Joel and Mindy Friedman and daughter Malka outside their new home in Canvey Island, Essex. Photograph: Richard Saker for the Observer
Families from the Haredi community in Stamford Hill area are pioneering a move to establish a new community on the Essex coast
By Harriet Sherwood
Two weeks after Joel and Mindy Friedman moved house, all but a handful of the boxes have been unpacked. A new trampoline for their six children has been put up in the back garden and Joel’s collection of religious texts are already sitting on new bookshelves.
A few days after the move, an older couple living beside the Friedmans’ new home put a welcome card through the letterbox and the family on the other side invited the children over to play.
The Friedmans are delighted. “You can hear the birds sing,” said Joel, drinking orange juice in his garden as workmen finished alterations to the kitchen. “Did you see the cows and horses in the fields? We’re more connected to nature here. And the neighbours are lovely.”
The Friedmans are one of seven ultra-orthodox Jewish families who have bought houses on Canvey Island, Essex, in a bold experiment to set up a satellite community 35 miles from Stamford Hill, the overcrowded, overpriced area of north-east London that is home to Britain’s biggest Haredi population.
Their choice of Canvey Island – in one of the 10 most pro-Brexit boroughs in the UK, one of Ukip’s target seats in last year’s general election and among the most monocultural places in the country – may seem surprising, but the fledgling community is optimistic about the move. Indeed, they hope that 50 Haredi families will be living on the island in the Thames estuary within a year, amid a local population typified by retired former East Enders.
Read full article: North London Jews find room to flourish in the wide open spaces of Canvey Island | World news | The Guardian
