London Living

Ella Frears is a poet and artist based in London. Her latest book, Goodlord, has been shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Collection. In 2020, her collection Shine, Darling was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the TS Eliot Prize for Poetry. She has held multiple residencies and fellowships including at the Tate Gallery, the National Trust and Royal Holloway University physics department. She is currently the RLF Fellow at the Courtauld Institute of Art. She hosts Tears for Frears on Soho Radio.

Oisín McKenna grew up in Drogheda, Ireland, and lives in London. He was awarded the Next Generation Bursary from the Arts Council of Ireland to write Evenings and Weekends and it was developed with further support from Arts Council England. In 2022, he was awarded a London Writers Award, and in 2017 he was named in the Irish Times as one of the best spoken word artists in the country. He has written and performed four theatre shows, including ADMIN, an award-winning production at Dublin Fringe 2019, and his writing has appeared in the Irish Times and Banshee, among others.

Holly Pester is a poet and writer. She has worked in sound art and performance with BBC Radio, Women’s Art Library and Wellcome Collection. She is the author of Comic Timing, shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection. Her novel The Lodgers was published in February 2024.

Described as ‘Britain’s brightest social housing champion’, activist Kwajo Tweneboa tirelessly campaigns against poor social housing conditions. In his documentary with Channel 4, Help! My Home Is Disgusting, Tweneboa helped tenants tell their stories. He has appeared on Sky News, Good Morning Britain and GB News, and featured in The Guardian and The Independent. Tweneboa was highlighted by the Big Issue as a changemaker.

Kieran Yates is a journalist, broadcaster and author who writes regularly on youth culture, housing, immigration and politics for publications including The Guardian, The Independent and Vice. She recently produced the BBC Radio 4 documentary Estate Music, which explored the link between music, immigrant communities in the UK and social housing. All The Houses I’ve Ever Lived In is her first solo book.