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Street Feast – the hugely successful company behind the Dalston Yard, Model Market and Dinerama street food events – is no more.

In its place comes London Union, a partnership between Street Feast’s founder Jonathan Downey and Henry Dimbleby, the powerhouse behind healthy fast food chain Leon.

London Union’s ambitious plan is to create a permanent, large food market in central London as early as next year – offering both hot food and produce – as well as running 15 local markets across London across the next five years.

The company has already raised over a million pounds in investment towards this, from more than 50 different street food businesses and high-profile food industry figures. These include Jamie Oliver, Nigella Lawson and Yotam Ottolenghi along with chefs Bill Granger, José Pizarro and Stevie Parle; food critics Giles Coren, Tom Parker-Bowles and Marina O’Loughlin; Polpo founders Russell Norman and Richard Beatty; Wahaca founder Thomasina Miers and Soho House CEO and founder Nick Jones.

As well as providing funding, these names will also offer help in planning and organising the events, and many of them also set to feature at them.

Downey and Dimbleby have their sights on a former Smithfield market building for London Union’s permanent market, which Dimbleby says will be the “spiritual mothership of what we’re doing”. They are also in early talks with TfL about the possibility of a floating market on a jetty on the Thames near Royal Festival Hall. Neither location is confirmed, but the pair of confident of opening somewhere around spring 2016.

“We want the market to have everything – street food, fresh fish and meat, veg, a coffee roastery and maybe even its own brewery,” says Downey. “We see it having both local and visitor appeal. Very different from Borough Market, but in the same vein.”

The market will run all-day selling produce and food-to-go, and will also operate as a street food hub in evenings.

In terms of the local markets – which will be similar in style to Model Market in Lewisham – Dimbleby has eyed-up Shepherd’s Bush, Loughborough Junction, the Isle of Dogs and Holloway as locations they are looking into.

He also urges councils and property developers to get in touch if they have any disused space that could be used.

“London is in danger of being hollowed out,” he says. “It is full of empty spaces that have been bought by investors awaiting planning to build flats. We want to take those spaces and use them to create something both profitable and positive for Londoners; our markets will offer entertainment, employment and a space for entrepreneurs to get started. They also bring communities together by giving them a local hub, as we’ve seen in Lewisham.”

Downey neatly sums up London Union’s ambitious aim: “London is the greatest city in the world, but it doesn’t yet have the world’s greatest food markets. With London Union we are going to change that.”

Visit londonunion.com.

Follow Ben Norum on Twitter @BenNorum

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