A globally-recognised Hackney cultural brand has been refused council permission to host music events from its “community space” amid uproar from neighbours over noise and allegations of the owner’s “appalling” behaviour.
Gauchoworld, a Hackney-based print magazine and cultural platform “documenting the intersections of music, fashion, sport and youth culture”, opened its physical hub, Gauchoworld Space, in Haggerston in August 2025, according to founder Dean George.
George, who told councillors he runs the business by himself, said his family had helped him transform a former bike shop a short walk from Broadway Market into a “working creative studio”.
The founder said he was “proud to build a career as a Hackney resident and to bring those connections and opportunity back to the borough” after working with brands including Nike, Google, Adidas, Salomon and New Balance. Since founding his magazine in 2018, he says he has supported over 1,500 creatives from under-privileged and under-represented backgrounds.
But the business’s growth is now causing friction with local residents, who complain of crowds spilling into the street from pop-ups, launch parties and music events held at the roughly 40 square metre ground-floor unit.
One neighbour told councillors that “in excess of two or 300 people” had attended some events. George had originally asked Hackney Council for permission to play live and recorded music from the venue between 10am and 11pm, and to show films until 11pm, seven days a week. The application drew 49 representations from residents, one of which was later withdrawn, and the council’s own licensing service recommended refusal.
At a licensing hearing last Wednesday (7 October), one neighbour said the behaviour witnessed when events were held “numerous times during the summer” had “brought me close to losing faith in humanity”.
Profiling
Gauchoworld began as a blog that Dean George started in his bedroom at his parents’ home in 2018. He later launched a bi-annual magazine, and in August 2025 opened a physical hub on Goldsmiths Row in Haggerston. The council’s licensing service told the hearing that the premises is surrounded by residential properties.
Tensions between the business and neighbours from these surrounding streets came to a head during the licensing meeting on Wednesday. George said there was “a lot of like profiling in terms of the demographic of people that are coming through”, and suggested objectors were detached from the young people from under-represented backgrounds that the venue was aimed at. In his closing remarks, he told the panel he had been receiving racist emails, which he said was why he had raised the issue of profiling.
George said neighbours were wrongly depicting Gauchoworld Space as a nightclub, when it was in fact a space hosting “exhibitions, workshops, and community sessions”, with music one part of the programme. The music-led events held during the summer were designed to bring in revenue from brands and record labels paying to use the venue, he said. This had helped pay for community workshops and opportunities for young people, the founder added.
But as the hearing got underway, George said he would only turn his camera on if everyone else on the call did the same, and named one neighbour who he said had called him a “narcissist” on social media. He made his submissions with his camera off.
In turn, locals accused the owner of aggression and hostility, and of repeatedly failing to engage with neighbours, while complaining of overcrowding, public urination and the stench of alcohol and cigarettes “wafting into bedrooms”.
Public urination
“The music, the noise is atrocious,” said John Hirst, who added that he had sometimes encountered “over 100 people” standing in Goldsmiths Row, and people in his estate “urinating against the wall, slinging cans on the floor, smoking cannabis”.
The plan submitted with the application states that there are no toilet facilities within the licensed premises. James Emtage, who lives in the same building, told the panel that the only toilet is a single communal one up a shared staircase used by residents of the flats above, including children. George said there was “a bathroom in there already” that event-goers could use, and that the residents above had never complained.
At least two objectors also cast doubt on the building’s use as a ‘community space’, claiming they rarely saw the shutters open.
The owner did not apply for a licence to sell alcohol from the premises. However, one resident told the panel that alcohol was “apparently being purchased from the off licence next door” in connection with events. Another objector submitted evidence of alcohol being sold and supplied at Gauchoworld events, including their own photograph of a priced cocktail menu at a pop-up bar run by rum brand Mirchi, and a matching card payment.
George told the panel that Gauchoworld “does not sell alcohol from our premises and has never done so”. He said Mirchi was a separate, independent business, that the sale took place outside the premises, and that he understood Mirchi had its own licence at the time.
Prior to the meeting he scaled back his request by offering to restrict live and recorded music to between 6pm and 11pm on Fridays and Saturdays only, capped at three music-led events per calendar month. Asked by Cllr Janet Lee whether finishing music events at 9.30pm would affect his business, he said it would be “manageable”.
Oil drums
Further complaints also revolved around the venue’s association with other events in the area. One resident described music being played from a van at an event in a nearby car park, while another said people had cooked jerk chicken in oil drums on the street.
George said the van event was “associated with me”, but that he had not given permission for the van or the jerk pan, and had told those involved not to play music from the van.
One woman identifying only as Ulla, who George claimed had personally attacked him online, said that as a “young solo woman” she did not feel safe walking to the shops “when people are heavily intoxicated and blocking all of the pavement and the road”. She said bass from the car park event had shaken nearby houses and left her elderly dog, who has since died, “very very unsettled” while it was recovering from surgery.
She pushed back on suggestions of profiling. “Saying we’re not part of the demographic. It’s not relevant,” said Ulla. She became audibly exasperated as she pointed to laughing reactions that had appeared in the online meeting’s chat during her comments.
“This is a grown man,” said Ulla. “And to perpetually act like he can do as he wants is just… it’s appalling.”
Wrong building
Theo Gentilli, who told the panel he works in a similar field to George, said he thought Gauchoworld was “wicked” and a “great idea” but in “the wrong building”. Emtage accused George of hostility and of refusing to meet him face to face.
Another neighbour told the council in a written representation that they had reported George to police after he followed them down the street during a dispute over late-night building work, behaviour they described as “aggressive and intimidating”.
George was named on Forbes’ 30 Under 30 Europe list for Media & Marketing in April. Forbes said his personal blog had become a “globally recognized editorial platform covering music and culture”, with more than 65,000 followers online and a print circulation of 18,000.
Hackney Council has itself featured George and Gauchoworld Space on its Instagram account, in a joint post that called it “a local success story still yet to fully unfold”. George told the hearing that council staff had visited the space for the video.
Though he apologised for “the disturbance experienced”, acknowledging concerns about “noise and gatherings outside”, the founder told the panel that police had made no representations opposing the application on crime and disorder grounds. The police had withdrawn an earlier representation after George agreed conditions including CCTV and an incident log. He also promised to cap attendance at 50 people.
Noise complaints
The council’s licensing service, which had recorded 34 noise complaints from 17 households between February and August this year, maintained its objection. Principal licensing officer Channing Riviera told the panel it was “very difficult” to see how conditions could prevent nuisance while still allowing the business to operate viably, given the premises’ proximity to people’s homes.
The council’s planning enforcement team opened an investigation in August into an alleged change of use of the premises to an events space.
In the end the licensing committee refused the application and the offer for reduced hours. The panel concluded that evidence showed poor control of prior events, but left the door open for George to try again if he could prove that “management of the premises had changed”.
The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) contacted Gauchoworld several days before publication but did not receive a response.
With additional reporting by Hackney Citizen.
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