I knew everyone here': the tower block with 164 boarded-up homes and a few residents who just won't leave

Fabikun lives in a cosy flat filled with personal items, family photos, Nigerian handicrafts, and many houseplants. She describes a community of neighbours in the 21-storey tower block, including a grumpy old man who is kind to his granddaughter, a young couple who met in the building, and a Bangladeshi family with limited English whom she helped with homework. She says she knows most people in the building, though many have moved out. Today the landing is cold, echoey, dirty, and poorly maintained, with steel security doors blocking access to other flats. Only four of 168 flats still have residents, and Fabikun’s is the only occupied one on the fifth floor.

"She is telling me about her neighbours here on the fifth floor of Lund Point, a tower block on the Carpenters estate in Stratford, east London. Next door there's a grumpy old man; well, she thought he was a grumpy old man, but then she saw him in the lift with his granddaughter and he was sweet with her, so maybe he's not so bad. There's always two sides. In the next flat along is a young couple who met in the building, maybe in that lift."

"The Bangladeshi family who only speak a little English. Fabikun's first contact with them was when their daughter knocked on the door holding out an exercise book and just said homework; after that Fabikun would often help with her studies. And so on. And it's not just her immediate neighbours on the fifth floor that Tee knows; she knows pretty much everyone in the 21-storey block. Correction: make that knew, and ex-neighbours."

"Because today outside Fabikun's flat on the landing it is neither cosy nor homely. It is cold, echoey, dirty, the paint is peeling, and the entrances to the seven other flats on the floor have been closed off with steel security doors. Fabikun's flat is the only occupied one on the fifth floor. And it is the same throughout the building. Of the 168 flats in Lund Point, only four still have residents."

"Warren Lubin lives on the 20th floor (one lift is working, thankfully). He says it is a mess at the moment, so he'll come down to Fabikun's. They moved into the building around the same time, in 1997, and have been friends ever since. From outside, it is hard to believe anyone lives in Lund Point."

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