The handbags are out over a plan to add two floors to a Finsbury Park fashion centre – which people claim will turn their homes into a “concrete prison”.

Many of those who live near the London Fashion Centre, in Fonthill Road, are incensed about a scheme to add the new storeys on the building, which houses several cut price fashion shops.

The developers want to extend the centre for extra office and retail space, but those living in the area say it will block sunlight and lead to overcrowding – exacerbating problems brought by the new Park Theatre, recently completed nearby.

The application goes before an Islington Council planning committee tonight and more than 40 residents have signed a petition them to block the move.

A 71-year-old grandmother who lives in Clifton Terrace said: “I feel very stressed over this matter as I feel my property will be strongly affected by this.

‘‘I won’t have any light in my bathroom or my son’s bedroom, who has disability problems, or my granddaughter.

“I don’t feel like my home is my home any more. Our privacy has been taken away.”

Another woman, who lives in Lennox Road, said if the development went ahead it would “affect the mental health of local residents”.

She added: “We have already had problems with workers from the fashion house staring directly into our back gardens and homes, smoking out on the fire escape and then disposing of their cigarette butts and rubbish into the gardens.”

She added: “It would be like living in a concrete prison.”

A third woman added the new floors would “block out natural sunlight which has already been reduced by the new Park Theatre development.”

She said: “It would result in bringing disruption, pollution and congestion to an already congested area which already struggles to accommodate the parking of the local residents and cause more construction noise, which has been constant around this area for the last few years.”

No one from the London Fashion Centre was available for comment as the Gazette went to press.