Gentrification, Class, and Gender: Some Comments on Wardens ‘Gentrification as Consumption’

In this paper Warde's argument that gentrification is primarily an issue of gender is questioned. It is argued that class and gender are both important in understanding gentrification. Contra Warde, it is argued that gentrification is likely to be found in the distinctive locational patterns of particular fractions of the middle class, Evidence from a recent study of gentrification in northeast London suggests that gentrifiers are drawn disproportionately from the second-generation middle-class and that it is within this context that the role played by women in the gentrification process needs to be understood.