The Cycle of Urban Bohemian Communities

Richard Lloyd’s work Neobohemia, Art and Commerce in the Postindustrial City examines the phenomena of “hipster” neighborhoods that emerge periodically in urban areas. These communities normally emerge in lower-middle-income neighborhoods where the costs of living, particularly housing costs, are relatively affordable. A large supply of low rent apartments or rental homes will attract an influx of artists, musicians, actors, and other creative types who are able to pursue their endeavors while maintaining their ability to support themselves financially. Such neighborhoods will then assume a somewhat exotic quality, and become havens for art displays, musical performances, and other artistic endeavors of a “cutting edge” or “avant-garde” nature. A combined presence of creative and unconventional artistic types and lower-income working people allows for these communities to become places of refuge from the pressures of bourgeois respectability. So-called “hipster” neighborhoods of these kinds will then become known for such features as unusual styles of fashion, drug use, the flouting of sexual conventions, and so forth. Richard Lloyd demonstrates how the stories of these kinds of neighborhoods normally follow a particular cycle that ultimately proves to be their undoing as places of cutting edge non-conformity.

The term “bohemian” entered the popular language in nineteenth-century France. At the time, creative people such as artists, writers, and intellectuals would congregate in the economically affordable communities of France that were populated by the Romani people, commonly referred to as “gypsies.” The adjective of “bohemian” was used because the Romani had migrated to France from the region of Bohemia in what is now the Czech Republic. These communities of artists and intellectuals living among the Romani people in France of the 1800s became the prototypes for subsequent “bohemian” communities found in many different places all over the world. The term “bohemian” subsequently became a generic descriptive term for these kinds of communities.

A number of well-known neighborhoods of this type have existed and continue to exist in the United States. Probably the most famous of these is Greenwich Village in New York City. Boulder, Colorado and Austin, Texas are among the American cities that have become known for their bohemian communities in recent years. Richard Lloyd provides the case study of Chicago’s Wicker Park neighborhood as an example of a prominent and typical American bohemian community. During the 1980s, Wicker Park was stereotypical of the kind of neighborhood where bohemian subcultures tend to develop. It was a neglected neighborhood in a state of socioeconomic decline. Consequently, rents and property values in the area tended to be low. The neighborhood then experienced the migration of large numbers of creative people who wished to pursue their various artistic endeavors on limited incomes. The area then acquired a distinctively bohemian appearance and reputation.

Richard Lloyd observes that bohemian neighborhoods are normally marked by multiple identifiable characteristics. Because of their low rents with affordable housing and low property values, these communities tend to be inhabited by a cross-section of socially or economically marginalized people. These include not only creative and artistic types, but also lower-income families and single working people, and others lacking upward mobility but who are not completely impoverished. Because these neighborhoods are in a state of decline, they are normally not a priority for law enforcement. Also, such neighborhoods are often adjacent to genuinely poor neighborhoods. Consequently, crime rates in bohemian neighborhoods tend to be on the high end though usually not to extremes. A lack of attention from law enforcement means that these neighborhoods will often attract illegal subcultures, such as drug users and prostitutes, and become havens for commercialized vice such as pornographic businesses. A disproportionately high number of homeless people will sometimes be found in these neighborhoods as well.

One interesting aspect of bohemian communities is that the convergence of social phenomena that causes them to emerge also ensures they will likely be unusually diverse in terms of their demographic makeup. Bohemian neighborhoods will often be populated by a cross-section of racial and ethnic groups, students and working people, young and old, and varying socioeconomic levels in a way that is not typically found in most neighborhoods. The economic life of these communities also tends to take on a fairly distinctive flavor. Bohemian neighborhoods will normally have a very large number of cafes, coffee shops, bars, nightclubs, live music venues, and restaurants with low prices. They will also normally have an unusually low presence of chain businesses, though some fast food, convenience store, or other commercial chains may have franchises in the area which blend in with the rest of the community. It is also not uncommon for such neighborhoods to emerge within close proximity of large universities, particularly those with many students in artistic fields, as these students tend to migrate towards bohemian communities.

Richard Lloyd analyzes the cycle that bohemian neighborhoods such as Wicker Park tend to follow over periods of time. A declining, low property value neighborhood that develops a thriving bohemian community will eventually establish a reputation for itself as a trendy, “cool,” or “hip” location. This reputation will attract an ever greater number of potential residents who wish to become a part of what they regard as an exciting and dynamic community. The ironic factor that accompanies this pattern is that bohemian communities often end up being the victims of their own success. Such was the fate of Wicker Park. The experience of Wicker Park’s transformation from a bohemian community in the 1980s to a gentrified neighborhood in the 1990s provides a powerful illustration of what happens to such communities as their reputation and popularity grow.

The reputation of a neighborhood as a “cool” place to live, thereby increasing the influx of migrants, ultimately has the effect of raising rents and property values. This has the ironic subsequent effect of making the area less affordable and less hospitable to the low-income artisans who built a community there in the first place. Further, the growth and increased upward mobility of the neighborhood will attract an influx of more affluent people, and the lower to lower-middle-income families that initially populated the area will be driven out by increased housing costs. Real estate developers and commercial interests will begin to take an interest in the community, and low rent apartment complexes will start being converted into condominiums and townhouses. Corporate-owned chain stores will become ever more present.

The presence of newly arrived affluent families or professional people will result in a push for greater police presence in the area. This will be accompanied by a push by civic organizations to rid the area of the homeless, drug users, prostitutes, sex-related businesses, and other populations and activities conventionally regarded as disreputable. The same newly arrived affluent elements will also push for greater enforcement of laws pertaining to the sale of alcoholic beverages, noise ordinances, and other initiatives that have the effect of curbing the nightlife of the community. The planning divisions of municipal governments will seek to eliminate older, sometimes even historic buildings, and replace these with more conventional commercial establishments. Ultimately, bohemian neighborhoods experience a transformation into commercial and residential centers for the relatively well-to-do.

This may be a regrettable pattern to those who value the uniqueness of bohemian communities and the creativity they often inspire. One may also consider it an unfortunate development when more vulnerable populations suffer economic dislocation and displacement. Yet, this process seems to be one that is inevitable. A particularly unique creative style in the areas of fashion, music, or some other cultural endeavor loses its uniqueness and cutting edge nature when it becomes commercially successful. Such was the fate of punk music and bell-bottom pants. Apparently, this is the fate of bohemian neighborhoods as well.

Works Cited

Graña, César. Bohemian versus Bourgeois: French Society and the French Man of Letters in the Nineteenth Century. New York: Basic Books, 1964.

Lloyd, Richard. Neobohemia, Art and Commerce in the Postindustrial City. New York, Routledge, 2006.

Siegel, Jerrold. Bohemian Paris: Culture, Politics, and the Boundaries of Bourgeois Life,1830–1930. Baltimore, Maryland: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999.

Stansell, Christine. American Moderns: Bohemian New York and the Creation of a New Century. New York: Henry Holt & Company, 2000.