthy collectors who are powering the current market boom. For galleries like Shave’s and the Approach, who secured their reputations in the east of the city and are ready to expand, it is a viable compromise.

Stuart Shave and the Approach both launched around the turn of the millennium as small venues with relatively unknown artists. In the years since, both have grown in the international market alongside their artists—Shave’s roster includes Cooke, Eva Rothschild, and David Altmejd, while the Approach has John Stezaker, Gary Webb, and Michael Raedecker. Shave says that though he considered staying near his original Vyner Street space in the East End—a traditionally lower-income, more industrial side of town where cheap rents and large spaces attracted a creative class, who, in turn have helped to regenerate the district—Fitzrovia was too tempting commercially. "The move isn't a backlash against the East but a desire to move to a bigger space." 

Fitzrovia, he says, "still feels edgy and slightly left behind."

Indeed, the new Fitzrovia galleries hope to bring the spirit of the East End with them as they move west, and they are keen to carve out a reputation for the area that will differentiate it from the commercial storefronts of the curatorially safer Cork Street spaces, the very galleries that the East End scene began as a resistance to in the 1990s. Alison Jacques was the last of the galleries to represent vibrant contemporary artists south of Oxford, and it was perhaps this isolation that led her to move north to Fitzrovia a year ago, paving the way for Shave and others. Beyond its relatively reasonable rents, another attraction of the area is the legacy of its former staple usage, including a number of large cavernous showroom spaces that are perfect for displaying contemporary art. “Spaces I looked at in Mayfair or Pall Mall were too small. I wanted the gallery to grow for the artists, and I think moving to Mayfair into a smaller space would really compromise me,” Shave explains.

The real draw of Fitzrovia, however, is its undeniable commercial advantage. The chic East End might have emerged as the de rigueur residential and social playground for the creative industries, but those who have the money required to collect contemporary art live in the West End. “Fitzrovia is so central,” says Jonathan Hudson, director of Hudsons Property London. “And though the great restaurants attract wealth, this sometimes forgotten and secret backwater has yet to really attract the big hitters. This enables smaller shops and galleries to open up and thrive.”

For both Londoners and visiting international collectors, a trek to the East End can easily involve one traffic jam too many. Wolfrem Schnelle and Andrew Mummery, who opened Mummery Schnelle gallery in Fitzrovia five months ago, have seen an increase in foot traffic over Mummery’s former East End space. Says Schnelle, “All the collectors that went to Andrew’s old gallery say it’s so great that they don’t have to go out to the East anymore. [The new space] is far more convenient for them and they come in more often.” Alexandre Pollazzon, a former curator at Sketch who has established his own gallery in the area, agrees. “Collectors were tired of spending so much time going to the East End, so they were missing lots of exhibitions there,” he says.